Dear Grandparents,

I knew that it was your time to go after you were so sick for so long, but I never expected that would actually happen. When someone gets sick and you know they aren't going to get better you expect them to die, but you never accept it. That was my problem when it came to both of you. I never accepted that I was going to lose you, I just knew that it was coming.

Losing two grandparents throughout my college career was one of the hardest things to deal with. You're not just dealing with moving away from home and adjusting to a new place and new people. When you lose someone while you're in a strange place and so far away, you feel like you lose a piece of yourself and like you're losing control of your own life. My freshman year was hard enough with adjusting to living three hours away from my family and friends, the place in which I am comfortable. As soon as I thought I would be able to get over being home sick, tragedy hit. Losing my grandma was one of the hardest things that I have ever had to deal with. You weren't only my grandma but you were one of my best friends and biggest inspirations.

After I lost you I tried to find a way to find that missing piece in my heart. It then became throwing myself into my studies and that semester I earned a 3.7 GPA and got on the Dean's List. You helped me do that, Nanny. I knew that I had to make you proud somehow and I feel that I have finally accomplished that. I didn't have free time because every second I wasn't busy I thought of you and that would make my emotions and myself spiral out of control. The worst was I didn't only lose you the week of March 5, 2014, I lost Poppy as well. Having one grandparent pass away and another have a stroke the day after the services for the other, is one of the worst things to experience in a week.

I started to make myself believe that everything good ended with something bad. That all I was ever going to get in life was good things that would never even out with the bad. I would get a good grade, and then hear that Poppy had pneumonia. I became anxious and depressed and all around scared. I was scared of experiencing life in every aspect.

Sophomore year turned into one where managing my emotions and my personal relationships, on top of my homesickness, threw me over the edge. I was diagnosed with an anxiety disorder that year and didn't have motivation to do anything besides school work. I applied to go on a trip to Ireland of January 2015, but denied it when I got accepted because I was scared of leaving Poppy. He became my only thought, but I never saw him. After seeing Nanny the way she was in the nursing home I just couldn't go there much.

Then I lost you the week after I finished my spring semester sophomore year. May 28, 2015 was the day that my world came crashing down a second time. I had lost two of the strongest most influential people I had ever met within such a short amount of time. I lost my best bud, one of my biggest cheerleaders, and the man who taught me so many things that my parents never would be able to.

Losing two of the most important people in life so quickly killed me inside and outside. I didn't know how to deal with emotions, I was just a walking, crying, ball of anger. I was angry at myself for not accepting that this would happen, angry that I wasn't strong enough to see you both when you were sick and angry that I couldn't stop this from happening. I became angry at both of you for your life decisions that led this to happening, that led to the fact that I would lose both of you at such a young age and angry at both of you for not trying to be better for me, not trying to get better to see the parts of my life you will now miss.

I have recently released that anger. I have let go of the fact that you could have changed your life and bettered it to be able to stay in mine longer. I have realized that, as hard as I try, I can't control anyone's life and I was never able to fix either of you. Now, I just miss you. I just wish I was able to tell you one more time that I love you both and that I never wanted to lose you. You both made me stronger, you both made me into the amazing, motivated and strong person I am today. I thank you for influencing me in such an amazing way and I thank you for being amazing people, not only grandparents.

I love both of you with all my heart. I will see you when I see you. Rest in peace, forever. And, as Hilary Duff would say, "someone's watching over me".