They say that friends come and go in life, and from what I have learned, that saying is completely true. I've had so many friends in my life who either I had a falling out with, or we just drifted away naturally. However, I have had a friendship in the last year that I just had to abruptly end. It was quite a hard and painful experience to do, but now that I look back I realized that I made the right choice and I should have done it way sooner.

To give some backstory, I had been friends with this girl for a few years. Right off the bat, our friendship was a huge success. We spent a lot of time together and told each other everything. However, lets just say this phase did not last forever. Yes, we still had good moments with each other, but I found that it became harder for me to talk about certain things with this person without her getting mad at me. This became very hard for me to talk sometimes, and I found myself walking on eggshells around her. Sometimes this person would lash out at me, and made up excuses whenever I confronted her about it.

These things did upset me; however, I tried my best to let everything go. I had been doing everything to make sure that I did not lose this person as a friend, because I did not want that to happen. I made excuses up for this person, telling myself that they only did it because they were stressed. It even got to the point where I would blame myself for her actions and would cry over the fact that I'd upset my friend. At some point though, I did have to learn that nothing about this was my fault, and this person had every ability to control their emotions. This was on and off for a few years, but after an incident a few months ago, I finally decided to completely cut this person out of my life.

It was really hard at first to not have this person in my life. I cried daily about losing someone who I once called my best friend. It took a few days for the tears to stop, but I still felt a lot of pain. Over time though, I realized that the pain I felt was completely normal, since a friend breakup is as painful as a love breakup. However, once the pain healed, I felt a surge of happiness. There was a weight lifted off my shoulders, the feeling of freedom that came from not having to deal with this person anymore. I realized that now I could focus on the positives of myself without having to think about whether or not I was a horrible friend. Once I analyzed my other friendships, I came to terms with the fact that this friend had been toxic to me, and I had no choice but to let her go.

Over the past few months since I let the person go, I have been able to find so much happiness in my other friendships. It's still hard some days when I see this person around or online, but I remind myself on what happened and where I am now. I know that I am surrounded by supportive friends and family who are happy for me, and treat me with kindness. My message to everyone reading this is that if you're having a hard time with someone and you are not happy to be with them, then let them go. You deserve so much better than someone who brings negativity into your life. Trust me, once you do it you will become a much happier person.