Goodbye's are horrible.

Dear Doll-face,

I intended to write to you tonight about how amazing/awful the movie Abraham Lincolin, Vampire Hunter was, and how awful Amber is for not cooking dinner for us before the last night, but instead I thought I'd get deep with you, and share why excactly Derrick and Amber leaving feels so much like heart break and prehaps remind you that everything will be okay.

Excuse the derp on my face, I was
 pretty derppy at this point in my life.

In the fall of 2007 I started dating a boy who was nothing but trouble and drama and he was truely no good for me.  I thought I was in love, I know now I was infatuated.  When our relationship fell to absolute pieces by January 2008 I was a wreak.

And it wasn't just the break up.  That previous fall my parents got into a legal battle over the cost of my tuituion and I ended up in the middle of it. My father wanted to see my grades and because the school's policy was that no one could have access to those unless I gave them that access, I felt it was unnecessary for him to get them. It was pretty ugly, and really it only got worse as the semester drug on.  Along with the ugly battle between them, my best friend was falling apart 4 hours away at her fancy private college.  She had come out of the closet (finally) and her life was quickly becoming a nightmare.  My closest friend on campus had become an RA and so I hardly ever got to see her (this is actually the year we really lost touch) I was miserable without her.  She had been the rock that held me together through my freshman year.

That boy that I was infatuated with, he didn't help things. Our relationship was always on the rocks, I was slowly going crazy and his web of lies were the only thing stringing me along. I lost 60 pounds in a single semester because I stopped eating.  I stopped sleeping.  I was completely engrossed in the dramatic crap show that was my life.  In January when he broke up with me, (or really, I finally let him because he had tried in Decemeber but I declared that he wasn't a quitter so we had to keep trying... yes I was that delusional at this point.)  By March I had pushed away most of my friends in some haphazard quest becoming a better person and earn his love back (yeah, still really delusional) and my personal pychosis was to the point where the safest place for me was no where.  No one liked me.  No one knew me. 
I was a ball of broken mystery. I felt completely isolated.  Everyone wanted me to change and be "better" but I didn't even know what that meant.

I was in this deep dark hole. There was absoltely no light, no sound, no way out.  I was being wreakless with my body and my heart.  I gave myself willingly over to all sorts of vices, some I wouldn't even dare to whisper today. I stopped going to class, I stopped doing homework, I continued to not eat or sleep.  I obsessed over lost "love" even though I knew it wasn't love anymore. It was insanity.  One night I begged someone to cancel their plans and hang out with me.  I didn't feel right.  My mom had been fighting with my dad, my grandfather was ill, and I felt like nothing more than a raw burden on society.

The idea struck like lightening.  No one would feel the need to fix me, save me, change me, pay for my college, or worry about me at all if I was dead. So I penned a letter that I mostly don't remember and  calmly poured myself a glass of water then pulled all my medications out of my closet. There were some heavy hitting pain killers and your standard cold tablets.

I sat down on the bathroom floor and mixed myself a medley of half of each bottle I had.  There were probably 6.  I thought for sure my migraine medication would put me fast asleep before my body's natural reactions to puke kicked in.  I don't know how long I sat there in the silence on the cold tile. I also don't know how many I actually took.  Somewhere from the shadows I had gotten an idea, that I would call Derrick.

My body started to panic.  He was on the other end of the line telling me he was going to come get me, and I just kept saying no. It didn't matter. He came.
I broke into a sprint, tearing up evidence, flushing left over pills, and trying to wipe the hysteria out of my eyes.  I remember looking down in to the toilet bowl and thinking how much suicide looks like a rainbow on it's way back up.

It was a couple of days before word got out about my brush with death and your big brother was one of the people who sat by my side the day I left for the hospital.  Looking back it's hard for me to remember individual hours and days, it's mostly a blurr anymore. 
My first weeks back at school no one really knew how to react towards me.  It was a slow long process to complete recovery.  I'm still not actually recovered. I don't think I ever will be.

Note how facial hair and hair cut changes
 a wild Derrick's appearance drastically.

So today as I barely hugged Derrick goodbye (he was super sweaty from packing the UHaul) and gave Amber well wishes my heart shattered.

Today I am your big sister because of Derrick.
I fell in love because of Derrick.
I graduated college because of Derrick.

He came when no one else cared. He showed up with open arms and no judgment. Because of that, I'm alive.

Don't get a big head though Derrick, you're still an asshole. (A loveable one, but one nonetheless.)

So today I said goodbye again.  I hate goodbye's. Yours was awful enough (your brother is still moping on the couch, because that's where you sat) but at least we know we'll see you again.  This could be it for Amber and Derrick. There are no familial obligations to them.  All I can do is hope and pray that the future brings us all together again.

I miss you kiddo, doll-face, darlin, sugar, and all of those other names that I call you so often. Let my personal history be testimate to you that even in your darkest of hours, someone still cares, and sometimes it's the someone you least expected.