Just recently I had my 24th birthday. The whole day I was thinking about my life. About how much I had accomplished and where the Lord had brought me. I am so blessed. I have an awesome, hard working husband that would do anything for me, 2 amazing,  healthy children who I love with all my heart, a great, supportive family, and so many materialistic blessings also. I thought about my life up until that day and then thought about how much more life I had to live. I will watch my kids grow and accomplish new things. I will get to experience joyous occasions with my husband as we grow older and closer together. There is still so much that life is going to bring my way. It was a great day and my husband made it incredible for me since we had went away, just the two of us for the weekend. I went to sleep happy.

I woke up not the same. The day after my birthday was a good friend of mine’s birthday. I had known her all throughout middle school and high school. And at one time we were very close. It’s strange how once you graduate high school or boys enter into the picture, how friendships dwindle. I remember seeing her a few times in stores shopping and casually saying hello and doing a 3 minute “catch up” of our lives. I had still always remembered her birthday because she, along with one other friend, was younger than me. I had started school early and was quite a bit younger than most of my friends, but she was one of the only ones that I could say I was older than. Silly looking back now how we would talk about it and make a big deal of it. I just remember always thinking of her around this time of year. I would smile thinking of the memories we had of seeing whose birthday feel on Labor day and getting excited because we always had a long weekend out of school on our birthdays.

This year was different when I thought about that day. Kristen committed suicide a little over a year ago. She was 22 years old when she died. I remember hearing the news and thinking, what could be going on in that girl’s world, that she felt the only way out was to end her life? It was heartbreaking! So young! This year while thinking of all my blessing I was distraught thinking of Kristen. She had so much life to live. So many things to experience still. She never had children or had gotten married. She had missed out on so much. It really makes me think of how you never know what people are going through. Later I had found out that she had lost her boyfriend in the battle against cancer. That may have be a deciding factor in her decision. Who knows? How many people around us are battling their own things and feel so helpless and depressed that we don’t even pick up on? How many people put a smile on their face and seem to have it together, yet inside they are crying out and are at their end? It’s truly something to think about.

I yearn for Kristen. Saddened by what she is missing, yet more aware of how we should be on the lookout when someone around us may be needing help. Sometimes it will be hard to see. But sometimes, maybe if we look deeply and care enough, we will see it.