Rebuilding Burned Bridges

We’ve all had a friend fall out at some point or another in our lives, and they can take a toll on us. This column is going to be more of a story with a sprinkle of advice at the end.
In the fall of 2015, I lost two important people in my life: my boyfriend and my best friend. Losing my boyfriend was heart-breaking, but losing my best friend was completely devastating. I had talked to her more about my future, and vice versa, way more than I had ever talked to my boyfriend about that kind of stuff.
We had four years of memories and jokes and hardships built up and suddenly it was over. No explanation, no “sorry”, nothing. It was complete radio silence for over a year, except for me messaging her to try and get her to tell me what happened.
So, one year I went without my other half. It was so rough because so much went on in that year that I just wanted to talk to her about. Fast-forward to last week, and there was just something that told me to reach out to her, after months of not trying. I am so thankful that I did because it led to us reconnecting.
We went out to dinner, then to our old spot and talked for almost 2 hours. It was like we had never stopped being friends. In a way, it seemed as though she just went on a year vacation, and when she got back we just had a lot to catch up on.
Looking back, I am thinking that maybe everything does happen for a reason. Maybe people are supposed to come and go at various times for various reasons. Sometimes, people have to fall apart in order to realize how much they need to be together.
My bit of advice in this column is that if something happens between you and your best friend, and you can’t stop thinking about him/her, reach out to them. Odds are they are thinking about you too, and who knows; no matter what happened between you, they might want to rebuild the burnt bridge just as much as you do.