My Heart Hurts

I learned that a woman I love passed away today from breast cancer. She was such a good person and treated me with so much kindness. I loved to be around her and her vibrant spirit. Her daughter and I served together in YW and then in Primary. She was our in-service leader for Primary and I always enjoyed her lessons. She loved to laugh and whenever she entered the room it brightened just from her presence. I will miss her.

I get the whole mortality thing, that we all have a time to live and a time to die, but that doesn't make it any easier when someone you love leaves mortality. I still miss my father, mother, grandparents, sister-in-law, and friends that have passed away. I guess it's meant to be that way. Maybe it's how we feel in the pre-existence when others are born into mortality.

Death is as much a part of the plan as birth. Mortality is a probationary, temporary time of testing to see if we'll choose to follow the Savior. How we live in mortality determines how we'll live in eternity. I have a testimony of this and of the plan. I have no doubt that my friend is in a better place and she no longer suffers from her physical afflictions.

But today my heart hurts.