Absence is cruel. It’s ironic to be able to feel something so much more deeply when it isn’t there; how much bigger a space seems when it isn’t occupied.

Sometimes such deep emptiness brings us to the pit of ourselves, where we feel so hollow we believe that there is nothing left.

At times, loss is so overwhelming we feel the pure emotion will implode inside and we will never stop erupting with fear, hatred, love, and sadness.

There is no end to it all. It’s like a weight of stones, sitting on your chest. It never goes away. But everyday, it’s there, just like the last, and eventually the weight is just part of the things we carry. We continue on, breathing, working, doing, because loss is a part of life.

In this issue, we delve into the most complex forms of loss; the loss of one another.

The loss of a family member, a person who is bound to you through blood. We are all born into a family, and when that base relationship of instinctive love and trust that existed before is gone, it’s hard to know how to move on without them.

The loss of a friend, whose bond with you is forged over time and built up from nothing, can feel like a bridge burning or a wall collapsing. You feel like you’re falling, you feel like there’s nothing left, because the relationship and person you spent so much time growing with has vanished too suddenly.

Loss in general. To be without is so frustrating and emotional that it feels like you’re all alone, that there is no one to understand you in the way the person no longer there could.

But you are not alone. For better or for worse, loss is a part of life, and so long as we all live, we will experience it, together.