You recognize this when you don't see your best friend every week

Once I told her: ‘I think we shouldn't see each other for a day tomorrow.’ I meant it half-heartedly. But we had already spent every day together for about three weeks. Including nights of sleeping over.

We talked the same. Laughed the same. Said the same things at the same time and moved the same. It got a bit crazy, for others that is, we found it incredibly fun. Us against the rest.

We had too much time, too much to discuss and too much to do together. We always went to other people's parties together. Each other's plus-one to work drinks. Drinks, terraces, coffees, lunches, working together, cycling together, sleeping over together. A wonderful carefree time in which men, cats, an automatic vacuum cleaner and sitting on the couch seemed far away. A time when the pub on the corner was ‘our regular’ and where we always had to go, even if we didn't feel like it. Yes, a best friend is someone to cherish. Even after times like these together.

Because lives change and so you grow from phase to phase. Suddenly you both have a serious adult job and you no longer have time for all those coffees. Let alone for that regular pub, which by the way has long been closed and turned into a place where you can pick up disgusting sushi. You're busy and she is even busier. You have to get used to that. You don't see each other every week anymore, unfortunately. Let alone three weeks in a row every day. Change is beautiful, but sometimes it's a bit hard to swallow.

Everyone recognizes this who occasionally has to miss their bestie:

• It's like old times again after ten seconds, when you finally see each other again after a month or so.
• You immediately shout that a new date needs to be scheduled. Right now. Just set that date.
• At every appointment too much wine is drunk because hey, you don't see each other that often anymore.
• You have annual traditions that you always go to together. The first Saturday in August is the barbecue at her place, at the end of August always a night together at a spa, in September three days in Spain... That's set and no one can come between that.
• You laugh more than you talk when you see each other. You know each other so well.
• You reminisce and keep repeating the golden stories from back then. Wonderful to think back.
• You tell each other all the new secrets of life and you can really thrive on that in the weeks without each other. It's always delicious, all that gossip.
• You don't text her a day later that you miss her again, but you do miss her.
• You know she'll still be there for you in eighteen years. And you know that distance, growing up, and getting older doesn't matter. That makes you happy. She makes you happy.