The kids aren't alright

I don't really know where to start with this post.. I'm just going to kind of rant without a real plan on how to tie this up with a nice little bow..

Uhm, I used to play a private World of Warcraft server as a kid the game was a great escape from a less than stellar home life and the amounts of social anxiety I felt going to school.
Over a 8 year period of playing on the same server I met a lot of really amazing people, they were so much support threw some really hard times and they were like my family only better.
Around this time last year the server was basically dead with not enough population to keep things going.
This fractured my guild to other servers, different patches and different games; I had lost my support structure and regular contact with people who had helped me threw so much.

Today I had another really close friend die of an opioid overdose. This one has me fucked up..
I dated this girl and I'm an asshole, but she was really sweet. Even though things ended badly she kept in contact once in awhile to catch up. She worried so much about me and it's not till now that i realize it's probably because she related to me; she probably wanted someone to worry about her the same amount, just making sure shes doing ok. This guilt is fucking sickening and I feel so fucking cold from the shock even 8 hours later.

After all the chaos has slowed down it's 4am and I am badly missing that WoWfamily I had.
I have such a hard time opening up, I've already stopped and thought about just exiting this because just writing it gets so much off my chest. It took me so long to feel comfortable with these people and I have a hard time tracking them down just to catch up and not talk for another 4 months. I miss having people to talk to everyday and having them give me awesome advise everytime I needed it.

I hope to find a similar group one day, I know it will take time. I still have contact with some of the people but I need that daily conversation with people I know and who know me.

Break down the stigma surrounding mental health and drug abuse in your friend groups. Ask and keep asking your friends how they're doing. Show vulnerabilities that you have to make them more comfortable in sharing how they really are doing. Care about the people you care about they might not be around as long as you think. Don't take people who care about you for granted.

So many problems stem from mental health, we need better care. Care where no one needs to feel at risk of anything when they ask for help. Where no one needs to lie or downplay things so that they don't lose their way to provide for themselves and their families. Because right now if you're too honest in Canada you're at a very real risk of losing your kids, license, job, freedom.

I don't want to talk about this anymore. But I guess I will post it since writing this helped calm me down a bit and helped with figuring out what I should be doing. So here we go without proof reading.. clicks post