I have a friend who is going through a very tough …

I have a friend who is going through a very tough relationship type of situation highly (but not completely) similar to one I went through some years ago. Now the whole time that I have known about the situation, I have been hoping that she could distance herself from it because I remembered the pain and suffering that I went through in this situation. But you know what? I never thought about all of the things I learned about myself and the ways I had grown because of the hardships created by that experience. I was much stronger in the knowledge of who I was and what I would put up with in a relationship, so when my husband came along, I was completely ready to move into that phase of my life. A lot of times in the past I have wanted to shield my sisters and my friends from the pain of some choices in life that I have experienced. The thing that suddenly dawned upon me recently is that sometimes unpleasant life realities pave the road to growth and learning.