Life isn't easy; it's full of pitfalls and setbacks and heartache. But few things, if anything, can compare to the pain brought on by the loss of a child.

Since losing her 10-year-old daughter Libby two years ago, Brooke Carlock's life has been consumed by grief. She has tried everything to cope with it - to somehow manage it - including authoring a book, "Grief Sucks (But Your Life Doesn't Have To)."

"It was awful. It's the most awful thing that can happen to anyone," said Carlock, a resident of Elizabethtown and an eighth-grade English/language arts teacher at Warwick Middle School. "It's the call you never want to get. You know it could happen to you, but you never think it will. What I was looking for was someone to tell me what to do. But there are no instructions for grief."

Carlock self-published her book at the beginning of April. The 133-page publication, her first, took four months to write.

For Carlock, a published freelance writer, the book evolved from a blog designed to handle her grief.

"I always wanted to write a book, but never had anything I was super motivated to write about," said Carlock. "It was much easier to write than I thought it would be. It was therapeutic. I just kind of put everything I was going through out there. I'm not really anyone special. I'm just an average, everyday person putting it out there and being honest. I think that's what people respond to."

A fifth-grader at John R. Bonfield Elementary School in Lititz, Libby Shannon Miller was a joy for everyone to be around. But she was the apple of her mother's eye.

The date was Feb. 9, 2022, and Libby's older brother Max had just picked her up from dance class. At the precarious intersection of Lititz Road and Route 72, the car they were riding in was struck by a truck on Libby's side.

She died at the scene.

"At her funeral, 10 kids spoke, and they all said she was their best friend," said Carlock. "She was silly and funny, and she always had a smile for everyone. She was the kid who would sit with the kids who didn't have any friends in the cafeteria. She was the best. She was a ray of sunshine."

Since Libby's passing, Carlock has started her own YouTube channel, gone through therapy, become a grief counselor and helped establish LiveLikeLibby, a foundation that provides financial aid for youths interested in dancing - the thing in this world that Libby was most passionate about. Carlock has also gone back to work at Warwick Middle School, in search of her life's new normal.

But before she did, Carlock had to face her grief and look it straight in the eye.

"How do you deal with it? Very simply, you don't have a choice," said Carlock. "It's something you honestly never get over. I have a million memories of her every day. I know I have to keep moving forward. It's never about getting over it. It's a constant part of my life. My grief is my companion."

To purchase a copy of the book, go to Amazon and search for "Grief Sucks (But Your Life Doesn't Have To)."