I went through my nihilism crisis a little over two years ago. I was depressed and sad, and didn't see any point in existing. After about two weeks, I realized what was going on - that I had kicked that last pillar of "the universe has meaning" out from under my model of the world. It was odd, having something that seemed so trivial have so much of an impact on my well being. Prior to that experience, I would not have expected it.

But once I realized that was the problem, once I realized that life had no point, things changed. The problem at that point simply became, "why do I exist, and why do I care?" The answer I came up with is that I exist because the universe happens to be set up this way. And I care (about any/everything) simply because my genetics, atoms, molecules, and processing architecture are set up in a way that happens to care.

This was good enough. In fact, it's turned out to be better than what I had before. I love life, I want to experience things, I want to contribute, I want to maximize the utility function that is partially of my own making and partially not.

Getting through to true nihilism can be difficult, and I can see many people not having the ability to do so. But in my case, it has served me well, as my model of the world is now more accurate.