February 23, 2012
Dear Brian,
I have been thinking about you so much lately. I find myself again obsessing over all the details I wasn’t able to get out of my head right after you died. Things like our last phone conversation, the last e-mail you sent me, the last time I was with you; I keep imagining what you were thinking as you were dying—were you in pain? Were you relieved? Were you thinking of me at all? What is the last thing you saw or thought before you passed? What did you take and how did you get it? What day did you die? I felt cheated that I couldn’t even have a “day” to mourn your death—all I know is it was sometime between October 7th and October 13th. However, based on the medical examiner’s report, it easily could have been a week. I still feel nauseous when I think about that part. You were dead for a week and I had no idea; I feel like I should have known or felt something wasn’t right.
Just before Christmas an acquaintance passed away following a 4 year battle with cancer. As I read her family’s last post on her Caring Bridge website to share the news, I absolutely fell apart. There was so much going through my head, Brian. They spoke of how she gently passed to the other side while surrounded by all those she held dear as they sang to her, prayed with her and held her hands and helped her to let go. It was the most beautiful thing I could ever imagine. It only made it that much more difficult to think of your passing—at your own hand, possibly painful and…absolutely all alone. I hope you had at least some idea of how much you were loved and appreciated and that your last thoughts were not questioning your worth. You were so important to me and your death has left an irreversible void.
It is so strange to think of how for all these years that you and I were so much the same— we both spent nearly all of our lives in and out of deep depressive episodes with recurring thoughts of suicide. I tried to hide it from everyone not only because I didn’t want to worry anyone but because I felt unsafe expressing any feelings or emotions and I know you felt the same way. Not only was there a robust family history of depression in our family, but we weren’t brought up in an environment where the healthy sharing of emotions and feelings was happening and that pattern seems to have run generations deep as well. There were a specific few years of my 20's that were particularly bad when I thought of suicide every single day. I had a folder full of all sorts of methods I had researched which could implement to bring about my demise should one single day prove to be the one that put me over the edge. Having that folder kept me going—it brought me so much peace to know that I had a plan and I wouldn’t have to endure the pain forever. I tried so hard to talk with you about that towards the end; I shared all of that with you but, in hindsight, I can’t imagine things would have played out any other way.
Truth be told, when I felt like you did, there isn’t a single thing anyone could do or say to make any difference at all. In fact, I’m spending more and more time in that state since you died. I’m actually jealous of you most days! I’m exhausted with life and going through the motions of day to day life. I truly feel as though I’m just getting by when deep in my heart I see no point. Honestly, if Mom and Dad weren’t around I would quite possibly join you tomorrow; but I just can’t bring myself to do that to them as I’m the only family they have left and vice versa. I’m really struggling to get myself to a point where I don’t feel so listless and hopeless and where there is more keeping me alive than just an obligation to others.
I truly hope you are healing on the other side and have found some comfort where you are.
Love,
Laura