My brother took his life on the 7th of January. I feel like my world has been crumbling around me since. It’s been incredibly hard to talk about, talking about Kyle in past tense is not something I ever fathomed and it makes my heartache. Every interaction with anyone but my family feels pointless or full of pity.
When my mom’s long term boyfriend Zach passed away unexpectedly in 2016 it was so fucking hard for me; I thought I don’t know what I’ll do if I lose anyone else. Zach felt like the closest thing I’d ever get to a father figure, the only man to date my mother and make me feel like a daughter and not just an obstacle to secure my mom’s affection. Everytime I drink a yuengling beer (Zach’s favorite) I think about how he passed before I could legally drink one with him.
I was at an all time mental low before Zach had passed. I wished for death like people wish for winning lottery tickets. I, in a way felt responsible for his death. I felt like the death I wished for had missed its mark and took him instead. My mental health worsened. But I saw how the grief affected my mother and decided I never wanted to make a decision that would put her through that kind of grief again.
But it didn’t make the sadness and sense of loss go away. It just made me try to find a purpose to focus on. I decided that purpose would be my family and their happiness. Cause if I could find my own happiness, I’d love to aid there’s. I thought, 2024 is the year I focus on my family. Get us a spacious house we can all feel safe in. Make enough money that my mom never has to worry about rent, enough that Kyle and Kania would never have to work unless they wanted to.
But now with Kyle gone, I’ve lost a huge sense of my purpose in a way. Now that he’s gone, it’s harder to use my family’s happiness as motivation to not give up. Are they even actually happy? Are we all just suffering silently, with a few laughs here and there? Everytime I had a shitty shift and wanted to quit my job I’d think, you gotta keep at it to keep the family safe. To keep them sheltered and worry free. Everything I do now feels pointless. It won’t bring Kyle back, it won’t bring Zach back. I feel like since Zach passed, I was always trying to prepare myself for one of my grandparents to pass not my little brother. He was just 22, he was still just a kid to me.
Kyle always moved so fearlessly and recklessly, even if he was good at talking himself outta trouble. I always worried that he’d encounter the wrong cop or substance. I was so relieved when we moved from Richmond because I thought, no more cops that recognize his car and he won’t be anywhere near that guy who purposefully got him hooked on drugs. Prayed he’d never overdose again.
And yeah, there was still some rough days since we’d left Richmond 2 years ago. But the past year -the past 6 months especially had been so progressive I just feel like I’ve been blindsided.
Kyle used to be so private. But lately he was leaving his bedroom door open so he could talk/interact with us more. He’d leave the house and hang out with me without me having to persuade him. I was trying to build a home gym for us since he didn’t like going to the public gym and he was excited about the new weights. He was helping me get into weight lifting. We were playing video games together like every other night. We talked about the future and traveling more than ever. I told him I’d get the stuff to start up his GameCube and challenged him to seeing who could raise the strongest Chao on Sonic A2B. He agreed as long as he got to raise his Chao “dark” using Shadow. Feels like we just walked around the mall for hours so he could find our youngest sibling a good Christmas gift. Yes, Kyle was depressed, about not having a job (among other things) but he seemed like he was making his way in a brighter direction. He’d just applied for a grant to take welding classes.
Was it all just the quiet before the storm?
The night before, I had just put him on my phone bill because he had these meetings he was doing for a sales job his “friend” was trying to help him get. He met me at my job and it was raining, he hopped out my mom’s truck to put an umbrella over me cause I just pressed my hair. He told my mom my that he wasn’t sure what I did but that my hair looked really pretty and he had to protect it. We teased him and told him he looked like turnip head from Howls Moving Castle when he shielded Sophie from the rain. We set his phone up, then when we got home he was trying to help my fiancé set up their PlayStation. They talked about the games they should get and what they were excited to play together.
Later that night after we all fell asleep my mom says she vaguely heard him arguing with someone and assumed he was playing video games online with someone. He came to her room really upset and said that “friend” that was helping him with a job was a bitch. My mom woke up enough to ask him what was going on but he didn’t answer and left and she fell back asleep. We found him the next afternoon. My mom realized she hadn’t seen him all day and went to check on him and found him. I’ll never forget the cry she let out.
I feel like that “friend” said something that tiggered Kyle and it just happened that we were asleep and not there to talk him down. Kyle’s had episodes before but we’d talk it out, go for a drive, whatever and he’d calm down overtime. Kyle was impulsive though, I wonder how much that played into this.
Kyle and I used to bicker a lot, it took me growing up and learning the signs/behaviors to realize we were just siblings on the spectrum that had/needed different types of communication/care. But we meshed more than ever recently. But even when we didn’t mesh I never wanted this.
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