The Numbness of Loss

[Skayda]

I don't really know how to begin but let me first say that I am so glad I found this site. I know I said the same thing on my introduction post, but it's so true.

I lost my baby brother to schizophrenia, drug use and a loaded gun on December 12, 2008. The details are that he went on a meth binge with a friend and went home to this woman's house he was staying with and found a loaded gun under her pillow with which he used to kill himself.

He had a long history of not taking his prescribed meds for his mental illness and ending up in some kind of trouble, usually for trespassing and whatnot because he'd get confused and not know where he was. My family and I tried everything to get him help and for the most part he was always willing but no matter how many hospitals or whatnot we took him to all they ever did was get him stable on his meds and let him out the door back onto the streets.

We tried to explain to all the places we took him for help that just stabilizing him wasn't enough. He needed 24/7 supervision so that he was reminded and forced to take his meds and not get into trouble. We just couldn't give him that kind of attention. Especially when my sister has three small children to take care of and I and my boyfriend have to help his sister take care of her one year old son and seven year old son every day. To say nothing of my own problems with opiates. It was just too hard.

As I read over what I just wrote it sounds like so many excuses for not being able to help him. Even though when it happened I was about three hundred miles away and couldn't do anything at the time it doesn't stop me from feeling that maybe if I'd tried harder to force some place to take him long-term or something that he'd still be alive to celebrate Christmas and birthdays with.

I did cry when I first found out. I was staying over at my sister's house, (she lives in the valley of the city I live in and I live on the north side), helping her with the little ones when, around midnight or so the phone rang. It was my boyfriend and he wanted to speak with my sister. After a moment or so they hung up and she called our Mom. I didn't know what was going on until my sister handed me the phone. My mom told me that she'd first called my house to talk to me and found out I was with my sister so she had my boyfriend call my sister to tell her to call our Mom.

Mom told me what happened and I broke down, mostly due to disbelief and shock. But, that's been the only time I've cried about it. A numbness has taken me over. I don't know about my sister, I know she was feeling numb too at first and it scared her but I don't know about now. We celebrated Christmas for the little ones even though most of us, as my grandma said, "Would rather crawl under a rock".

I feel guilty for not feeling more. I don't know when this numbness will go away. Last night I had a dream that my brother was visiting us and he wasn't sick, he was like he was when we were kids, always getting into my stuff, getting on my nerves and making jokes and laughing in ways he knew just pissed me off. I woke up angry and laughing at the same time thinking; "I gotta call Mom to see how he's doing...." before I was fully awake. When I woke up fully and realised my mistake and that he wasn't with us anymore this horrible sadness washed over me. I am still pretty numb but I think, finally, the shell of numbness is starting to crack.

We are going to have his funeral service on his birthday April 11. Mom had his remains cremated and we are going to have him buried in April in the plot reserved for our Mother, which is right next to the plots reserved for our Mom's parents. So, our mother and brother will eventually be sharing a plot together but have two separate headstones. I think we will all find closure after the funeral and I believe that's probably when this numbness will finally fall away to allow us to grieve and heal.

I made a memorial website for our friends and family but I'm not allowed to post the link here until I've made like fifteen posts or something. If anyone would like the link feel free to send me a private note, though. It really helped me to be the one to work on it and I know my friends and family members were too.

Thank you and I pray for everyone else who's lost someone close no matter how many years its been or if it was just last week.

God bless!

~Skayda

[GiveLove]

Skayda,

I'm so sorry about your brother. I have a mentally ill, alcoholic brother and an addict brother, and every day is an exercise in being mentally prepared for the day when one of them makes a bad choice for himself.

It took a long, long time to get used to the thought that I had no control over my brothers' destinies, and that they were on a journey I had no right to judge. No matter how awful and sad it seemed to ME (and everybody else...)

Just know that there's nothing you could have done to change your brother's path. He chose it. If you'd found and gotten him into a facility where they forced him to take his meds, he would've found a way to leave it. My brother has done that several times; the last time, he was hit by a moving train (survived somehow).

What you're doing -- remembering the beauty in him, memorializing him with your friends -- is exactly what you should be doing.

Don't think of your numbness as a lack of caring. Your caring is just in cold storage right now so it doesn't get destroyed by all those sharp-edged chaotic feelings inside you. You need to be numb for now - it's nature's way really. It will thaw out on its own time, slowly...try not to rush it and try not to get down on yourself.

When my sister committed suicide (great family i have, huh?) I saw the world in black and white for weeks and weeks. Literally, I didn't feel anything, couldn't smell anything, taste anything....I saw a car accident right on the street near where I was parked where an older lady got broadsided and killed by a huge truck....and I felt nothing, not even surprise really.

It's not that I didn't care. It's just that my heart was just in hibernation. It came back eventually, and yours will too.

Big hugs to you. If you wanted to PM me your memorial site I'd love to see it. I'm on my way to yet another funeral in the morning and it might help me come out of my own numbness a little.

[Impurrfect]

((Skayda))

Welcome to SR, though I'm so sorry for what you are going through.

I have a cousin who is schizophrenic, but he is in CA and I am in GA, so only hear what my grandmother wants to divulge (which isn't much) about his condition. I do have a good friend, at work, though whose son also suffers from schizophrenia and I have seen what she and her family go through each time he goes off his medication. He is, again, hospitalized for the safety of himself and his family and it is only because he qualifies for the indigent care funds of the hospital that he can remain there for months at a time.

She has missed a lot of work, the past couple of weeks and done everything she can but, like you and your family, they are no match for mental illness. It is nothing any of you have done wrong, it is simply too much for any of us to fix.

I love what Givelove has written about the numbness. After my mom died of heart disease, even though I knew she was sick, I also went through a period of numbness. Oh, I cried for days, but I was still numb. I think it's our body and heart's way of only letting us deal with what we can deal with, as we can deal with it...a kind of self-protective mechanism. Dealing with it all, at one time, would simply be too overwhelming. It was 6 months, after my mom's death, before it actually sunk in, that she was really gone.

I, too, would love to see the memorial page, but don't know if you can pm yet, until you have more posts. I'm going to pm you my e-mail address, so you can e-mail it to me.

I'm glad you're here. I'm a recovering crack addict, recovering codie, and "fit" into a lot of forums, and always find support, no matter where I go, here.

Hugs and prayers!

Amy

[Rowan]

I'm sorry about your brother, but I'm glad that you found us. I'll PM you for the link - I would love to see the memorial website you created for him.

[IO Storm]

Dear Skayda,

I had a schizophrenic cousin who did the same in a hotel room in Las Vegas.

It is so tragic about your brother, and I am so very sorry for your loss.

But the numbness?

I miscarried twin babies at four months..my father passed two weeks later.

I didn't grieve...not for a long while. I went back to work. I "numbed out."

It is what the others said.. a self protective mechanism.

We can only handle so much at a time, hun.

In time..your feelings will come..

Many hugs, and prayers.

[Skayda]

Thank you all for writing back. All of your words have really helped to give me strength and give me a better outlook at this whole situation. Thank you so much.

~Skayda (Ami)

[Skayda]

Oh and Rowan, my one year old niece has the same name. Only it's spelled Rowen with an "e" rather than an "a". Mostly we call her by her first and middle name: Rowen Fae together. I know this is off-topic but I just noticed your user-name.

~Skayda (Ami)