What now?

Before I write this post, I want to insert a trigger warning. I will be discussing suicide, however, it isn't because I'm suicidal. I've recently lost someone to suicide and I didn't now where else to discuss it. So is the topic is too much for you, stop reading now.

For those who read on, here's the story:

Last Friday, I received the news from a completely unexpected source. My brother had died last December. The source? HIS mother. Now that this has been said, here's some back story.

My brother and I are half-siblings, we have different mothers, but same fathers. Also, we never got to meet. Due to major past issues, conflicts, and fights, we were torn away from each other. I was an infant, so I have absolutely no memories of him. I end up hearing different versions of the same story from everyone who tells me, so I do not know which is true. I hear my father abandoned my brother to his mother denied my father visitation, etc. I don't have any concrete evidence other than hearsay, so I cannot believe any of the stories I'm told.

I was nine-years-old when I found out about him. Ever since then, over the years, I've tried everything I could to connect with him. When Myspace was the thing, I found him and we actually talked to each other. Then, one day, he stopped messaging me altogether. After that, every attempt I made was always met with a wall, instant silence. I also couldn't just constantly try because that could be seen as harassment in the eyes of the law and I didn't want that. So I tried as much as I could but was careful on how often.

Now, back to last Friday, March 10th.

I'm on my phone when I get a random message request on Facebook. I was able to read the first part, which the lady introduced herself as my brother's mother. I accepted the request after I read the entire message. This was the first and so far only time she has contacted me, ever. She told me my brother had died and she had no way to contact my father and I needed to tell him. So I called him after replying to her message in shock and told him. My father hasn't seen him since he was maybe five or six years old and has made efforts to reconnect with him but met with the same walls as I encountered. My father fell apart and had to hang up while I waited for more information.

As I continued my conversation with her, it was revealed to me my brother had some serious issues, illness and depression. He was in so much pain he shot himself in the head. December 18th was when he died.

Now, it took this woman over three months to contact my father or myself....THREE MONTHS! That's not right. She could have easily sent at least someone from law enforcement to tell us the news (they seriously will do that). My father should've known the night it happened. I know she's still mourning for her son, however, to wait that long is selfish and sick. I'm angry not just for me, but my father. NO ONE SHOULD EVER WAIT THAT LONG TO TELL SOMEONE THAT SOMEONE IS DEAD! He had a service in another town about a few hours away (where he was last living) and there will be a service here in my town (our hometown) in May. He was cremated I found out.

I have to relay all this information to my father. Why must I be the messenger about this?!

Now I'm doing what I can to get information because she hasn't told me when in May the service is. I have asked and am waiting for the answer. That's the only question I'm asking for now, I do not wish to give her a reason to slam the door she's opened in my face.

So now, I'm in a position that not too many people are in.

How do you mourn for someone you never met? How do you not mourn them after every single attempt you made to connect with them? If we would've met, how would things be now? What if....? I can't get it out of my head.

The more I read his obituary, the more I learned what many things we had in common. The more his mother told me of his depression and struggles, we had many of similar if not the same ones. Why couldn't we have grown up together? Why wouldn't he meet me despite my messages and calls? Why were we alone suffering instead of supporting each other? We suffered many of the same things ALONE! No one else to understand us, but each other. Yet, we were always apart. I only have seen pictures and have the worlds of everyone else...that's just sad. If I can ever log back into that old Myspace account, then I could see our only ever conversation.

He was only four years older than I. We lived in the same city for most of our lives. He has an infant son he left behind.

There's so much I need answers to right now.

There are so many hopes and dreams I had for my brother and I.

So much effort.

Now, all of that is gone.

All I can do now is try to get all the answers I know I can.

Sadly, I can't just fight for myself. I have to do all of it for dad now too. I have to defend him, I'm his rock. I know that woman will attack him, it's a matter of time. She's proven herself to be crazy and even attacked my mother when I mentioned her.

I had to tell her "I'm not my mother or my father, I'm me".

Mom thought I threw her and my father under the bus for saying that. Dad knows I'm being careful so that I can keep the door open. The only person who actually understood what I meant and is proud of me for saying that is my stepmom. I'm disappointed in my mother, like seriously? My STEPMOM is the only one truly proud of me for that. Why would my mother take offense to that? I'm my own person, what the hell?

Mom won't shut up about the woman, dad needs answers, and once again I have to put what I want aside to get things done.

But once I know when the service is, I'm planning out how I will get everything else I need. I'm tired of not knowing. I will have the information I want, I will find out the truth behind all the past that I only keep hearing about, the past that has haunted me and more.

For now, I just want and need to know when the service is....it's been almost a full week and she hasn't answered me yet...My patience wears thin.

So, what now?

I have a bigger responsibility now, I'm the surviving child.

I have a bigger responsibility to treat my depression as well. Which it looks like I found a method of getting a doctor without health insurance, I'm going to look into it and it looks like something I can afford. So I can be responsible to those I care about.

In the end, I just wish we would've been able to meet. I know for a fact if we had, he'd be alive today.

Please, don't ever kill yourself, there are people who love you, even if you've never met them.