Now the anger is setting in. I can feel it growing on the outer fringes of my grief and disbelief. Each day it grows a little more and there's nothing I can do to stop it. In the five months since he took his life, anger has not been a part of my mourning cycle. I've felt grief, denial, shock and disbelief but never anger. Except one night, a few days after he passed. I was alone in my apartment, listening to a sad montage of music while I scanned stacks of pictures of him onto my computer for the picture slide show we showed at his viewing. As the words of loss and pain echoed in the background, I gazed upon proof of his happiness and captured moments of our time together and could not fathom why he would leave us all behind. Why he could leave me behind.
I've never felt anger before as I did that night. Anger so intense it chokes you. Makes you burn from the inside. Blinds you with the tears that flow like a glacier; faster and faster they came until I couldn't breathe. I cursed him and railed at him for leaving. Especially with the way things were between him and me, him and my mom, him and his son. Then the anger mingled with guilt. Guilt for cursing at him and being angry with him. But most of all, guilt for every time I was mad at him for leaving dishes in the sink or eating the leftovers I had been craving, for being annoyed with him when he belched like a fat man without saying excuse me or when he would go back and forth with his decisions: "I'm selling my truck, no I'm not, yes I am." And guilty for not getting out of the car in the Wendy's parking lot and hugging him with all I had and tell him I loved him and missed him. Then turning the anger on myself for letting the memory of staying in the car, refusing to look at him, be the last one I had of him.
That night was the only time in the last five months that I was angry with him. Until now. Over the last few weeks, I've noticed the anger start to build. There are moments when the grief outshines the anger and I think of what I've lost. But there are days when the anger is stronger and more profound than the grief. When it happens, I'm angry at him for leaving, for being selfish, for being a coward and leaving this world by his will and not God's. I'm angry at him for the pain he has caused my family, for the turmoil he has left us in. For leaving his son without a father. He grew up without his biological dad; he knew what it felt like to be separated from a part of yourself and still he did it to Riley. I'm angry at him for not thinking of me, Riley, Jeff, Taylor and mom when he made the decision to give up. I'm angry at him for the consequences of his actions that we are left to feel.
Since his death, I've noticed I've become more reserved and socially awkward than I was before. I don't want to go anywhere or do anything with crowds or interact with anyone, especially those I don't know. I don't know if that is a direct result of his death or if it's a gradual decline of my already withdrawn personality. Getting down deep, I'd say it was my conscious effort of standing "still" while the world goes on without my brother. I don't want to experience life without him so I withdraw even farther into myself to prevent my world from moving on. I want to stay in the cocoon I've been in since December.
I still don't know how to move on from this or if I ever will. I will never be over it - this is something you never get over - but I wonder if this emptiness, this unwillingness to live, will ever recede. Will there be a day when I won't miss or think about him every minute? When I don't feel like a vital part of our family circle is missing? Will there be a time when I won't cry with the simple lyrics of a song? Will there be a time when everyone I see doesn't look like him? Will there be a day when I accept that this is my life now and do whatever I have to, to make the most of it. He may be gone but I am still here.
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