This post was one that was shared with me by it’s author, Shannon Weisleder as well as several other women who care deeply about her. It really hit home, not only because I knew well of her brother’s horrific, abrupt departure from this life and had thought many times of how horrible this must feel for everyone who loved him.
by Shannon Weisleder
I will never forget the sadness that hung over me on a Friday morning last January. I had been shopping for my brother’s new rental house. I was so excited to plant spring pansies to boost his spirits as he was starting over. Recently having gone through the “perfect storm” as we called it, he had lost his marriage, his career, a public election for local office and was diagnosed with a mood disorder, a mental illness, bipolar disorder.
I stood in Home Depot fretting over just which pots would bring him the most cheer and recall being a bit disappointed in the color selection of the winter time pansies. Would Pat care that they were burgundy with a little yellow center? Nah.
I left Home Depot, ran to get my garden tools along with the chairs and small table I had to assemble for Pat’s small deck. I thought, “he can have his iced tea here or have a sandwich with the sunshine warming his face.”
Later, I was standing with a group of ladies at school and was a little put off when someone asked me why I was not invited on a trip that a bunch of my neighbors had just left to go on. It actually had not crossed my mind, but it put me in a foul mood, souring the morning of kindness I had set out to enjoy.
I also had recently pulled a muscle in my neck and had been on prednisone all week. Well, that can make you wild and bitchy in its own right! So, I plowed forward, heading to meet my mom and her best friend to finish unpacking and organizing my brother’s new kitchen and to set up his “garden” on his deck.
One last stop I told myself, to the Greenhouse to pick up a plant for my brother’s kitchen. I walked around agonizing for some silly reason over what kind of plant to get…finally one of the sales girls came up to see if I needed help and I said, “Yes, I need something my brother can’t kill.” We choose a great green stalky beauty – perfect I thought!
I drive up to the “rental” with my music playing, happy to see my mom and her best friend, and we laughed about having to assemble this tiny table with a million pieces. They knew I was in a bit of a funk and when I told them why…”I feel so silly,” I said, “but my friends went away and I was not invited…why do I feel so left out?” My mom’s friend came over to my car window later when I was leaving and said, “Elizabeth, let me tell you a similar story. Many years ago I was in a tennis group. I was left out of some lunch or dinner, I cannot even recall now. The next week my mother died and it put everything into perspective.”
Okay, thanks, I said. You are right. I need to buck up. I laughed and said the three of us could go into business together, “Decorating for the downtrodden.” We all laughed. We loved to decorate, no matter who or what for.
The next day I laid on the sofa at my house while my brother was moving. My neck hurt, I was in a terrible mood, and really, I had been to the consignment stores for furniture, goodwill for kids books, Dollar General, Target, Crate and Barrel, and through my own attic trying to prepare a “home is where the heart is” kind of place for my brother to start his life over again. To heal.
When my mom called to check in she was at my brother’s apartment with him. She had just finished cleaning it and having lunch with
him and a couple of his kids on the floor of the finally empty and clean apartment. “Why are you cleaning his apartment Mom?” I was a little perturbed at everyone and everything. Just like a sister to be a bit jealous of a brother whose mama does everything for. She said, “Say hi to your brother.” I was like, Mom, I don’t need to talk to him and as I was saying this he was saying hello. I told him I did not feel well and was sorry I could not get over to move him. He said “don’t worry,” and I said, “I’ll be over tomorrow to sort through your clothes with you and to bring you the rest of the drawers to the yellow dresser for the kid’s room.” “Okay,” he said. I reminded him that we needed to put the rug down first and I would be over with it the next day. Then we said, “Love you.”
The next morning my mom called and said, “Have you talked to your brother?” “No,” I said. “Remember you told him to sleep in and then we would be over.” “You’re right, she said.” She called me back again and said, “He is not answering his phone and his car is there.” “Mom,” I said, “give the guy some space, he has probably gone for a run.”
But by then my stomach was starting to hurt. Something felt not right. I asked my husband to hurry up and take the dresser drawers and rug over to my brother. “In a few minutes he said.” By then, I was pacing and getting worried…”Hurry up I said, before you find him hanging from the rafters.” I did not mean that of course. But for some reason those words spilled out of my mouth. I finally said, “forget it, I’ll go. My mom is on the way over there anyway.” My husband sensed my panic and said, “No, I’ll go.”
I will never forget the amount of time it took from leaving my brother a voice mail, “Pat, pick up, its Elizabeth, George is on the way. He is bringing the dresser and the rug. Are you there? Call me.”
20 minutes must have passed. WHY was my husband not answering his phone? WHY was my mother not answering her phone?????? Panic, sweating, PLEASE GOD, let my brother be okay.
What time is it?? I checked my watch and it had stopped. Strange.
When my mom finally answered her phone, she was screaming, “He is dead Elizabeth.”
PAUSE.
I cannot even explain the feeling of the world coming out from under your feet. I ran out of my house up the street, past my friends empty homes with tears streaming down my face…NO, THIS IS NOT REAL, NOT POSSIBLE. THEY ARE WRONG.
The blue police lights are something I will never forget.
My brother, at age 41, was dead. January 29, 2012. Gunshot wound to the head. My mother found him. My husband was right behind her. She pushed everyone out of the way and locked herself in the house with him and held his hand until the police arrived.
They say that you go through five stages of grief when you lose a loved one.
Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance
I have been through, over, under, and back around and through, again, and again, the five stages of grief.
What I can tell you is this. I hated the author of the book that told me I would find a “gift,” in all of this. WHAT, how is that possible?
The gift I have been given is my voice. After facing something as traumatic as the suicide death of your brother, after setting up a home for him and then packing it up piece by piece, throwing things away, deciding what to keep, donating what would help others, I found, if I can do that, I can do anything. What would I do if I were not afraid? Suddenly I was afraid of everything though. Trauma will do that to you.
This is the first time I have taken a chance to talk about my brother’s stigmatized illness and his public death. And what I know is that the truth will set you free. Love always wins. Good intention, good will, compassion and empathy will get you further that ill will, anger and hate.
I think about Pat when he decided to depart this life – struggling because he felt broken and ashamed because he let others define his character. I wonder what his thoughts were and I wonder what answers he has now.
It has taken me all of this time, over 400 days, to work on my voice, with pain, and tears, hope and courage, to transition into advocate.
I hope my brother would be proud.
