Author Topic: New person finally ready to grieve...  (Read 33500 times)

Doug1222

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New person finally ready to grieve...
« on: January 12, 2012, 10:24:40 AM »
Hello, everyone. I ran across this site in researching a way to deal with what seems to be a mid-life crisis. For nearly a year, I've been trying to figure out what was wrong with me. I'll be 44 in a couple months, and the only thing I could find was "mid-life crisis". The best way to describe it is empty and listless. I felt hollow. Things I used to enjoy no longer bring me happiness. Everything I found said the problem is inside me and pointed to mid-life crisis. I started looking inside.

I kept digging for the problem and couldn't find one. Everything is great! I went down the entire checklist: job, marriage, family, house, money, etc. It's all great. I have a happy marriage, I'm successful, good kids...the whole package is fine. I kept digging and digging until I came to this: grief.

My little brother was killed in 1995 in a traffic accident. He was on active duty in the Army at the time and on his way home before going to Korea. He was 22. I was in my last semester of college at the time then took a new job and had a fairly new girlfriend. I was very busy and had to just keep going. I know I never dealt with it completely.

Over the next couple years, I kept on going. We got married in 1998, and I took on three, great step-kids. Several job changes. Grieving him was a slow process because of the shock. I think it was just beginning to heal when my dad was killed in 2000 in a very similar accident. He was healthy and 57.

I shut down a part of myself after that. My parents had a farm with horses that I had to keep going. My sister and mom needed me. I had just begun a new job that was the goal of all the job changes. I couldn't handle a knife being plunged into that old wound again, so I put a steel plate over the hole. I remember when it happened.

One night, I was laying in bed talking with my wife. I think I was feeling guilty for not being able to open my heart to her the way I did before my brother died. I was crying. She said something like,"Don't worry. It'll get better." I told her,"I'm not sure if it will. I think maybe I don't have anything else left to give."

I will never forget the look in her eyes. It broke her heart. I could see it in her eyes. She immediately started crying and laid on my chest for hours sobbing. I felt terrible, so I tried to never bring it back up again. We just kept soldiering on...accepting that this was our new reality. I just wasn't a complete person anymore, and what we had was what we were going to have. I had to hope it was enough.

That worked fine until around a year ago when I started feeling the hole. Then I started questioning everything. I made some choices that could be destructive looking to fill it. I came close to thowing away everything I've worked the last 43 years to build in typical mid-life fashion. I got to where I could barely eat or sleep a few months ago. It came to the point where I was discussing divorce with my wife who I love with everything I have. We never considered getting one or anything. I just talked with her to try to figure out why I kept thinking about it. It didn't make sense, but I just didn't feel comfortable keeping her in a marriage where I couldn't give my heart completely. It was irrational, though. We get along great in every way!! Life was still intact, but it was no longer fulfilling me. I seemed to be the only one who wasn't happy with it, so I know the problem is me. It's been a very stressful year in general with several funerals , a major shift in my duties at work, and a lot of other stuff. My wife and I have had hours and hours of discussion over the last few months. I knew something was wrong inside me, but I just couldn't figure out what.

It took a while to track this down, but I am almost certain that I've found the hole. It was left there by my brother and my dad a long time ago. I need to deal with that. Otherwise, I can never be a complete person again. I need to heal that wound so I can open my heart again. I'm tired of covering it up. I never finished grieving my brother, and I never really started grieving my dad. That has to be done before I can move into the second half of my life. The people who love me deserve it. I sincerely think finally dealing with all of this will allow me to love my wife the way I loved her before my brother was killed. I haven't really felt like I gave her 100% since that day, and I want to be able to again. She's stuck with me through it all. She's the only one who can probably help me through it because she was there before. I discussed this with my wife last night, and she agrees. She thinks this could be the root problem. She also told me she'd be happy to go to grief counseling with me later if it feels like I need it. At this point, I've ordered some books I saw looking on here yesterday and I'm going to begin working on it myself. I just can't open up the way I did before my brother until I heal that wound. It's come to a point where that has to happen for me to be happy and satisfied again. It took a long time, but that's why I'm here. I want my life back. It took me seventeen years to ask for help, but I need it now.

I apologize for the long introduction, but that's my story. Anything anybody has that might help me get through this process is extremely welcome. I guess this is a bit on the extreme end of delayed grieving, but I know in my heart that this is the root of my problem. I want to fix it.
Thanks,
Doug

PS: I'm usually a pretty chipper guy who jokes around all the time, by the way. This introduction was a bit somber, but generally...I'm always laughing and smiling until recently.
 :laughing7:
« Last Edit: January 12, 2012, 10:31:11 AM by Doug1222 »

Terry

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Re: New person finally ready to grieve...
« Reply #1 on: January 12, 2012, 01:00:21 PM »

Hi Doug,

I'm so sorry to hear of the deaths of your Brother and your Father. You're right, that not going through a grieving process can and will catch up with you in later years. That is very true. And, just the fact that you've realized that is a step toward healing, both your mind and your body because both go through so many changes when feelings are suppressed and for so many years.

It's healing just telling your story and over and over. Tell us more about your Brother and your Dad, both so young. We're here to listen and help if we can.

I'm glad to hear you have the support of your wife.

Welcome to webhealing, Doug and I look forward to hearing more from you.
(((((Doug)))))

Love,
Terry

browneyedgirl

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Re: New person finally ready to grieve...
« Reply #2 on: January 12, 2012, 01:29:27 PM »
Dear Doug ~

I am so very sorry for the loss of your Brother and Father.  I, too, lost my brother, almost 3 years now.

Welcome.  You have come to the right place.  There is always someone to listen and we all care. 

Come back soon and let us know how you're doing.
Tony Repola 07/20/66 – 03/29/09
I know you are fishing in the oceans and streams of heaven

Doug1222

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Re: New person finally ready to grieve...
« Reply #3 on: January 12, 2012, 01:48:21 PM »
Tell us more about your Brother and your Dad, both so young. We're here to listen and help if we can.

Thanks so much for the welcome, Terry! I don't even know where to begin, but I'll start with my brother. This will probably be long and hard, but I'm glad you asked.

He was four and a half years younger than me. His name was Steven Craig, but we always called him Stevie. We shared a room while I was growing up...probably ten years together. A lot of it was on bunk beds until our room upstairs was finished. I waited a long time to have a sibling, so I was really excited when they brought him home. I actually had a sister in between me and him, but she died of SIDS as an infant. I don't remember her and didn't even know about her until my aunt's funeral when I was twelve. That's when my mom and dad took me to her gravestone. Her name was Lisa Michelle. I suppose that's a whole other issue. Right now, I want to talk about my brother, though.

He was a goofy kid. He was always getting in trouble at school for something, but people liked him so much he got away with most of it. He had a real infectious smile that just disarmed people. Nobody could stay mad at him for long. His main love in life was baseball. He played it growing up and collected baseball cards. That, collecting bottle caps, and playing with He Man figures was mostly what he did. We fought like kids do, but mostly we got along good. I do remember one time when he was running by me and I tripped him. I dislocated his elbow and we had to go to the emergency room. We didn't really fight a whole lot, though. He was a good kid. He just barely graduated from high school because he didn't try very hard. He just wanted his grades good enough to play ball. Somehow, he managed to squeak by with exactly enough credits to graduate. They didn't actually know if he'd have enough until grades came in on the day of graduation!

I went in the Army when he was in eighth grade and spent the next four years in Germany and Colorado, so most of what I know about his high school years comes from my sister. She's a year younger than him. I got out just in time to go to his graduation and took him to Iowa for his graduation present. He wanted to go to the real Field of Dreams. We had a great time on that trip. Then he left for the Army. His job in the Army was very technical, and my parents worried a lot about whether he’d do all right. He worked with satellite communications. He flourished, though!!  He spent the first two years in Germany then transferred for Fort Bragg, North Carolina where he worked for 18th Airborne Corps’ commanding general! He bought my dad’s 1969 Camaro while he was in Germany. It was a show car, and he took it with him to Ft. Bragg. He was part of the aborted invasion of Haiti and had around thirty jumps while he was airborne. When it came time to re-enlist, he decided that he’d like to have a more exciting job, so he changed his MOS to forward observer and went to Fort Sill, Oklahoma for that school. It was also easier to get promoted in that job. After the school, he was supposed to transfer to Korea. I went with my dad to visit him while he was there, and we spent a weekend in the hills fishing. We spent a couple nights in a motel, too. We watched movies there. He loved watching movies. That’s the last time I saw him alive.

While he was at Sill, somebody ran into his car at Fort Bragg. It wasn’t a huge accident, but there was some body damage. When he got back, he put it in the shop so it would be fixed when he got home. He didn’t want my dad to think he messed it up. Well, the shop owner tried to keep it. Every time my brother would go to the shop, he would have some new problem with it and want more money. Eventually, my brother was into the leave he was supposed to have at home before going to Korea and had spent most of his re-enlistment bonus. The crook was trying to use up his leave so he’d have to leave his car there. His First Sergeant finally went to the shop and demanded that the shop owner give my brother’s car back. He gave it back.

Stevie was almost out of leave, so he left right after he got his car back to drive back to Missouri. Somewhere east of Nashville, Tennessee, the wheels fell off the right side of his car and it spun around in the median. It spun around several times. This was late at night. We’re not sure exactly what happened after that, but he was hit by a tractor trailer standing off of the highway next to his car. He died immediately of traumatic brain injury. His head hit the pavement.

People from his unit took leave to come do the funeral service and honor guard. We were able to talk with them for nearly a week. That’s where we found out most of what we know happened with the car. His whole chain of command was there to a full, airborne funeral. It’s all really a blur. A female sergeant who was friends with him told us he’d yell,”Yeeehaaa!” every time they did a jump. They told us he had a girlfriend who was serious. He was planning on maybe marrying her after Korea. We never met her. When they folded the flag, they all took off their jump wings and put them inside of it. His friends from high school came and put a baseball they all signed in the casket. His battalion commander took his specialist rank off in the casket and gave him the promotion he was waiting to tell us about. It was like the entire town was in shock.
It was all just so horrible.
 
My dad was a deputy sheriff. He contacted the highway patrol in Tennessee to find out what happened to the car. They told him the lug nuts on that side were backwards and spun off. That’s why his wheels came off. He was actually murdered by that body shop owner. My dad made several trips to Tennessee to do an investigation of the scene. Eventually, there was a civil suit against the truck driver that my parents won. I’m not sure what all happened there. I lived across the state. I don’t think the body shop guy was ever charged for it, but I do think people from Stevie’s unit might have taken care of it on their own. I’m not sure. I never saw any of them again after the funeral.

I know this was really long, but I never really talk about Stevie. I don’t know if I’ve ever talked with anybody about most of this. Most people who know me now don’t even know I ever had a brother. When they ask about brothers and sisters, I usually just tell them I have a sister.
 
I did have a brother, though. His name was Stevie. He lived next to me for a long time and shared most of my childhood. He was a wonderful, funny human being with a beautiful smile. He had a girlfriend and a life and a future. All he ever wanted was to have a family and to live in the house we grew up in and coach baseball. He barely got to meet my wife. He never got to see my grandkids. He didn’t get to see the Cardinals win the World Series this year. It was all stolen from him over a stupid car. He was a good man, and I miss him. I miss him terribly every day.

Thank you for asking about him.

Doug1222

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Re: New person finally ready to grieve...
« Reply #4 on: January 12, 2012, 01:59:51 PM »
Come back soon and let us know how you're doing.

Thank you, browneyedgirl! Wow...that was hard. I'm very sorry to hear about your brother, also.

Something struck me as I was re-reading through all of that. Part of what's always bothered me and my sister is how good my brother was. He was the best hearted of all of us.

He really was a very good person. I'm happy I finally put all of that down in writing. I saved it. I'm going to start saving some of my posts here as a journal. I do think this is what I need to do.

It's past time.

Doug1222

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Re: New person finally ready to grieve...
« Reply #5 on: January 12, 2012, 02:40:10 PM »
Here's another example of my brother that I just thought of. My mom told me about this after he died.

We grew up in a rural Missouri town that was pretty much all white. It was just a fact of life. Racism was still pretty prevalent...ingrained is probably a better word. It's just how things were. That's not how my family was because my mom grew up in south St. Louis, but it really is how the town was. She wouldn't tolerate it out of us. It was all around us, though.

Well, Stevie came home on leave after Germany. We lived a block away from a church where we attended and just hung out. They had a big parking lot where we'd ride bikes or play basketball. Stevie was looking for something to do in between baseball games, so he walked over to shoot some hoops at the church lot.

A black family had moved into town while he was in Germany. Obviously, they weren't probably real comfortable in an all white, racist town. They kept to themselves. One of the kids was over at the church lot shooting a basketball all by himself. My mom said he was always over there by himself playing.

Stevie walked over, stole the ball, and shot a basket.

My mom was watching through the bathroom window. She said he didn't hesitate. He just started joking with the kid and playing ball. The kid stood there in shock, but within minutes they were laughing and playing a game. All he saw was a kid playing ball. He didn't see the "new black kid". He just saw a human being who liked to play ball, and he liked people who liked to play ball. If the kid liked playing ball, they were friends. He invited the kid over to the house for supper that night. They ended up hanging out for the rest of the time he was home. It was like they'd been friends forever.

She said that was the first time she saw that kid when he wasn't alone.

That's who my brother was.
« Last Edit: January 12, 2012, 05:36:45 PM by Doug1222 »

Doug1222

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Re: New person finally ready to grieve...
« Reply #6 on: January 12, 2012, 06:10:07 PM »
I'm going to let all of this sink in for a while. If anybody has any questions or anything, please ask. The books I ordered will be here on 1-21! I just got that e-mail today.

Once I get a chance to process these posts about my brother, I'll tell you a bit about my dad. I need time to think about this, though. Saying that stuff about Stevie was very emotional for me. I'm going to share it with my wife when she gets home, actually.

I still have more to say, I'm sure. I'll add things as I think of them. I think the next thing will be introducing my dad, though.

Thank you. Anybody who has anything to say, feel perfectly free to do it. Questions about any of this are welcome. It's a lot to take in. Part of the reason I generally don't talk about all this is that it's all so unbelievable. People were telling us at the time. It almost feels like I'm making it up. It's all real, though. Please, if you have any questions, ask. It will help me to fill in blanks. It's a whole lot to take in.

It was a lot to live!
 :laughing6:

Edit: My wife just read what I wrote earlier and cried. I definitely think discussing this will help.
« Last Edit: January 12, 2012, 08:54:02 PM by Doug1222 »

Doug1222

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Re: New person finally ready to grieve...
« Reply #7 on: January 13, 2012, 06:57:36 AM »
Ok, everybody. This will be another long one to introduce my dad.

My dad was also named Doug. I’m a Junior. He was from the St. Louis area and lived at different times in the city or in the country south of St. Louis. He came from a big family and was seventh of twelve kids, I think. He was a fighter growing up by all accounts, but my aunts and uncles always tell me he almost never got in trouble because he was my grandpa’s “favorite”. He dropped out of school when he was seventeen because he was going to a bad school in south St. Louis. He went in the Army in 1959 and became a medic. He was in the Army until 1965 and spent three years of it in Germany. He got a GED while he was in the Army. He also did some amateur boxing while he was in and was quite good. He fought at 117 pounds. He was real skinny until he got older.
 
After the Army, he married my mom when she was sixteen and he was twenty-three. They had me a few years later. He was a welder, woodworker, and a lot of other things until the mid-seventies. He made good money as a welder in the city, but he cut his arm real bad at work and had to quit doing that. It was paralyzed for quite a while and took years of physical therapy to work right again. We moved to the country when I was little. It was not long after my sister died. We raised pigs. Right after Jimmy Carter got elected, we moved to a little town where my dad worked in a factory. He became a deputy sheriff not too long after we moved to town and spent the next twenty years doing that.
 
My dad was a good guy. He had some problems with drinking when he was young, but quit that by time I was in school. He smoked until one day when he couldn’t find his lighter. That day he quit that, too. He had a tremendous amount of willpower. He always worked hard and loved his family. My mom and dad bought a farm down by where I live right before my brother died. After that happened, it became his escape. He spent a lot of time down here working on a fence. He took out his grief and anger on that split rail fence. He built it all by hand, and it took months. I’d go over and help him after work. We spent a lot of time together during that time. We also hunted together. Every year from when I was twelve until he died, we deer hunted together. I took leave during deer season when I was in the Army.
 
He was never the same after my brother died.

I spent the day before he died with my dad. We worked on a shed he was fixing up. Then we watched “To Hell and Back” with Audie Murphy. We mostly just sat around together. We were the only two men left in our family, and spending time together was important. I had just taken a job with the feds, and he was real proud. I had him fill out some paperwork to tour the place where I work. My wife and he were scheduled for a family tour in June. He worked in a jail for a long time at the sheriff’s department, and I work in a prison. He always wanted to go through where I work, and my wife was a criminal justice minor in college at the time. She was excited to get to go through it with him. I said goodbye and drove home.

The next day at work, my wife called and told me her ex-husband had been assaulted and might die. He was in ICU. He was the biological dad of our kids, so it was an entire family emergency. I went and spent the whole evening at the hospital with her. When we got home, there was a message from my mom on the phone to call her. It sounded just like the message from when my brother got killed. I called her even though it was around two in the morning. She told me my dad had been killed on the way home from the farm. He purposely ran his car out of gas because he wanted to know if the gas gauge worked right. He suspected it wasn’t working right, so he ran it dead just to see. He told her on the phone that was going to do it. He wasn’t in a hurry, so it was a good time. It was also a pretty day for February. It ran out near a town on the way, so he parked it on the side of the interstate. He walked into town with the gas can. As he was walking back on the service road, a woman picked him up to give him a lift. She pulled over on the service road to let him out by his car, and another woman ran right into the back of them. It was apparently while he was stepping out of the car. He was killed instantly and the woman who gave him a lift was injured pretty badly.

It was the day before my mom and dad’s thirty-fourth anniversary.

Rather than go through the aftermath now, I’m going to leave my dad’s introduction there. The aftermath was extensive and I’m really only dealing with some of it now. It’s better to save that for later in chunks. These posts are awfully long, but it seemed necessary. Anybody who has questions or things to say, please do. That’ll make it a lot easier for me to know what to say. Thank you for the chance to tell you about all of this. By the way, my wife’s ex-husband spent the next couple months in a coma and on life support. He eventually died in April.
« Last Edit: January 13, 2012, 10:10:00 AM by Doug1222 »

Doug1222

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Re: New person finally ready to grieve...
« Reply #8 on: January 14, 2012, 11:49:17 AM »
I'll try to wait for questions or comments to write more. Doing this part was helpful, but it stirred up a lot of other thoughts. I'm not sure what else to write.

If anybody has any questions, I can answer them. The whole thing is a lot to take in. That might help me organize it all.

I shared what I've written so far with my wife. She told me there was a lot of that she didn't even know. I do think this process is going to be very helpful. Thank you again for giving me a place to sort all this out. I need to do that.
Doug

Terry

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Re: New person finally ready to grieve...
« Reply #9 on: January 14, 2012, 01:25:17 PM »

This is great, Doug that you've been able to conjure up these memories and share them in such detail and with such obvious love for your brother, Stevie and for your Dad. What a great kid and with a promising future.
Your Dad instilled your strong will, it would seem with also, many wonderful qualities. How blessed you were to have had the love of these two wonderful men in your life. Now, you're sifting through the memories, and you're right that it does stir up a lot of feelings and can be very difficult and this is what we call "grief work" but it's so very important for our healing process. For a long time, Doug I did not understand the meaning of "grief work" as it was explained to me. It took a lot of time and patience with me. It's what you're doing, facing/dealing with every memory, regardless of how painful and you have my support while working so hard for you and for your wife.

Take it slowly. And, take it from someone who 'didn't' take it slowly and ended up having a meltdown as my brain and also my heart were on overload. You've shared a lot here. Process it, slowly. Have you started journal-ling yet? Very important and helpful especially where you are right now. Go out and buy yourself a big theme tablet or a journal and what I did was, write down the memory and the feelings I had along with the ones I was having difficulty with. Then leave yourself about ten blank pages after each memory/event to later go back and reflect and continuously add to it as other feelings will be cropping up. You can be sure of that. It's ongoing. It's healthy and it's rewarding. It's a very long and difficult process. And, we're all worth it because the time will come when peace will fill our hearts and a joy that we only dreamed of.

Again, I am so glad that you and your wife are working this out in such a healthy manner. It will take time, but you are on the right path, Doug and you have all the tools.

I really enjoy reading the stories about these two great guys and getting to know them better.

Keep sharing. I'm listening.

Love,
Terry

laurenE

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Re: New person finally ready to grieve...
« Reply #10 on: January 14, 2012, 03:08:54 PM »
Welcome Doug,

Its great to see you plow through your grief, at long last.  You will find great healing from your writing.  You write well.   I can feel the emotion as I read. Great job.
Thanks for letting us into your life and getting to know your dad and brother. I'm so sorry that they're gone. Life sure doesnt make a whole lot of sense sometimes.  But have faith. You'l lfind your way through.  I know this b/c you are working so hard at it.  You want it.

Sometimes when we attend another funeral, even yrs later,  it can bring up our own loss and grief.  I remember going to a coworkers brothers funeral and sobbing like a child b/c he left behind 2 small children.   I had never even met the guy.  After some reflecting later,  I realized the little girl inside of me was sobbing for her own father who had died some 20yrs prior,  when I was barely 12.  Obviously I had some more grieving that I had to finish up that day.  And so I did.  :)

Keep writing.  Its what healed me from the sudden loss of my mother 9 1/2 yrs ago.  That and my strong faith in God. 

laurenE

Doug1222

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Re: New person finally ready to grieve...
« Reply #11 on: January 15, 2012, 12:39:01 PM »
Keep sharing. I'm listening.

Love,
Terry

Thank you, Terry!

Doug1222

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Re: New person finally ready to grieve...
« Reply #12 on: January 15, 2012, 12:53:22 PM »
Sometimes when we attend another funeral, even yrs later,  it can bring up our own loss and grief.
laurenE

Hi, Lauren! I've found that certain funerals hit me really hard.

I had a coworker killed in Afghanistan back around 2004 or 2005. He was a young guy around thirty with a wife and small kids. I work in a federal prison, so we had a huge memorial service for him. It was a law enforcement memorial. Twenty-one gun salutes always hit me as well as Taps for obvious reasons. My brother and my dad both had that. That's wasn't the problem, though. It was his wife and kids. After the service, there was a receiving line after the service where we all walked through to give his wife our condolences. She looked so young and in shock. Their little kids were standing there holding the flag.  

When I shook her hand, I nearly collapsed. I squeaked out that I was very sorry for her and had to walk outside and sob. It was one of the hardest services I've ever been to. I'd never met her before and didn't really know her husband. He got deployed right after he started. It was just that I could see what they were going through in their eyes. I could see us in her eyes. They also do a thing called "last call" when we have services at work. The dispatcher in control center calls for them on the radio three times. It's a law enforcement thing. That always makes me upset because they did it at my dad's funeral.

We've had a lot of deaths this year. One of my closest uncles died of lung cancer about August or September. Then my daughter's mother in law died of breast cancer the end of September. My wife's cousin had a husband who died suddenly around September or October. He was real young, too.

I think all of those funerals so close together probably accelerated my crisis. I felt like everything was falling apart by November...with no real explanation at that time. It took since then to dig down and find a source. I'm glad to finally be dealing with it.

Thanks, everybody!
« Last Edit: January 18, 2012, 06:21:48 AM by Doug1222 »

Doug1222

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Re: New person finally ready to grieve...
« Reply #13 on: January 16, 2012, 04:17:45 PM »
One of the things that has always bothered me about my brother was that he never asked us for help. I talked with him on the phone just a few weeks before he came home. He didn't say anything at all about a problem going on down there. We just chatted. He joked around about the women in Oklahoma. It was just brother stuff. He thanked me for coming down to see him.

I had a cousin who murdered her mom right before then. (It was a real high profile case. She stabbed her mom and she was the youngest person ever certified as an adult in our state at the time.) He said,"Maybe Kim had too much OJ!" It was right after the O.J. Simpson murders. We laughed about that. He asked how my wife (girlfriend at the time) and the kids were doing.

We just talked about stuff. We didn't talk a bit about all the problems he was having with the car. I didn't have a clue or we would have helped him. It was going on at that time, but we didn't know that until the funeral. I guess he wanted to show that he was an adult...that he could handle his own problems.

It's always bothered me that he didn't ask for help.

Doug1222

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Re: New person finally ready to grieve...
« Reply #14 on: January 17, 2012, 10:39:44 AM »
Hi, everyone!

I'm cleaning guns today. My dad collected guns among a lot of other things. He grew up in a big family and never had much, so he liked to collect things. It was in his obituary that he was a "collector of fine collectibles". He had comics, tin toys, beer steins, nice books, little toys, antique musical intruments...just a bunch of stuff.

Anyway, the guns were originally supposed to go to my brother and me. After my brother, they all were supposed to go to me. I finally brought them all to my house when we moved to our current house in 2005 and consolidated his with mine. I put as many as I could in my gun cabinet in the den, but I ended up buying a gun safe for the rest of them and hiding it in our bedroom closet. My wife accidentally put a bunch of stuff in front of the door, so I couldn't get it open for a long time. She got that area cleaned out this weekend, and I can open it.

I'm taking them out one at a time and cleaning them today.
« Last Edit: January 17, 2012, 03:08:01 PM by Doug1222 »