The good die young….

….but why? This evening I’ve been thinking about a memory that’s had me in tears. 

When I was 13 one of my brothers was taken ill and was admitted into hospital. He was diagnosed as having major issues with his pancreas and progressively got worse over a number of months. He ended up in intensive care and was there for a good few months. He was having surgery nearly every day at one point to remove parts of his pancreas, but it didn’t seem to help. He was getting worse and worse. 

It got to the point where he had a major internal bleed and we were told he was unlikely to make it. My family was advised that we should all see him and stay with him as he was unlikely to pull through. This was a really difficult time in my life, as well as for my family. My brothers illness really put a strain on my whole family in many different ways. For over a year my sister (who is older than me) and I had to look after ourselves whilst my parents spent pretty much 24/7 at the hospital with my brother. Of course I don’t blame them for this, I wouldn’t have wanted or expected them to do any different. 

By some miracle my brother pulled through. He started to get better and eventually moved out of intensive care back up to the ward. I spent all day every Saturday and Sunday’s  up there with him with him and became closer than we’d ever been. He was 5 years older than me so you can probably imagine that we didn’t always get on too well together. But him getting so ill allowed us to build a solid relationship that we’d never had before.

It was just before Christmas on the 19th of December and I was breaking up from school for the holidays. My mum picked me up and said that my brother was having a bit of an off day and I’d be better off being dropped off at home than going to visit. So that’s what happened.

Around about 4:30/5 pm our house phone rang. It was our family GP calling. He asked if my mum was available to talk which seemed a little odd as I knew she was at the hospital. My GP said that he’d call back later. A little bit later I suddenly got a sickening feeling in my stomach like something was wrong. It was weird as I’d never had this feeling before. An hour or so later my parents car pulled around the corner and came towards our house. The weirdest thing was my dad was in the car with my mum. He was meant to be working so I knew something was wrong. The pulled up outside our horse and I opened the window to ask my dad if my brother was okay. He didn’t answer me and came into the house and asked if my sister was upstairs, which she was. He then went up to find her. My mum then walked through the door and it was obvious she had been crying.

 I asked what was wrong and she said “Dave’s dead.”

I couldn’t quite comprehend what she’d just said. She then went to the sofa laid down and was at airing into space. It was then it finally hit me. My brother was dead. That’s when I started crying and the reality hit me that if never see my big brother again. I’d never be able to talk to him, laugh with him, make memories with him. He was gone. Dead.

That was quite some time ago now. But while I am typing this the pain I’m feeling now is just as bad as it was back then. I miss him. I miss him so much that it feels like my heart is being ripped out and shredded to pieces. It hurts so much. I can’t remember what his voice sounded like and I hate myself because of this. I makes me feel guilty like I’ve forgotten him, but not fully. This isn’t the case at all. There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think about him or miss him. The only comfort I have is that with every minute that passes I am that little bit closer to seeing him again.

So tonight I’m going to go to bed crying and thinking about my big brother that I miss so terribly and I’ll try to figure out why my brother was taken away so young.

I love you David xxx