So, I havenโt added an entry to my blog in quite some time. Life has gotten busy and thatโs okay. I am still sober and still in recovery. However, I felt the need to write about a recent tragedy in my family. About what it has taught me about myself and my relationships with those closest to me.
My cousin recently killed herself. She was 41 years old and had 4 kids. The devastation brought forth by her suicide is incalculable. Her children are now and forever without a mother, and her own mother, my aunt, is now faced with every parents greatest fear; burying a child. Itโs a tragedy in a long string of tragedies my family has had to endure. The weight of that pain, the pressure it yields, has begun to crush us.
Her death is reminiscent of another suicide committed by another cousin around 15 years ago. The means in which both people used to end their lives is similar. However, I was in a very different place the first time this happened. When I had received the news 15 years ago of my young cousinโs death, I was drinking heavily and had begun my decent into full blown alcoholism. The news was shocking. I was barely able to make any sense of it. From what I could gather, others in my family felt the same way. Of course, I couldnโt know for sure because after hearing the news, I isolated myself from the family. I ducked phone calls from my parents and other family members, and when it came time to go to the funeral, I made up an excuse to not go.
I regret that now. Although I regret it, I understand why I chose not to go. I do not remember the excuse I cooked up to get out of going, but the truth is, I couldnโt bear to look at the familial pain. Not only was I uncomfortable with seeing others in emotional distress, I was petrified of catching my own reflection in the faces of my family members. I was afraid of seeing how broken I had become. Afraid of the accumulation of unresolved fears, defeats, disappointments, and shame that filled my heart to capacity, and what would happen if that dam were to break.
So I stayed home and drank away that pain, refusing to look at the parts of myself that would and could hold a gun to my own head and pull the trigger. Just another piece of suffering stuffed deep down on top of other suffering.
In getting sober, I have begun the process of self-realization. Iโve begun to open Pandoraโs Box, so to speak. It hasnโt been nearly as bad as I thought it would be, but it hasnโt been easy either. When I look back on my cousinโs suicide, some 15 years ago, I knew why he did it. He was a heavy drinker like most people in my family. Drinking keeps you trapped. Itโs a prison cell. As long as you rely on it to keep you comfortable, you will never move forward in the way you hope to. It traps you in amber on the inside but on the outside it ages and hardens you.
I hated myself, and chances are, my cousin felt the same way. I get why he did it. – I wish he hadnโt, but I get it. It changed the family forever and left a stain on all of us that will never wash out. Had he been able to see what this had done to the family, maybe he wouldnโt have done it. But I know he was trapped and all he could see is how much he hated himself.
Hearing the recent news of my cousinโs death is no less heartbreaking. Former tragedy does not lessen the pain, but compounds it when you have not let yourself process any of it.
However, this time I did not run away. I did not isolate myself. I called people to check in with them. Whenever the pain surfaces, I have let myself feel it. I have asked questions. I have let myself be angry, confused and hurt. But in this allowance I have seen my reflection in ways I did not anticipate.
For instance, my aunt, whose daughter killed herself, has decided to not hold a funeral, but only a small memorial for her immediate family. Similarly, before I had gotten sober I lost an uncle to drinking. His death was so traumatic that we never held a service for him โ not until my grandmother died about 9 months later. We literally did a two for one. At the time I understood the decision. I had been with my uncle at the end and it was terrible. He died in my grandmotherโs home where she herself was in poor health and battling dementia.
There were other forms of chaos going on with the family at the moment so when my uncle died, per his wishes, a service was never performed for him. For the first time that I can remember, the family never came together to mourn the passing of a beloved member. When my grandmother died months later her service was simple and no one from the extended family was invited to attend, never mind that my grandmother was the last of her birth family. All of her brothers and sisters had passed.
I understood the choice to not hold a service for my uncle or to not make a fuss for my grandmother’s passing. For the first time in my life I had played an active role in supporting the family at a time of need and it was overwhelming. In my little chaotic life as a heavy drinker, I just wanted it all to end so I could go back to closing my eyes to lifeโs unending tragedies.
So to see that we are carrying on a new tradition in my family where we isolate from one another in the name of the deceased โwishesโ is depressing. Again, I understand why this is. I am not alone in spending the majority of my life running from my emotions. However, by refusing to come together and to mourn together, we rob ourselves of closure. We rob ourselves of a pathway to healing.
I spent my entire life doing that, and I donโt want that for myself anymore. I do not want that for my family. A good friend of mine in recovery mentioned to me that a memorial could still be held for my cousin here in California. This is true. However, the family will be without my cousinโs sisters, mother and children.
I guess the point of this post is to highlight that in sobriety, you get the chance to realize that life is meant to be lived in the moment. You will not always do the right thing in that moment, but life is better when it is faced head on. Tragedy is something we all have to face, and sobriety is making me realize I am much stronger than I had given myself credit for. I hope to show my family that they too possess this strength.
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