Bad News

I haven’t really had time or the clarity to wrap my head around this, but my brother Mike died this past Thursday. He was very recently put into home hospice with a hospital bed and the whole nine. He was getting weaker and weaker since April, but it got really bad in the last month. And we still were not speaking. 

I don’t know for sure if he was still going into work, but he was in pretty bad shape when I last saw him in April. I could hardly believe it, but he was still showing up for work on most days. He had to so he could keep his health insurance, and the health insurance for the whole family. Don’t get me started on health insurance, though.

I’ve been wanting to write about what’s been happening with all this—to process it, but I haven’t until right now. Instead, I’ve been trying to keep busy to distract myself. I don’t know why I do that. I guess I don’t want to feel the feelings. However, I’ve felt a low-grade depression since I found out. I’m also very touchy and irritated.

When I first found out, I lay in bed for a couple of hours. I cried a bit. But then, I was overcome with so many other complicated emotions. Our relationship was volatile at times, other times, it was non-existent. We haven’t been talking since the middle of May. It was my decision to stop communicating. At that time, he was leaving horrible voice messages on my phone. It was truly traumatizing me, so I told him, “No more.” If he didn’t have cancer, I wouldn’t have felt so guilty about it, but I couldn’t put up with it anymore. 

I didn’t make the drive to say goodbye to him, so I feel guilty about that too. I wasn’t able to drive because of my aneurysm, but I honestly don’t think I would have if I could. I feel like the last time I saw him was on a good note. We had a nice visit. In the back of my mind, I wondered if it would be the last time I’d ever see him, and it was. So there it is. I can’t go back in time if I wanted to.

Not even two days before he passed, I wrote a few pages to contribute to his eulogy. I had a hard time getting started with that, but then, little childhood stories and nice things about his character began to pour out of me. It was probably good to remember him in a good light and to give others some context about things only I knew about him. We were super close as kids.

That closeness was the fodder that kept our reconnections going. I longed for that closeness at each reunion, but it was always very temporary. Most of those times were because he was ill in some form or another. I’d run out to see him; he’d promised he was a changed person, but then we’d be right back to where we were at our disconnection points again. It would reach a point where it would become untenable. 

The last time we stopped talking, I began to realize how much like our mom he was. Sounds stupid that I never realized it before, but the more time I didn’t have him in my life, the more I saw him clearly. It’s not totally his fault. We both had the same crazy parents, despite how well he was treated by them. But he never had an ounce of therapy. He should have sought it out after the drugs, after Scientology, after each drug reversion, after the Evangelical Christian zeal, and more drug reversions later. Every time he was “finished” with these things, I thought, Now I can have a normal relationship with him. It never happened. I didn’t want to believe he was flawed. I looked up to him for most of my early life, and I wanted his shortcomings to be because of these things, not regardless of them. I refused to learn. I always wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt, give him as much compassion as I could possibly shower him with, and I especially did that toward the end, but nothing I did was ever good enough. More and more, I’d leave our coming-togethers in tears, and I was too weak to endure it. 

I think my main problem with him is that he never listened to me. He never took me or my life into consideration. He actually didn’t know all that much about me. He never asked me how I was doing or what was going on in my life—very similar to my mom. My mom was obsessed with herself and Mike. That’s all she cared about. But Mike had a number of better qualities than she did, like being a generous soul and wanting to help others when he could. He and his wife adopted our two autistic (2nd) cousins when our first cousin and aunt died. He was crazy religious at the time, but it was still the right thing to do. He stopped believing in all that stuff a few years later, but he was still a good parent to both of them and to his own girls, though still estranged from his oldest son. He mentored the older cousin, who was ten when they were adopted. And he played with the younger one (an infant then) every single day after work. Now the older one, despite his autism, works in cybersecurity for the Marine force. The younger one, who is much more autistic, is doing well in school. It’s sad for all the kids, though.

I’ve been waiting to hear the dates of the funeral because I’ll be going to that for sure. I want to be there for his wife and kids. But I’m still waiting for the grief cloud to come and envelop me. 

16 thoughts on “Bad News

  1. Elizabeth Hoffman August 4, 2025 / 1:19 pm

    My heart goes out to you and Hannah.

    • Ayin Es August 6, 2025 / 9:35 am

      Thank you, E. I can feel it.

  2. Emily Snyder Wackler August 5, 2025 / 5:20 pm

    I am so sorry and was hoping to visit him next year but again never wait till tomorrow. I am so glad I connected with Mike and you after all these years. Life is definitely not fair to good people.

    • Ayin Es August 6, 2025 / 9:36 am

      Thank you, Emily.

  3. Monica Wyatt August 5, 2025 / 5:29 pm

    Soooo very sorry for this huge loss. Sending you strength and comfort and healing.

  4. Ayin Es August 6, 2025 / 9:37 am

    Thank you, Monica. I appreciate that.

  5. Steph August 9, 2025 / 11:09 am

    I’m so sorry for your loss, Ayin. It sounds like you two had a strong bond when younger. I feel like those bonds can be remembered and felt for a lifetime even if things aren’t the same later. I don’t talk to my brother much (no conflict between us, we just live different lives), but I always remember looking up to him when younger and feeling nostalgic over the time we spent together as kids.

    • Ayin Es August 9, 2025 / 2:33 pm

      Thank you Steph. I appreciate your understanding. Do you have more than one sibling?

      • Steph August 10, 2025 / 5:35 pm

        I have one older brother who I grew up with. I also have two half-brothers who are much older than me (like 10 years older). I only saw my half-brothers sporadically growing up. Don’t have any sisters. You?

        • Ayin Es August 11, 2025 / 10:10 am

          I only had my older brother. Older by three years. I do have three half-sisters, but I’ve only met one of them. I started talking to another on Facebook after my dad died, but they are all much older, and they have never been in my life.

          Okay, have any pets?

          • Steph August 14, 2025 / 6:28 pm

            Haha, do you mean pets growing up or pets currently? Growing up, our family had all manner of pets! Dogs, cats, birds, bunnies, guinea pigs. Even a wild baby squirrel at one point. But now I just have my one cat, Marcel. I’ve seen your dog, she looks like a cutie! 🙂 Did you have dogs growing up too?

          • Ayin Es August 15, 2025 / 1:28 pm

            Hi Steph. Yeah, I guess I meant either growing up or now. I have Ruby now. First dog again in almost six years. I grew up with dogs, usually two at a time. We are both allergic to cats, but I like them anyway and like to pet and cuddle them, but it makes my eyes swell up and my nose runny. I actually had a cat for a minute when I was a kid, but my dad made me bring it back to the people I got her from. 🙁 She had short white fur. I was quite allergic to her, but I didn’t care really.

  6. Steph August 19, 2025 / 12:03 pm

    Ayin, we have so much in common! Haha. I had the same experience as a child regarding a cat! My brother and I got two kittens, but my dad made us bring them back to the rescue after a short period of time. I was about 6 years old when it happened and it was traumatizing for me, I remember drawing pictures of those kittens and crying about them for days. I think that’s why I have a cat now because it’s the one pet I didn’t really have growing up. We also always had about two dogs at a time, too, always big dogs. My own dog was a standard poodle named Maggie who lived to be 17 years old, she was truly my best friend growing up.

    • Ayin Es August 20, 2025 / 8:12 am

      My mom got my little white kitten in front of a beauty shop, so we named her Shampoo. She had a blue eye and a brown eye like David Bowie. My dad (and I) were allergic to cats, but we kept her hidden in my room for a few weeks before she got out and hid in his shoe. That’s how he found out about her and made us call the people who gave her away to my mom. I understand about Maggie, but 17 for a dog that size is a very long life.. My dog as a kid was also my best friend. His name was Spunkie–a border collie. His ending was very sad, but I have still missed him all these years. The dog before him was Gigi– a shelty, and she got hit by a car when I was 5. 🙁

      • Steph August 21, 2025 / 3:23 pm

        Oh that’s such an adorable name! Shampoo, awww. Yeah… that’s the hardest thing about having pets, they pass away. I don’t even want to think about the day I will have to say goodbye to my cat (Marcel), I feel so bonded to him, he’s my little buddy and such a comforting presence in my life.

        • Ayin Es August 21, 2025 / 3:57 pm

          OMG, I don’t even want to think about that! 🙁 Ruby should live forever.

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