Shittier Days

[Yoji]

It's impossible to know what someone is thinking when they decide to take their own life. Everyone I've known that's gone through the experience of having a relative or friend commit suicide has ended up looking at it from every conceivable angle, and come away with the same answer - "We'll never know why"

What he said. I'm not going to get into it much, but my family had something similar happen some months back. There was definitely that "how could you do this to us" kind of anger involved, but my wife also made the point that for the guy who shot himself, it was inarguably the worst day of his life.

It's also worth remembering that there's not really a right or wrong way to mourn, especially in a situation this fucked up. Anyone who says otherwise might have watched too many movies.

[Thad]

Aw hell. Sorry to hear that, Caithness, and my condolences to you and your family.

[Kfroog]

I, on the other hand, cried for the first time today at the viewing. His father is taking it real hard, and it's tough to see someone in that much pain.

[Yoji]

Okay, this is going to be difficult and awkward. Not sure how or if I should do it.

Today will mark one year since my beloved aunt was murdered. On top of that, I still need to talk with my estranged dad about meeting up for Father's Day. So all-in-all, it's going to be an awesome day.

[Büge]

Jesus. I hope you can make it, Hardly.

[Newbie]

Yeah, that is an exemplary candidate for the archetypal shittier day. Let us know how things go.

[Thad]

Good luck / belated condolences.

[Yoji]

Good luck / belated condolences.

Thanks. I've been sitting on it for a year wondering "When is a good time to bring it up with the BrontoJerks? Is there a good time? Eh, forget it. Let's just try and go to BrontoKon '16 and try to pretend everything's okay."

I'd like to say it's going to be okay, but I'm not sure it'll ever be okay. Like... hm, how to do this without a great wall of text...

My aunt loved me, my brothers, and my son like they were her own; she was so uncritically supportive of us, it was actually annoying at times. She once said the only thing I could do to truly upset her was to shave off all my long hair, but you can bet your bottom dollar she'd say I have the most handsomely polished dome in the land. She was hardly perfect; lots of failed marriages and poor life choices and always talked over me, but she was scrappy and loving and the kids always came first. She was like a second mother and a terrible example at once.

Towards the end, she'd hooked back up with her first ex, who I guess had drinking and abuse problems. You wouldn't think so just meeting him, though. Jolly, despite being pretty much poor and having COPD that would eventually kill him. They remarried last summer and everything seemed fine; I was one of the groomsmen, and she was bugging me for a way to fuse her engagement and wedding rings together. And he seemed like he really was on the mend, working a crappy but honest forklift job at a warehouse somewhere.

It seemed fine until June 16th 2016, at about 4:30pm PST, less than four days after they were married, when my younger brother calls me to tell me they were both dead. It looks like he shot her in the back of her head, possibly as she was sleeping, before going into the front hall and blowing his own brains out. They were rooming with my mother on account of being one medical emergency away from bankruptcy, so his dead ass was the first thing she saw coming in the door from work. No note or anything; we haven't even gotten her Chromebook back from the police yet. We didn't even know he had a gun in the house, nevermind five. The last thing I'd ever spoken to her was something like "I'll see if epoxy plays well with silver," and the last text I ever got from her just read "Lol." To my knowledge, it was the first violent death in the family since World War II, when a distant uncle took flack in the neck in a bomber flying over Europe.


So what better time for a bitter phone call with my dad? Father's Day just a few days after, and he chose that time to get all pissy about being estranged from the family. Like, "nobody will call me a saint when I die! Poor me! It's been so hard since I ended a marriage of 35 years to run off with some bleached blond in Mission Viejo! How come Kathy got a free pass for infidelity and all I got was a beautiful timeshare in Maui??" Paraphrasing, of course, but all that while my emotional wounds are still bleeding. And this is after years of growing animosity between the two that I never completely understood. We were on increasingly shaky ground for years before, what with him randomly yelling at me for hours about my rude friends and my sinful life choices (and by those, I mean "Romo helped himself to leftover tacos after I invited him to" and "you're sharing a bed with a girl you've been in love with since high school").

He says he misses us all and I desperately want to believe him, but he hasn't been terribly proactive about meeting up. Doesn't help that there isn't much overlap in our interests; he likes trainspotting and drag racing, I like video games (which he's upset over how violent they are sometimes. To be fair, the last time he said that was when I was playing Dead Space). But it seems like whenever I do try and get together, he's got some race in Bakersfield to cover. Just today I tried to make plans, but he's busy with some other damn thing this Sunday that has more priority over me and my new copy of Driveclub VR.

I guess one of the things making it difficult with him is that I really used to look up to my parents and their relationship. It seemed like everyone else in the world were getting divorced or were already on their second marriages, but they somehow beat the odds, like they were somehow above it. Then one fine night in 2007, we catch him making late night phone calls to strange women and it was all downhill from there. It was like my family was this island in the middle of a brobdingnagian, dangerous, unknowable ocean, and it had suddenly fractured into this disfunctional archapelago, trying to build flimsy bridges between everyone.


I'm trying to deal with it all, but it's hard. I'm always wondering how Alexis and I are going to split, since it seems pretty much everyone does with enough time. It's not even like we're in any imminent danger, but it's hard to feel safe after my invincible parents split. Like, it could happen to anyone at that point. As for my aunt, I try distract myself from the fact that one of the most important people in my life is now just an old photo album and a bag of ash in a ceramic angel. But I see her everywhere: fireworks at Disneyland, where she used to work at the hotel. Anything in tacky leopard print, which she always wore. Even my own son; whenever he learns something new, I always think "Your aunt would be proud if she weren't d̡͚̣͉̱̩̙̤ḙ͙͟à̗͙̀͢d͇̝͕͈̫ͅ."

Sorry to go on like this. I don't even know many folks here terribly well, but... I dunno. It seems like a better way to deal than Facebook and making shitty paintings.

[Friday]

As much good as an internet hug will do, I'll give you one.

*hug*

As no stranger to family drama of the type you're talking about, (well, I never had anyone do a murder-suicide) I can tell you that the best and most useful thing I learned when dealing with misbehaving family is to treat them as if they were not family. That is, treat them like you'd treat any other random human who was doing the fucked up behavior.

That's not easy, because (generally) it means you have to emotionally detach yourself. I spent ages trying to play my father's games because "he was my father" before I simply realized that any other person doing this behavior would get cut out of my life with no regrets.

So I cut him out of my life, with no regrets. And I was much, much happier for it.

I'm not saying that's what you should do with your dad. You have to make your own choices. But my advice is to treat him like any other person who was doing that shit. People should not get a free pass to act like enormous cocks just because you share DNA. If he's hurting you repeatedly, stop letting him do that, one way or another.

As far as your Aunt goes, I can only offer my sincere condolences. Death is never easy. Stay strong. And fuck that guy who killed her.

I'm always wondering how Alexis and I are going to split, since it seems pretty much everyone does with enough time. It's not even like we're in any imminent danger, but it's hard to feel safe after my invincible parents split. Like, it could happen to anyone at that point.

It's understandable that you'd feel this way, but I hope that you know that it's an illogical fear. Not everyone splits up. Each relationship lives or dies on its own merits, and though I don't know you that well, everything I've seen and heard about yours has been good.

[nosimpleway]

One of the managers at work, during some rambling small-talk conversation, mentioned "Last week was the thirteenth anniversary of the day my father died. And it was the first anniversary where I didn't cry about it at some point during the day."

This is going to be a raw emotional wound for a while. That's normal. Coping takes time.

[Joxam]

Yeah as much as it is probably the worst way to deal with it I actually deal with my mom dying by just working during her birthday and the day she died every year. Its a rough couple weeks though, I'm in the terrible position of having my mom's birthday by June 24th, my uncle robert's birthday be july 5th, the day he died be july 6th and the day my mom died be july 9th. So instead of deal with all that shit I just throw myself into work for a couple of week.

[Mongrel]

I'm trying to deal with it all, but it's hard. I'm always wondering how Alexis and I are going to split, since it seems pretty much everyone does with enough time. It's not even like we're in any imminent danger, but it's hard to feel safe after my invincible parents split. Like, it could happen to anyone at that point.

I think a lot of what I could say has already been said - condolences, good luck, this will take time and so forth - but it bears repeating what Friday has said that every relationship is unique and that nothing you've ever said or done on here has given us the least indication that you're an unhealthy person or living in an unhealthy relationship.

Of course there are no guarantees in life, but by all the normal indicators your relationship seems happy and healthy and you're doing all the right things so far. Just keep on doing what you're doing, and if you ever need help or have a question, ask.

[Yoji]

I tried looking for an obituary for my aunt again. I seem to do this every few weeks or so; something in the news or whatever reminds me she's f͖̻̟̞u̦̫c̡̣̣͚͎͉͇̞k͓̫ḭ͙ń̜͖̦̝̩g̪͍̺̗͔̺͞ ͇̤̲d̼̠̩͚̠eà̬̜̥̥̪̖̳d̮̫̹̫͇̥̻ and I feel I need to find some record.

But every time, practically nothing. Pretty much just her Facebook page, an ancestry site mentioning her marriages, and of course the GoFundMe page for her funerary expenses. Not even anything on the Anaheim police blotter, and it really gets me down. I mean, getting me down is easier than punching a paralyzed monkey in the face, but it's super-saddening that besides those, it's like she never even existed.


Thanks for humoring me on all this. I don't really like to bring up this stuff, but I'm not sure Facebook would've been a good place to bring it up. You don't make another person miserable if you can, especially if you love them. Too many well wishes mixed with too much Christianity for me to stomach*. And too brobdingnagian of a risk for truly assholish comments since guns were involved in her murder. So thanks, everyone.

*I've been in the atheist closet since like 2003, and most people in my life don't know it. So when they offer prayers and assurances of heaven and all that, it just rings too hollow. I mean, they mean well, but as far as I can tell my aunt is d̙͔̙ea͖̤̼̭̗͎͢d͙ ̙a̶̖̱̮͕͖n͖̖ͅd̞͎̠̜̘̀ ̭̭͜n͜e͖̩͡ͅv͕̠̜̰e͕̘̫͚̤͡r̺̱ ̦c̯om͟in̹̪͔͓͚̭g̵̬ ̢͈̤̭͙̰̣b̠a̗̞̪c͚̺̬̗̝͜k͈͝.̭͚̼̞͉͙̰ **
**sorry for overusing the Cthulhu text. If I could make some sort of awful growling bass noise or a single thundering heartbeat sound in your head as you read instead, trust me, I'd do it.

[zaratustra]

You seem to be worrying a lot she hasn't left enough of a mark. But: you still have her memories and what she taught you, and that will be part of what you are and what you pass on to your child, and onwards. That's a legacy anyone could be proud of.

[Caithness]

I don't know if this is a thing, but you could try writing an obituary for her and seeing if there's a time limitation for getting them published.

[Bal]

So, I've been estranged from my father for about twelve years, and to my mind the longer that lasted the better, but then it was discovered that he had a tumor in his head the size of a orange, and about two weeks after that, while I was figuring out what to say to him, he died. That was about a week and a half ago now, and I wasn't really thinking about it until the McCain respect debate popped up in homobortion. I would bring it up there, but honestly I don't think it's apropos of anything that I'm closely connected to the disease in question. It's just forcing me to think about it, which I do not like.

[Friday]

As someone who also hated her father's stinking guts, (while not assuming or knowing exactly what you're feeling) I can tell you that the weird feeling you might have about your father being dead will never really go away. I just sort of put it in a jar in my head and once in awhile (usually on Father's Day) I'll look in the jar and see a happy memory with him. And I'll wonder if, in another, gentler world, we could have been friends.

But we live in this world and sins have consequences. For instance, you die, and your kids shrug.

You'll stop thinking about it so much sooner or later. For what little it's worth, here's an internet hug. I'll Kritz your Scout anytime.

[Thad]

I've had a headache for a solid fucking week now.

I thought at first it was a response to barometric pressure changes -- I typically get headaches when it gets cloudy, and it got cloudy around the time I got the headache -- but the clouds have cleared up and the headache remains.

I'm seeing that headaches after vaccination are common, but this started *before* I got my second shot, and anyway they're supposed to clear up in a day or two and I'm coming up on a week since my shot.

I went to the doctor two weeks ago and she suggested maybe the headaches are related to my high blood pressure. She put me on a new BP med but so far it hasn't made a difference in my headaches or my BP.

So who knows what the fuck it is. I've been trying to answer that question for 30 years.

[Friday]

For whatever it's worth, I'm sorry about that. I hope you feel better.

[Thad]

Tried an edible to see if that would help. It did!

I ate about 1/3 of a chocolate square. Label says each square is 10mg, so I probably had 3, 4, somewhere in there. The pain didn't go away but it kinda faded to the background.

It's got the same drawback as any other effective migraine medication I've ever taken -- it helps with the pain but still prevents me from being able to do much of anything for the next few hours -- but as side effects go, getting high is a lot more pleasant than the hypertension and nausea I've gotten from prescription meds. Still, though, seems like one more treatment that only makes sense when the headache is so bad I can't do anything else anyway, not so much for moderate headaches I can sort of power through.

Last time I had a full square of that chocolate I was pretty much out for the weekend, but 1/3 of a square seems like it hits the sweet spot a little better; I'm not feeling it the morning after. I'm still working from home but if I had to drive somewhere and do stuff I could.

Still have a goddamn headache, though. We'll see how it goes the next 8 hours and whether I'm going to want to have another piece tonight.