by Belen Doughtery
Editor
The University Times
My brother passed away this summer at age 33; he was two years younger than me. According to “Worldmeter” the current world population is 8.1 billion and counting. As of the morning of July 10th, 31,862,360 people were reported deceased this year alone – with the meter changing by the second. His death didn’t dent the 8.1 billion but it has altered my existence.
I am sure there’s a book out there titled “Grief for Dummies,” maybe I should go read it. Instead I choose to let grief guide me, as I’ve done in the past.
Eight years ago my father passed away. He was hospitalized due to liver failure. He had been an alcoholic all my life, and even though he gave sobriety a good college try, he ultimately succumbed to the disease. His organs collectively failed, and he died at the age of 51.
“The apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree,” is a saying that can be applied in both a negative or positive context, affirming some sort of family lineage root. If we become as talented as a parent, the saying affirms it; if we are screw-ups, the saying confirms it. My brother also took up drinking. It probably became more prominent after our father passed away.
When my father passed away, I had already made peace with his addiction, his life choices, and the inevitable consequences if he ever took up the bottle again. When he relapsed I had a feeling that I wouldn’t get him back. I grieved my father hundreds of times while he was living; every time he called drunk, every missed childhood event, every call from jail. He was not present; he was not an active part of my life. The bottle had taken him. So when I got the official call that my father was not going to make it through the night, peace fell upon me. My father was finally going to be at peace, his body was going to rest, and he was no longer going to be under the influence of his disease.
The Fallen Apple –
I got a call from my sister on messenger on Jun 10, 2024 and I didn’t answer. She then messaged me:
Call Reyes Facebook Horacio has it
He’s gonna say what’s happening to rey idk
Mom and Mikayla are freaking out
Crying and I what hospital
My brother had gone under cardiac arrest, was internally bleeding and put under with a ventilator. Without being listed as his next of kin I couldn’t get any information – not to mention that I was over 800 miles away, in Maine. He lived in Maryland.
The Twilight Zone –
I cried, I knew he wasn’t going to make it. It was all too similar. Unlike my father’s last 12 hours, my brother’s last 12 hours were unsettling for me. He was too young. He didn’t have a chance to recover. I mean anyone can say there’s always a chance but not when you are living a dark existence. If my brother’s brain were to be scanned, if he were to be evaluated by specialists and psychologists, I would bet that his alcohol usage caused severe damage to his ability to make decisions. Researchers continue to study the impact of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) and the negative effects on brain function in adulthood – my brother would have been a great candidate for those studies. My minor is in psychology, and I can see all the connections in behavior and our upbringing that led my brother to die on that hospital bed that Tuesday morning.
My grief isn’t just about memories – my brother and I transforming into power rangers (him the blue ranger, me the yellow ranger) – jumping off the bed with a heeyah kick in the air. My grief comes in the form of impotence. Between his upbringing, genes, and societal status, my brother’s resources and opportunities were limited. It takes a village to raise a child, and if as a society we can’t understand that investments in mental health are pivotal for communities to thrive, more people like my brother will continue to die.According to “Mental Health America, Inc” “11.28% of adults in America had an alcohol use disorder in the past year. [And] 17.82% of adults in the U.S. had a substance use disorder in the past year, totaling over 45 million people”
My father Rafael Hernandez Diaz on the left of my brother Rey, both suffered from alcohol disorder and passed away from effects.
