 Danielepew, posted
over a year ago
Dear Birdy, first of all, I hope your ribs aren't hurting anymore. Second, but no less important, I'm with you in this moment of pain. You need to know that those of us who have made friends with you are here to support you. We love you and the people around you.
Your and your family's pain has been a slowly increasing and very prolonged one. It's already seven years since your brother got the diagnosis. This period must feel like a struggle not to slide down. Diseases affect the person, but very often we forget that they affect those around the person as well.
You and your family are clearly committed to help your brother the best way you can. You do this because you love him. It hurts to think that someone else, who in all correctness should not be there, is interfering with the medical treatment and making irrational demands that make it all the more difficult to handle the pain and the situation.
As to your brother, I agree with Uncle Phil. You need to bear in mind that he wasn't of sound mind when he might have felt that he had but precious little time to live and wanted to live wildly. I suppose that sex and adventure helped him forget what he had and what his chances were. Nobody wants to be sick, particularly if the disease is incurable or has an uncertain prognosis. People want to wake up one day and think it was all a bad dream. If this happens to people who are in full control of themselves, I speculate that perhaps your brother felt all the more inclined to go wild. Forgive him for the mess he brought into everybody's life. I don't think he meant to cause any pain. Most likely he just wanted to ignore the idea of death. The responsible behavior we think we can expect from the sick looks different when you're the sick person and you understand that behaving responsibly will also mean that you have to deprive yourself of many of the pleasures of life. I'm not justifying him, but I want to give you my honest opinion on this, in the hope that you might find it easier to see clearly and perhaps forgive your brother.
The other woman seems unable to understand that she isn't helping. She also seemes to have been uncaring about your brother, when she gave him an ultimatum. I suppose she was aware of the fact that he had cancer, and I don't think it is right to apply this sort of pressure to a sick man. It seems she was ignoring the disease and dealing with the relationship as if they were young and had nothing to worry about. I don't think we can put her on the same level as your brother. She isn't sick, and her mind, I suppose, is sound. She should be helping.
To be fair with her, however, there might be a reason for her behavior. I can speculate that, over the years, she might have come to love your brother, in her own way. It can be difficult for her to feel excluded and unable to do anything for the man she had a long relationship with. She refuses to pay a constructive role, but maybe she is acting out of ill-understood affection.
The friends and people your brother met might be siding with her because of this. He's dying, dear Birdy, and he's dying for her as well. Maybe she doesn't have a good heart and is uncaring and hateful with you and your family, but I suppose she must also feel something because your brother is going to die.
I'm afraid it can be very difficult for you to read my words and take them for what they are, the honest opinion of somebody who really cares for you. It can also be very difficult for you to make such comments to your sister in law and your nieces. So, I think you must not do anything but continue to support and give your brother your love in his final moments. I just want you to wear the other side shoes, for a little while, and perhaps speculate as to why they are doing you all the harm they objectively do.
Your brother can't speak and therefore he is unable to say a few words he should be saying. Let me be the one who does that in his stead. He has two wonderful daughters, but I want to speak more about the gem of his wife. Caring after a sick person, who is about to die, is very hard work, in practical terms, but, above all, emotionally. She has left everything else to look after him in his final moments. This speaks volumes regarding who she is. It is all the more difficult to look this lovingly after a man who had done such serious harm to her. I wonder if, in his search for adventure, your husband realized that, right by his side, he had more than what many of us ever find in life. Maybe he wanted to feel the thrill of adventure. He failed to feel the touch of such a great love. Perhaps his disease deprived him of the ability to perceive how great it is to feel loved this way. He can't give anything back to her, and has hurt her, yet she is by his side. My respect for her.
Of course, dear Birdy, you can come to us if you need us. You know where to find us.
Posted on 17 August 2008 @ 17:20 (London time) - permalink
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