Well...shit.

[Red Lion]

This has been a p terrible couple of weeks. One of my friends killed himself on Saturday and the other day we found out that my mom has breast cancer. I don't know how I'm supposed to feel about all of this but right now I just feel drained. I've gone through little phases of feeling sad or angry off and on all week but now I'm hollow. Every time I look on my facebook or my Steam I think "I should probably remove him. His name isn't going to light up green ever again," but for some reason I just haven't yet. Part of me still half expects that I'll find out it was a mistake or a joke or a lie or something. But I know I'm just being stupid. We weren't even that close but we got on well. He was always nice to me and he's had a presence in my life for years. And now it's just gone, a vacant space and a username that can't ever reply back again. You know what's even worse? He killed himself because he was in an abusive relationship and over his head in financial debt. I always hated his wife, I knew she was a pile of shit but I never said anything because he seemed happy. But I was in an abusive relationship myself, maybe I should have noticed all those red flags. Instead I kept telling myself I was paranoid or that I was just projecting. I kept telling myself that if he was happy it wasn't my business. After he died I did a little digging and found all kinds of shit that I could have easily unearthed at any time if I'd just had the presence of mind too. Not that it even matters now. 

Then the stuff with my mom, what the fuck do I even do with that? Her health has been getting worse and worse over the years (she's a chronic smoker with blood pressure issues who's deteriorated so much that she can't even WALK beyond a few paces). Can she even withstand treatment? Can she survive the surgeries and chemo she's expected to undergo? What's worse is that she seems like she's trying to make amends with me for all the shit she put me through growing up. Her abuse, her intense homophobia, her narcissism, after all of that what am I even supposed to feel for her?  I don't fucking know. My dad is on autopilot, my brother is trying his hardest to ignore it all, my 7 year old sister doesn't know what's going on and when I feel anything it's usually angry, I want to run into the basement with a bat and smash everything in sight. But then that anger dissipates and I'm empty and no matter what I try to do or how I try to cope I can't seem to figure out all of this shit. I want to just give up and let whatever happens happen. No more trying to weigh mom's survival rate, no more working out how to break the news to the rest of the family, no more driving from doctor to doctor only for things to keep getting worse. For no reason in particular I spent hours researching breast cancer, causes, treatments, stages and complications. I knew it wasn't going to magically make me smarter or more equipped to emotionally cope with this but I thought "It's SOMETHING right? Knowing is always better than not knowing?" well it didn't help. That's the problem, I don't know what I can actually DO besides just sit and watch it unfold. This, all of this, is just bullshit and I fucking hate it. 

 

[Jtrekkie]

Geez. I'm really sorry to hear all of that. 

 You don't have to take his name off of anything. Just try not to blame yourself for it. It's easy to go back and think about how you could've done things different, but isn't your fault.

My mom went through breast cancer a few years ago, it scared everyone and I didn't know how to handle it. She just wanted love from her family, though. If your mom is trying to get you to forgive her, it isn't hard. Maybe she doesn't deserve it, but she'll need that, and your siblings will need someone to lean on.

[Snagged]

There is a name on my Steam friend list that hasn't lit up in the last 4 years. His name online was Bennie, or in real life, Travis. He committed a suicide at age of 20. He hid his depression leading to him taking his own life so well that I don't know what lead to it. But I always remember him. We used to play games together and chat together about silly things and achievement hunting in games. 

Know why the name is still in the list? To help me remember someone who was a friend of mine. I suggest you do the same, to help yourself remember, else there is a danger that we do what's most natural to us, which is to move on and forget 

[Vallium]

Hang in there, buddy.

[Red Lion]

18 hours ago, Jtrekkie said:

Geez. I'm really sorry to hear all of that. 

 You don't have to take his name off of anything. Just try not to blame yourself for it. It's easy to go back and think about how you could've done things different, but isn't your fault.

My mom went through breast cancer a few years ago, it scared everyone and I didn't know how to handle it. She just wanted love from her family, though. If your mom is trying to get you to forgive her, it isn't hard. Maybe she doesn't deserve it, but she'll need that, and your siblings will need someone to lean on.

I'm trying. I don't know if I'm in a great place to be forgiving right now. : / 

17 hours ago, Snagged said:

There is a name on my Steam friend list that hasn't lit up in the last 4 years. His name online was Bennie, or in real life, Travis. He committed a suicide at age of 20. He hid his depression leading to him taking his own life so well that I don't know what lead to it. But I always remember him. We used to play games together and chat together about silly things and achievement hunting in games. 

Know why the name is still in the list? To help me remember someone who was a friend of mine. I suggest you do the same, to help yourself remember, else there is a danger that we do what's most natural to us, which is to move on and forget 

Thanks for the advice. I guess I feel like going ahead and taking him off will force me to accept it and move forward. I feel like now that this stuff with my mom is going down I can't properly focus on this right now. 

15 hours ago, Vallium said:

Hang in there, buddy.

I appreciate it.

[Wrecker]

Jeezless... I don't even know what to say... You've been dealt a horrible hand, and I hope you can power through it while still being happy in the end.

The only thing I can think of to write is that when shit stacks up against you like that, for one thing, you suffer like all fuck, but you live through it. The other thing is, and I don't know if it's a good or a bad thing, but it definitely makes you tougher. I'm sure you already know that, I just don't really know what to write.

I hope your mother gets better and you don't have to worry about her health, and as much as they're worth, I send her my best wishes. Nobody should have to go through dealing with that with their own mother, I hope you can be strong in all of that. I've came close to losing a friend that was really, really close to me, and I just can't fathom what you're going through in that aspect. That hurt enough, all I can say, is that I hope the rest of your friends and family are good and well enough to support you through all of this shit.

Here's hoping to much, much better times for you in the future. You do lots of good things for other people, and the time has to come where everything goes full-circle and starts paying you back. You deserve it. Keep your head up.

[Red Lion]

13 hours ago, Wrecker said:

Jeezless... I don't even know what to say... You've been dealt a horrible hand, and I hope you can power through it while still being happy in the end.

The only thing I can think of to write is that when shit stacks up against you like that, for one thing, you suffer like all fuck, but you live through it. The other thing is, and I don't know if it's a good or a bad thing, but it definitely makes you tougher. I'm sure you already know that, I just don't really know what to write.

I hope your mother gets better and you don't have to worry about her health, and as much as they're worth, I send her my best wishes. Nobody should have to go through dealing with that with their own mother, I hope you can be strong in all of that. I've came close to losing a friend that was really, really close to me, and I just can't fathom what you're going through in that aspect. That hurt enough, all I can say, is that I hope the rest of your friends and family are good and well enough to support you through all of this shit.

Here's hoping to much, much better times for you in the future. You do lots of good things for other people, and the time has to come where everything goes full-circle and starts paying you back. You deserve it. Keep your head up.

Thank you, I appreciate all of the support I've gotten in this thread. It does help to know people care, even a little.

I do feel a little better now. At the very least things have stabilized. I don't know, the initial rounds of being sad and angry have subsided and I feel like I'm back on track. I'm not 100% ok and I still dread the inevitable bills, doctor visits and potential for things to go really bad. But for right now I'm alright. 

[Llamapotamus]

Best of luck to you and your mom! Hopefully it was found in its early stages and can be taken care of relatively quickly and cheaply.