What I Learned from the Death of a Sibling

Some deaths hit closer to home than others.

Most people can’t live on this earth for very long and remain a stranger to death.

It comes from every direction — if we’re lucky, it comes remotely at first — pets, elderly (great) grandparents, casual friends, neighbors. We all slowly come to the understanding that our time here on this planet is limited.

If we’re not so lucky, it hits hard and fast — parents, spouses, siblings, very close friends.

However it comes to us — it does, indeed, come to us all eventually.

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I admit I am no stranger to loss caused by death. I lost a husband in our thirties. I was an orphan myself in my thirties when my parents died just a few years apart. Both of my parents came from large families and I was at the grave sites of many aunts, uncles and cousins for as long as I can remember — many of the extended family members I got to know only via funeral home encounters.

So, you might think I had my head wrapped around the human experience of living and dying.

Maybe not.

Recently, I lost my brother. It’s been a couple of months now and some of the numbness is wearing off. My mind is starting to wrap itself around exactly what his life, and death, have meant to me in my lifetime.

We were not particularly close in age — he was ten years my senior.

He was a teenager when I was a child.

He was an adult when I was a teenager.

He was married when I was casually dating.

He was actively engaged in his profession when I was a college student.

My brother was always, always, always one step ahead of me in life’s journey.

I looked up to him with a bit of hero worship at a time when he was probably looking at me as the little sister in need of protecting.

He fulfilled his role as “protector” right up to the end.

Because of our age difference, it made good sense to him to make me the executrix to his estate after his wife died and they had produced no heirs.

It made sense because, as we all tend to think, he had decades left to live this life and I, in all likelihood, might be the “last man standing” in our family tree at that point, somewhere in the distance, when the decisions I would have to make would seem pretty basic.

It made sense because, in spite of health issues that he never shared with his family, he thought he could handle his own health and life independent of the loving family who, had we known, would have done much, much more to help my brother navigate the twisted life issues that come with the aging and ailing process.

By the time he lost control of his life and his health — heart issues, kidney failure and run-away diabetes finally got the better of him — we (and by “we” I mean “me”) were powerless to “fix” him.

When he finally relinquished the control of his existence to his executrix and Power of Attorney (“me”), medicine could only lift its hands in despair and do the best it could to “keep him comfortable.”

His family could only offer words of pathetic encouragement to a man who refused to acknowledge his mortal fears because he felt his family “couldn’t handle the truth.” (His words to his social worker)

The only real help I could provide was to try to upgrade his neglected home to a state of readiness in preparation for a promised homecoming from the nursing home that was never going to happen.

In reality, my only accomplishment was to prepare that house for sale to settle the estate after his death.

My brother lived out the last ten weeks of his life in a nursing home that would not allow visitors because of the quarantine lock down in place due to the coronavirus pandemic.

My brother, although he did not die from the coronavirus, did, in fact, die alone, without family, without a hand to hold, without a final word of love or a chance to say good-bye.

That truth is a hard, unrelenting attack on my own personal sense of humanity. What I could have done, should have done, needed to do — and could not do — will forever weigh heavily on me.

Life teaches us lessons on a regular basis — some come easily — others come in unrelenting pain.

Am I a better person because I lost a sibling under such unlikely circumstances?

Maybe.

I am better because I view each moment as a chance to say something I may never get a chance to say again. My brother’s last words to me, three days before his death, were — “I don’t know what my future holds.”

My last words to him were — “Don’t worry, we will do whatever is necessary to take care of everything.” (The words of the powerless are so often filled with weak promises)

In those last few days of his life, my brother would tell whichever sibling called first — “I’m tired tonight. Tell the others not to call tonight. I’m going to sleep.”

I know now, he didn’t want to talk to us. He didn’t want to have that last conversation. He was carrying out the final journey on his own (He KNEW — and he was trying to protect us). We could have offered more — he chose to take the final journey alone (I learned from observing his strength that I don’t know if I will possess that same strength if called upon to do so).

I am better because I have been reminded, yet again, that life is precious — and unbelievably short.

I know I need to react to every moment and experience as if I will never see it again, because — in reality — I never will.

This reality check seems to be something we humans need to have slapped in our faces on a regular basis.

What I really know is this — my brother, ten years my senior, was always, always, always (and only) one step ahead of me on life’s pathway.

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