Abroad again

This is now my second time abroad this year, again for studying reasons. Again I am gone for almost three months. Again it feels awful. And yet it is different.
This spring was horrible partly because of the season, the first anniversary, the loneliness. While I am still lonely here I also have not that far to go home and actually do so every weekend. Or we meet elsewhere, like this weekend. Going on a weekend city trip is also quite nice, nothing to be laughed at, right? And yet, the days and times I am here in this admittedly beautiful city I only feel like bawling my eyes out. Well, sometimes it is better. But trust me, it gets back to being horrible, guaranteed. Not that I want it. I fight it. At least I try, but usually I fail. The only thing I can really do is wait until the phase is over. So why is all of this?
My rational mind tells me it can certainly not be all Alexander’s fault. He left us 1 and ½ years ago, it cannot affect me as much by now, right? Well, I think partly. I think what stuck with me is the fear of being alone, having to deal with myself and all of my feelings by myself. I am in the incredibly lucky position of having the best husband I could wish for and he is there for me, always, even if only on the phone. Yet this phone thing is just not the same. Call me spoiled, but it is not. I miss him, his advice, his strength, his believe in me. So what I am left with after Alexander left us is a profound fear of being alone. This does not mean I cannot be alone for a few hours a day in fact I need that. Yet knowing that there will be no one all day, for several days to hold me, to tell me that everything is going to be alright sucks and leaves me empty and fearful.
And there is another side to it too. I am scared to leave my family behind. Now, this does not really make sense since I am not much further away than usually, but since I am all alone here it still gives me that impression. It is difficult for them to get a hold of me, which in turn makes me feel like I am even farther away. I was there when Alexander left us. Again, my rationale is telling me that it does not make sense. Me being away does not mean something bad is going to happen. And yet, there is this feeling inside me, deeply rooted.
Thankfully my crying makes me tired so I sleep a lot. And sleeping helps passing the time. So I am almost halfway done with my time here. By far the best thing about it is that I will not have to do another semi-long stay abroad in the foreseeable future. I am praying that the remaining time will go fast and without too much bad feelings.

Upcoming anniversary

Last year this time I was still exhilarated by all that had happened the last few weeks – so many people who had wished us well at the beginning of our life together as husband and wife. And yet I was worried about my brother Alexander at the same time. We had just received all the pictures from the photographer and I had quickly noticed that Alexander was not on too many of them. This seemed strange as the photographer had been told to try and capture especially the close family. He had managed to do this very well with the exception of Alexander. What I should later learn was the last time I ever spoke with my brother also left me a bit uneasy. He was obviously somehow in a depressed state of mind although I would at the time have hardly used the word depression. It left a big enough impression though that I went to my family’s health insurance and picked up a booklet about depression. There was a questionnaire to see how you are doing, I filled it out how I thought Alexander might feel and I got the result of him being likely bipolar, definitely heavily depressed. This worried me but I did not know how to help him, how to do anything for him. In fact, I hate to admit it, I wanted to call him this entire week – a year ago – because of a necklace that I thought I might have forgotten in his room at my parents’ house. I procrastinated on that call until it was too late. I simply was scared of hearing another round of complaints about what I had done wrong or only how bad he was feeling and how horrible the world was. This is very hard to admit right now that I did not do what I can now never undo. I was not there for him when he needed me.
With the anniversary coming up I have to face another question this year. I will be flying home to my husband for a short time so that I do not have to be alone on May 3. My family has decided to hold a small service in Alexander’s memory. Aunts, uncles, grandmothers and cousins will all be there, not to speak of my direct family. Me and Luke are the only ones who will likely miss it. It would add another eight hours to my already long trip over an extended weekend. Should I go nonetheless? Am I only doing what I want and disregard what might be good for the others? Do they need me there? I am seriously torn, yet again, a full year later.

Concerns about a friend

Today is our first wedding anniversary. I understand that this is slightly off topic but I still had to mention it. It is a very depressing day since I am spending it all by myself here abroad with the volcano ash cloud over Europe preventing Luke from coming to see me. Oh well, it gives me time to write. My only fear is that if this damn cloud continues to hang in there it might prevent me from traveling to see my family for Alexander’s anniversary in two weeks. Let’s pray it does not since I cannot imagine spending that day all by myself. Oh, I don’t dare to think about this prospect too much.
Something else has occupied my thoughts these last few days as well though. A very dear friend of mine told me on Thursday that she is having relationship issues. Without getting into detail, she is torn between two guys. Well, that would not trouble me too much as such. But this would be all too simple for her, too. She feels really attracted to one of them, him being her ex-boyfriend whom she was together with for lets say two years. He broke up with her last summer, it took her a long time to get over him but she managed. Now they are talking again and she is again seriously interested, him as well. So where is the problem? He treated her pretty badly during their relationship, which I mean in an emotional kind of way. I do believe he is bipolar. She feels she cannot trust him, cannot be sure he will be there for her when she needs him. She told me that over several phone calls they have had in the past few weeks he apologized for bad emotional abuses, arguments where he did do something wrong. This is new since he always claimed to have forgotten everything about the entire argument before. The reason for me getting so detailed on this here is that it reminds me so much of arguments with Alexander. It was so hard for me to make him see how deeply he had hurt me or someone else, and then, half a year later, seemingly out of the blue, he might apologize for that very event. There were many more similarities between the two guys. Honestly, I am scared for my friend. The most – from her point of view – touching thing he said is ‘What is the point of living if I know that I cannot change?’ For very obvious reasons a statement like that has all sorts of alarm bells ringing inside me. Plus, from a negative point of view, I do think that only with an enormous amount of luck you can really cure bipolar depression, not to say that I don’t think that you can completely. So I am worried about her. While I can say that for him it would be great to have her by his side, I hope that she will choose a life where she can rely on her partner more. Obviously, I am getting into advisory terrain here that I do not really like and I would never tell her my opinion as I have written it here. But these are my – in this respect very damaged and biased – thoughts. Try to stay away from this illness, if you have the option.

Abroad

It has been a long time since I wrote anything here. In a way, I guess, this is a good sign since it must mean I am going on with my life. Well, to say the least, a lot has happened these last few weeks and certainly also many good things, some of which prevented me from posting anything here, too. We had my parents-in-law over for a visit, moved to a different apartment within the same city just a couple of days after they left and then I moved on to a different country for research purposes. So here I am now, all alone without my dear husband or very many friends (although there are a few very good ones here too). I guess I fell into some sort of minor depression when I arrived here. Reasons could be that I moved right back into winter, although the weather is getting better now, I am alone and bad as well as really good memories. Good memories since I used to live here, had the most wonderful time of my life here, including meeting my husband, bad memories include my very first encounter with suicide. A very dear friend attempted suicide while I was living here. He survived – miraculously – unharmed, and by unharmed I also mean that it turned out to be a impulsive action, not caused by severe depression. To be honest, I did not understand the full meaning of it all back then. How could I? I don’t blame anyone for not understanding the full extend of what a suicide does to the dear ones who has is not living through it. Therefore, wile it did not interrupt my lifestyle altogether too much it did impact my feelings going back now. I am not always sure of how this dear friend is doing although my general feeling is a good one. But if I learned something it is that you can never tell for sure. I am praying that it will be an alright time here and praying that time here will pass quickly.
And then there is the weight I am carrying with me about all the anniversaries coming up. While I am looking forward to our first wedding anniversary, mainly because Luke will come to visit, I am also dreading it since it is a reminder of what happened two weeks later a year ago. One year ago!!
I truly hope that I can settle in here quickly now, work efficiently on my research and come home quickly. And that the anniversaries will not be too tough.

Problems again

It feels as if something or someone does not want us i.e. my family to calm down. Last week Magnus’s friend mentioned his serious suicidal thoughts in front of him. The discussion ended with the friend being transported to a psychiatric clinic by the police on my brother’s call. My parents had to come see him in his apartment to calm him down again. I was worried about my little brother having that much responsibility but also so proud of him for having done that. How could we, any of us, ever live without doing something again? Anyone mentioning such thoughts to us must be aware of that.
Last weekend we went skiing, which was good to just get me to think about something else. The worry over my brother and a general incredible sadness had taken hold of me for most of the last week. Being out in the mountains with some friends helped to get a free head again. I felt ready for another week when my dad called me Monday around noon to tell me that one of Magnus’s friends had called him (my dad) to warn him that Magnus was in what looked like a heavy depression-wave. Apparently he spent days in bed crying, skipping school, and not getting anything done. It turned out that those things happened but quite a while back and he seems to be doing relatively fine. However, it scared me deeply. I am about to go abroad again, starting in April for a research project, and I worry so much about my little brother. It seems to be a repetition of the time I went to the same country a few years ago when he had some serious problems, too. Back then I did not see quite how serious they were. What, if I am underestimating them yet again? These thoughts seem to haunt me. How can I be sure nothing will happen this time? Somewhere deep down I do trust Magnus that he will be fine but then again I have been wrong before. I would have, no I have sworn that Alexander would be fine yet he did the most awful thing he could have done and took his life. Oh, if I would only know better what to do this time and would know that what I am doing if fine.
Last night I got the text message of an old high school friend of mine whom we were planning to meet over the weekend saying that her dad had just died. Her dad! Another shock, he was a really kind guy whom I had met on several occasions when we were over at her house during school time. What would I do if my dad died now? I am praying that nothing like that will happen to us in the near future. I don’t think we could take it.
Now I will have to attend the first funeral since Alexander’s next week. I am shivering when I think of it. Hopefully it will not remind me of my dear brother's funeral too much.
I am praying this is the last bit of bad news before I have to go. I am scared to be all alone over there for a couple of months and it certainly does not help to know that my family is not doing completely fine. I just love them all so much that I cannot stop myself thinking and worrying about them even though I know that I have to give myself time to grief, time to heal and time to work on my own projects. Easier said than done.

New problems

With all those problems that have been unfolded in the aftermath of Alexander’s death I always made myself believe that this would not happen to me again, never again. I would hopefully see the signs early on and act in a better way. I would be able to help the person who might not even see he needs help.
Now, yes, already, I have a similar situation within my own family. A very close family member is behaving in ways I used to know from Alexander years ago. At this point it is in no way exactly like what it used to be like the last months of his life but how it was several years ago. And compared to that it is scarily similar. But what to do? I am just as helpless as ever, or almost. I hope that I can get that person to see a therapist, I guess, what changed is that I do see my own limits and those of my family clearer. I see where I need help. But I want to do more but am unable to help. I have to completely trust a therapist I do not know and believe in his/her ability. This family member does only seldom see the problems caused by him/her and mainly blames the others. There are outbursts of accusations and ugly at that which cause big problems within the family. I feel so helpless again, so tied down. Again I can only hope I am doing things better, I do not know it. I am so scared of a similar spiral as Alexander’s.