My story - the funeral and the time since then

The day of the funeral was unreal. I do not know whether this is the word to describe it but certainly it was just not meant to be. I mean, how can I put my 23 year old brother to rest in a cemetery? He is meant to live for many more years! It is not right that he is in this coffin! I felt so helpless, I am the older sister, I should be able to help him, right? Why did he not come to me, why could I not help him? I would have moved heaven and earth to help him, to keep him alive!
I had not been to a service since my wedding. Isn't that awful? And then it happened that since were so many the front church pew was not long enough. So there were two chairs next to the pew. They were standing in the middle aisle. Since Luke and me were the last ones of my family to enter the church we had to sit there on those chairs. I could not help but think of our wedding just two weeks ago where we were sitting in a similar position but my world was still alright and the best it could have been.
Many of Alexander's friends had called us and wanted to contribute to the service. When his school friends, also trained singers, started singing, it was as if Alexander were up there. One of them had the same pitch of the voice. I wanted him to stop singing so badly even though it was so nice and beautiful and moving.
Our priest gave a wonderful sermon letting people know of how torn Alexander was inside himself without leaving out to mention his great smile, wonderful bright eyes, his warmth when he went to hug you. He had this wonderful gift of being 100% there for someone else who needed him. However, he could hurt you just as bad, too. And the priest encouraged us survivors to live. I am still trying.
There were hundreds of people to walk with him on his last way on this earth. Too many young people. I mean, there should be mainly old people when a funeral takes place, right?
Alexander had always said the last few weeks how he was so alone. There were sooo many friends of his there to be with him one last time! He was not alone. One of them wrote us later, even though Alexander could not see it any more, he had many friends who were there for him and now miss him dearly. A few brought a tree the day of his funeral. The next day they came to pick it up again - they were going to plant it in their garden but wanted to show him the tree first. Now they can still have him with them in years to come when they party or have barbecue in that garden. How wonderful and yet so depressing to know that he had the friends, but could simply not see it anymore.
On Saturday we moved his stuff out of his place in the town where he studied. I was not there, I did not need to see the room. Alexander had only moved in there right after our wedding, so he barely lived there for two weeks. Ever since then it became real in a certain way that he is gone when I saw his stuff.
On Sunday night we went back to our home. The next few weeks now almost two months were tough. I got to know myself in ways that I did not need to know. Sometimes I get angry and upset without reason. Sometimes poor Luke is in my way then. I am so sorry for not being able to deal with my emotions at all times. We went to see my parents fairly often. While it was good to see them it was always really hard to be there, too. But what I miss most here is not being able to go to his grave. The first month I could barely even cry. I thought I had to cry a lot. But tears came, although not nearly as often as I thought they had to come. Just before the first four weeks had passed I started having really bad weeks where I could not do anything. I had to write a paper for school but was unable to even do the tasks I usually do to keep me from my desk. I have never before felt so completely helpless. I finally managed to hand in my paper last Tuesday after receiving some help from my professor, my aunt and my parents. I believe I would not have managed to finish in time without their help. Thanks for your help!

My story - the week before

We still felt that amazing happiness surrounding us, I think it was one of the happiest two weeks in my life. The first week of our 'normal' life had passed. On April 30 my mum came to visit us and brought all the presents (we did not want to take them along on our honeymoon...). She stayed for one night. We were all worried about Alexander, more than we had been in a long time. During the week I had picked up a brochure about depression, I had talked to my aunt about how worried I was that he did not seem to enjoy the wedding celebrations. We could not see him on any, ANY picture of the party in the evening! It turned out later that he had spent most of the evening talking with one of our guests, a priest, and even went to sleep during the party, came back but left early. I talked with one of my other brothers and mentioned my worry. He planned to move to the same town as my other two brothers, including Alexander, and told me how he was worried about Alexander coming to him often to talk about his problems - Alexander was running in circles, we all knew what he would say, we would listen, we would say whatever we thought might help him, we did that many, many hours. I told my aunt that I felt that Alexander needed to do something now. It was in the air that he needed to decide and get help. I never imagined the other possibility of that decision although Alexander had mentioned suicide on several occasions to me. We had even debated the pros and cons about it together. One time I was on the verge of driving 250 miles one day to be there and help him find a therapist. Although I took it serious I did not know how to really help him. However, the week before I said to my mum that the next time he would mention anything like that I would call a helpline to have him taken into hospital. After referring to a therapist we were encouraged, however, to go and be with him immediately. Apparently, it would not help to have him hospitalized if he did not want to be treated or did not see himself as being sick. He would just feel like he could not trust me any longer. Instead, we were encouraged to go and be with him asap to help and be there. I even laid out a plan how to help him the week before!!
So my mum came to visit and was visibly nervous since Alexander was going to start with hunting season on the morning of May 1st. However, nothing happened, and he went hunting again that evening and the next day. My little cousin was with him on those trips to the forest. All of us relaxed a bit. It seemed that Alexander could handle weapons and was not harming himself. We were wrong.

My story - the wedding

It is hard to think where to start, so I will start with my wedding. I think my story begins here, since my feelings were severely changed after May 3.
I had my absolute dream wedding on April 18, 2009. We celebrated for three days, beautiful weather, all dear friends and family with us, it was wonderful. On the evening before the wedding we had a big party during which my brothers and sisters performed a splendid play depicting my husband Luke and myself in 30 years with children and all. It was so funny! I laughed and had tears streaming down my face. What a wonderful gift! The service at church was also amazing: I had all my five brothers and sisters around me, and all of them were involved in the ceremony. My younger sisters were my bridesmaids, one of my brothers helped with the procession and said a special prayer, the other one was a groomsman and Alexander, who was a singer, sang with my aunt a piece by Bach and Amazing Grace. It was beautiful! With this all of them helped so much to make our wedding special.
After a big breakfast with our guests we drove back to my parents' house the morning after. In the evening we opened our presents with our immediate family. After that my husband's family had to go to the airport to fly home. My husband's cousin and her husband, however, stayed for a few more days to spend with us. Alexander kept the list with all the presents and generous givers. Those were the last few hours I spent with my brother. However, he was there, but he was also absent. It is hard to describe, but even though he was present, event talked with us about the exact name of the giver, his attitude was such that I quickly forgot that he was there. It was so often during his last few weeks that he was asleep for most of the day or that he was not really involved in whatever was going on that we almost did not expect him to be there. And yet he was and helped us along, in fact is still helping us (we are still writing thank-yous...). I do not remember whether he was there and ate dinner with us that evening. Both Luke and me were really exhausted from a week of few hours of sleep, so we went to bed early that night and slept in. The next day we were touring in the area of my parents place with our two remaining guests and had dinner again at my parents'. Again, I do not remember Alexander being there, although I am fairly sure that he was. We were all happy and still full of the amazing, glowing feeling that was still surrounding us after the wedding. I was living a dream, finally being married to the love of my life. Later, after dinner that night I remember going out in the hallway, where Alexander was headed towards his room. He looked sad. So I asked him whether everything was alright, and he answered "no". So I asked again: "So what is wrong?" His reply: "Simply everything". I hugged him, wanting to ask a bit more. Just that moment our mum came in the hall and through my hug I felt him stiffen up - he did not want her to be there that moment. After my mum had left again it was not the same atmosphere between us anymore, and I did not feel like working hard to restore this feeling since I had guests in the living room. You always have a brother, and even if he is not feeling well, I can listen to him later, right? And truth be told, I knew already his story of what was wrong. It was always the same story and I had heard and listened to it many times. So I headed for the living room while Alexander went to bed. It was the last time I saw him alive.
The next morning we were in a rush to leave for our next stop on our 'honeymoon', my aunt's place. However, we still packed all our gifts (which took a while), so I am pretty sure we did not leave before noon, more like at 1pm. Alexander was still not awake and we were in a rush to finally leave and see at least something of the mountains that day. So I just told my other brother to say goodbye to Alexander, I did not go in his room again. I wish I had said at least a proper goodbye.
We continued with our honeymoon, said goodbye to our guests, had some time by ourselves and finally got back home.