7 years later...and I'm still trying to make sense of his death

So, not sure if this will help, but my therapist wants me to reach out and share my story. Maybe find something that will help me cope with the grief of losing my younger brother. It’s been about 7 years now…7 years in August. And I am just now coming to terms with wanting to cope with everything that has happened. I hadn’t realized that how much his death has affected aspects of my life…for years after I self-medicated myself with marijuana because I was not ready to deal with everything. My therapist believes I may have some PTSD from his death. But now that I have shaken off the cobwebs, I’m ready to start coping with what has happened. So here’s a little background…I come from a family of 13 kids…3 biological, 10 adopted. Of the ten adopted, 3 are from China and 7 from Korea. My brother and I came from Korea.

So the morning of, I had just gotten off an overnight shift at a group home and was ready to go to bed. I received a call from my mom, frantic because she could not find my brother at our cabin, where he was supposed to be taking care of the animals. I told her I had not heard from him, and told her to call me back when she found him…which she did. She called me back shortly after, frantic and telling me to call 911 because they had found him in the woods. I was so shocked I had to have my roommate at the time call for me, and then have her drive me up to the cabin, which was an hour away. It seemed like forever, and as we drove there, were passed by several emergency vehicles that I knew were headed there. I finally got to the cabin and found my family huddled together. From what I had learned, my brother had taken one of my dad’s shotguns and gone into the woods. My parents were the ones to find him a short distance away from the cabin. To be honest, a lot of it was a blur. My younger brothers and sisters were there so I spent time consoling them, and then contacting the rest of my siblings to inform them of what had happened. It would be a few hours before any of them made it to the cabin. I remember the police telling my dad that the medical examiner was going to be bringing my brother to the morgue, and my dad going onto the porch to watch. I remember I didn’t want my dad to be there by himself, so I went to join him, and watched as they carried my brother out on a stretcher. The next few days were surreal…going to the funeral home and seeing his body, the funeral a few days later.

After that, I shut down emotionally. I threw myself back into school and work (I went to college fulltime and worked fulltime). My boyfriend at the time was not terribly supportive, and I distinctly remember him telling me about a month after his death to ‘get over it’. (We broke up about a week or two later). I sought help and was put on antidepressants, of which I felt did not help. I did not go to therapy as I had had a bad experience as a child and was not ready. And, for a short time I was suicidal. Though, deep down I knew that I did not want to put my family through that again. Instead, I threw myself into unhealthy activities to hide from the pain.

Now, seven years later I’m ready to finally deal with the pain and grief of his death. I still feel guilty because he was my younger brother and I felt that we were pretty close growing up. I didn’t see any signs beforehand, but I knew he had some anger issues with my parents. He was ready to go to college, he had a lot of friends. He was so young and his whole life ahead of him. And then he was gone. And he didn’t leave a note…so we will never know why or what compelled him to do it. I’m hoping that by posting this, I can maybe reach out to someone else that is going through something similar, and also gain ideas or skills to help me through the grief process. I constantly struggle with depression and anxiety as a result, so I want to find a way to cope with everything in a healthy way. I want to be able to watch a movie or tv program without cringing every time someone holds a gun to their head. Any comments, ideas, stories, or well anything I guess would be helpful.