During his sober times he was nothing short of spectacular. A witty sense of humor, a charming personality, bright blue eyes and a spark that lit up every room. During his prime, he was a confident and sassy gay man who was also a gorgeous and talented Drag Queen (let me tell you what a mindfuck it is to have a brother who is a more beautiful woman than you are!). He is sarcastic, bold and fiercely loyal -- if you are in his circle, you are golden and if you aren’t, watch out. He’s everything you’d want in a brother and a friend but has never truly known just how special and extraordinary he is.
Maybe I should have told him more.
It wasn’t until I left Seattle in January that I allowed myself to acknowledge and admit that I missed him, a lot. It had been over three years since I have seen or heard from him personally, which I justified because I had a firm boundary around his drug use and lifestyle choices. We made an agreement a long time ago that when he was using the heavy, scary, unpredictable drugs I would remain at a safe distance from his lifestyle. A boundary he has always honored.
And to be honest, over these last three years I was experiencing massive shifts in my personal life and had become consumed with my own pain and struggle. I was so far heads down in my stuff that I didn’t have the capacity to give attention to anything that wasn’t in my immediate stratosphere. He was out of sight and out of mind. But when faced with the harsh reality that I may not ever see him again, the regrets came flooding in and were slowly overwhelming me.
Maybe my boundaries didn’t need to be so black-and-white, all-or-nothing. Maybe when we are going through our own stuff, we also need to remember that others are struggling too. Maybe when life becomes all-consuming this is exactly the time we need to consciously connect with our loved ones. Maybe if I had done those things, I wouldn’t have lost precious time with my brother.
Three months had passed since we launched our search and still no one had heard from him. With each day that passed, my heart sank but my determination remained fierce. I wasn’t ready to accept that he may have passed without his family knowing, without one of us by his side. I couldn’t bear knowing that his story could end alone and afraid somewhere on the cold, dark streets of Seattle. I continued to beg and plea with the Universe. I held on tightly to the relentless hope that I would see him one more time, that I would be able to look him in the eyes and tell him I loved him for exactly who he is.
I understood him differently now. My experience in Seattle changed me and changed my perspective on his “life choices” (which I realize now aren’t much of a choice at all). I can see now that he is in a constant state of fight-or-flight just trying to survive another day. Every minute of every day is consumed with where and how he will get his next high. He is driven by the fear of crippling withdrawals and the torturing mental health issues that surface when he is coming down. His only relief is the high that numbs him. I understand now and I no longer hold judgement.
And then, on a random Thursday, I woke up to a text sent at 12:01am: “Hi Reg it’s your little brother (the fabulous one) I love you! Jason”.
There are not enough words to describe the emotions in my heart that morning. For the first time in months, I felt myself release a deep sigh of relief.
Turns out the work we did in January paid off after all. He had been arrested and because there was a missing persons report filed, my mom was notified. Upon being released from jail he had reached out to her, who without hesitation, agreed to bring him home for a few days. All he wanted was a hot, safe shower and a warm meal. He got both of those things and slept until 5pm the next day.
We spoke later that night after he woke and cried together for nearly an hour. He was so touched that we had been looking for him, truly shocked that we had made such an effort to find him. Through my tears, I was able to tell him how much I missed him, how worried I had been and how badly I wanted to see his face with my own two eyes. The feeling was mutual. He agreed to stay a few extra days at my mom’s until I could get to town. Two days later I was in Seattle physically hugging him and we spent three glorious days together.
Over the years, he would occasionally come home to my mom’s for a few days at a time. I had heard about the behaviors and emotional swings that come with detoxing and withdrawals, but never personally witnessed them. The first two days of my visit he mostly slept. When he was awake, he was withdrawn, socially awkward and compulsively eating and chain smoking. His back ached and had severe stomach issues. When we talked, he wouldn’t make eye contact and gave short, one-word answers. I suspected that having a houseful of people with all eyes on him was overwhelming, particularly when you have been living in isolation for so long. Add in the intense physical and mental distress that comes with detoxing coupled with a strong dose of shame and guilt and it's a cocktail for severe anxiety. So, I gave him space to engage with me on his terms while I was there.
By the third night he was back to his magical self! He sat with us at the table, engaged in the conversation, made eye contact, laughed at jokes, made jokes and I could finally see the sparkle in his eyes again. We normalized being homeless and talked about his “home” just as if I was talking about my “home.” We talked about real world issues, how spectacular the Seattle homeless community is, about childhood memories and went through old family photos.
We also took photos ad nauseum. Our brothers came over that night too. It was the first time all four of us had been together in almost eight years and we wanted to capture the essence of that moment, not knowing if it could be our last. We talked and laughed for hours. It was magnificent and a memory I will forever hold dear.
I knew that it was only a matter of time before he would need to go back to Seattle, but somehow when the moment came it felt sudden and took my breath away. I wasn’t ready to say goodbye, I hadn’t yet told him all the things I had come to tell him. I had been giving him space and at the same time was losing precious time. I thought I was going to have one more night with him before I flew home the next day and had decided that I would find a way to pull him aside that night so we could finally talk alone. But his addiction was on a different timeline.
That afternoon my mom called crying, panicking. She had taken him to renew his Suboxone prescription, but his UA was positive for crystal meth and Xanax so they wouldn’t refill it. He immediately became desperate and consumed with fear of the physical sickness that comes with withdrawals. Instead of going back to her house, he was demanding that she take him straight to the bus station so he could get back to Seattle where he could quickly access drugs. She was hoping I could talk him out of it, that maybe by reminding him of my visit and the opportunity to have one more night together would convince him to stay. But I was under no illusion that he would succumb to the pressures of our family’s pleas to stay and get clean or that my presence would have any greater effect on his decision. And it was important to me that I did not feed the shame and guilt that already consumed him.
So instead, I told him I understood that he had to leave and asked him if he could come to the bus station nearest to me so I could give him a hug goodbye. I was trying to stay strong but my voice immediately cracked and the tears came flooding out. My heart wasn’t ready to let him go. He began crying too and said he loved me, thanked me for coming to see him, but he couldn’t do that. He had to go. Out of desperation to have the final moment together I had been planning all along, I asked if he would wait long enough for me to come to him, that I would sit with him until the next bus came. He said yes.
It took me 15 minutes to get to him – I drove like a bat out of hell sobbing the entire way. My eyes were so full of tears I could hardly see the road. I wanted to be so strong in our final minutes together and for that moment to be overflowing with love, encouragement and positivity, so I was frantically trying to get my emotions under control. But when I got there, I held on to him for dear life spewing all the I love yous and I’m proud of yous and you mean the world to mes. I told him how sorry I was that we fell out of touch, how truly special he is and how lucky I am to have him as my brother. We stood there crying, laughing and embracing until the bus came 10 minutes later.
I stood on the sidewalk paralyzed as I watched him get on the bus. There was a deep knowing in my heart as they drove away…I couldn’t shake the feeling that this might be the last time I would ever see him. I wanted to etch that final moment into my heart so deeply that I would never forget it. Through the tinted windows of the bus, I could see him waving goodbye as they drove away.
Those days with him were miraculous and healing and very bittersweet. I came home with a heart full of joy and gratitude and with an equal amount of ache and sadness. There are experiences in life when, in the moment, we don’t have the awareness to know just how meaningful and impactful that memory will be. It hits us months or years later when we look back and can see just how extraordinary it was. But this time, I knew going in exactly how powerful this moment would be.
I had the fortunate opportunity to be intentional about crafting that moment to be exactly what I wanted because I knew the chances of it happening again were slim. I made a conscious choice to go into the weekend with zero expectations - to let it flow as it was meant to happen and to let go of my need to control the process. I wasn’t, however, willing to let go of my need to achieve my desired outcomes. I came to give him a hug, to look him in the eye and tell him I loved him for everything he is and everything he isn’t. I wanted him to go back to Seattle with more love and light in his heart than he left with. I wanted him to be overflowing with love and affection and reminded that he is not alone.
I accomplished my goals in the first and last ten minutes of our visit. Everything else that happened in between was icing on the cake.
While my heart aches for him every day, there is a comfort in looking back and feeling no regret. I have a lot of other emotions swirling around in my head and heart, but regret is not one of them. I showed up exactly how I wanted to, I stayed true to my commitment to honor him and meet him where he is at (figuratively and literally!). There is a warm feeling of peace in my heart knowing if that was truly our last interaction, it was everything I had hoped it would be.
And still, I pray every day that it won’t be and that we will be blessed with the opportunity to create more memories together. But the reality is that I don’t know if there will be a Part Three to our story – this is a conscious awareness that brings me to my knees on some days. I’m still trying to figure out how to let go and accept our story for what it is, and at the same time, I dread what the future might hold.
For now, I’m grounding myself through the practice of gratitude and expressing my profound appreciation to the Universe, the Angels, the Spirit Guides and all the Gods for conspiring together to grant us that moment in time. That moment was bigger than us – it was a spiritual gift specifically curated to deeply embed connection, remembrance and healing into our hearts. For that, I am forever grateful.
“You can’t heal the people you love. You can’t make choices for them. You can’t rescue them. But you can promise that they won’t journey alone. You can loan them your map, but this trip is theirs.” ~ Laura Jean Truman
A Love Letter
Beautiful Boy,
If only you knew how special you are. How you are the spark that lights up every room you are in. How that smile and those dazzling blue eyes are the bright spot in someone’s day. How you can make others laugh in an instant with your witty and sarcastic sense of humor. How you can so skillfully capture the beauty and the tragedy of emotions through your art. You are simply extraordinary, beautiful boy.
You deserve a long, remarkable life full of success and abundance…. but this is bigger than you. Your addiction is shrewd. It started as something fun and devious and then slowly began to sneak into every crevasse of your soul stealing your light and replacing it with darkness. It created a world where you believe that being your true self isn’t enough and tricked you into believing that your pain and sorrow is more than you can manage on your own. A world full of scarcity and fear and a constant need to run from yourself. A world where you can only exist in the dark shadows of our society.
If only you knew that you held the answers the whole time. That YOU are the cure for your pain, your regret, your shame and your guilt. That all you ever needed was to believe in yourself, to love yourself and to accept yourself just the way you are.
Baby brother, my deepest hope and desire for you is that you can find a way to invite peace and love into your heart. That you can free yourself from your pain and suffering through the sincere belief that you are worthy of a life rich in connection, love and laughter. That you know, without question, that you are enough exactly the way you are. That you could see how you light up the world around you with your exquisite gifts. And that you can finally see just how fabulous you really are, inside and out.
I love you, beautiful boy.
With all my love and gratitude,
Your Adoring Big Sis