Brother Steve and Kubler-Ross

My thanks to all of you who came to Steve’s prayers, attended his funeral or wrote condolences on the funeral home website click here.  It meant a lot and I appreciate all of your support and many kindnesses.
My Mom keeps saying “I still can’t believe it” and I too find myself in that Denial Stage One of the grieving process.  However, there are moments when I start to slide into Stage Two Anger.

My brother was sent to Viet Nam when he was 18 years old and I don’t know that he ever really recovered from it.  Maybe no one ever fully recovers after having been to war and done what they’ve done and and seen what they’ve seen.  But in Steve’s case, once he came back home, he was not the same.  He partied post-Nam and God knows he partied hard.  However, the feeling I always had and picked up from him in his non-party moments, seemed that his was more a tears-of-a-clown reality than it was a let-the-good-times-roll kind of act.  It all caught up with and eventually overwhelmed him as he spent the last 30 years of his life in VA facilities and died at 58 years old.  The VA’s administering of electro shock therapy on him in the 80’s took Steve’s already bad situation and made it that much worse.
Recognizing that in life we either make or manage our own misery, I’m not blaming anyone or anything that my brother Steve is no longer with us.  However, were I inclined to do so……   (I only hope Stage Three of the grieving process commences soon.)