I don't often post a new thread here, but I just responded to Windy ways post and it put me in a really sad place. I have not allowed these thoughts or feelings to creep up in me for a solid decade, but here they are and I guess I am still very hear sick over this.

I mentioned the death of my step brother that crashed my shelf:

It is hard to explain sometimes, what shakes us out of our mormon comas. For me, it was when my step brother died. Bless his heart. He had special needs and could not take care of himself. When he was in his 20's his mom and her asshole husband left him alone and moved to Okinawa. He regularly had massive seizures, a few months into him living alone, his sister's husband found him dead in the bathroom. He had been there for 3 days. He had a seizure and had fallen down, smashing his head on the toilet. He died alone and laid there for 3 days. I went to his funeral in Pennsylvania and it crashed my shelf of mormonsism. Everything was "he is in a better place", "thank goodness he went through the temple a few months ago"- then hearing the bishop and stake president drone on about the plan of salvation making it all ok. I kept thinking it was all so disgusting but I couldn't put it into real words or thoughts- I just knew something was wrong.

In the airport on the way home, I picked up Krakauer's amazing "Under the Banner of Heaven". It explained the void I was suddenly experiencing. As you learn about the real history of the mormon church, I believe you will have clarity as to what you are experiencing. It is all wrong. All of it is wrong.

To explain a little further.

When I was a missionary, my mom married my step dad. Thanks for waiting for me to come home mom... I would have loved to have been there... but anyway-

I now had an adult step brother and sister around my age, and their younger brother who was mentally challenged and regularly suffered from seizures, often massive.

He was living with my mom and her new husband (my step dad, his dad) so when I came home, we were suddenly living under the same roof.

He had suffered brain damage when he was born, so he did not have the capability to make rational decisions. He would constantly steal things from stores, try to take over the bus driving duties from the bus driver WHILE HE WAS DRIVING DOWN STATE STREET IN OREM (not a cool thing 2 weeks after 9-11 happened)and he would sometimes run away which scared the shit out of all of us.

It was a lot for my mom to handle, so I had him move in with me and my buddy in a little rental house in Orem. We had fun with him, we loved him, he was our little brother. I never left him for a night by himself because it was so obvious that was dangerous for him. He loved Michael Jackson and his singles ward and regularly had all the weird local young adult mormons over to our place. He thought it was so cool to be living with roomates :).

This is the part I wish I could take back. This hurts. My roomate and I decided to move to Arizona, which left him to move back in with his dad and my mom. He was mad about it and acted out constantly until they decided he had to move to Pennsylvania to be with his mom.

She, the temple recommend holding bitch that she is, decided to move to Okinawa with her husband. He was dead within a few months.

I feel so much guilt over this. We all let him down.

It was the mormon funeral that did it for me. The hypocrisy oozed from the pulpit. All the talk about God's plan etc made me ill. He was dead because he had been severely neglected. By his mother. He was not in a better place, we left him in the ground. I mentioned in the previous post I picked up a copy of Under the Banner of Heaven by John Krakauer on the way home. By the time I landed in Phoenix Mormonism was over for me. Thank god my wife followed suit a few months later.

Not sure what to say that isn't trite. Thank you for sharing this terribly human tale. It is really and truly awesome that he had the roommate time in Orem that you were able to provide. His death is not your fault, but that doesn't make it any less tragic.

(((((((Virtual Hugs to you)))))))))))))

thank you so much

Please don't feel badly over moving to Arizona. Young people are going to have changes in their lives as a matter of course. (I had lots of roommates, but none lasted more than two years. They found romantic partners, or new jobs, or went back to school.) You handed him off to what seemed like a safe situation with his dad. You didn't abandon him. In fact, you probably brightened his life considerably for the period of time that you lived together.

The death of a loved one is a double-edged sword. It can leave you feeling vulnerable (and Mormon missionaries are trained to take advantage of this,) but it can also bring great clarity. I felt that I never saw people so clearly as I did after the death of someone close to me.

You sound like a good person, Aaron. I wish you peace.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/19/2017 06:46PM by summer.

Thank you Summer, I appreciate the kind words

It appears that your sense of compassion has been acutely enhanced through this painful experience. We all find experiences coming into our lives that expand and help our understandings and give us cause to ponder. Sometimes with regret. You are right in feeling that your mother and step father, 'missed the boat' when they abandoned your step brother.

To trivialize your step brothers passing by saying things like "he is in a better place" is simply an attempt to try to absolve them selves from the responsibility for the caring of the lives of those less fortunate.

Perhaps you could spend sometime putting down on paper the things you enjoyed about your step brother and reminisce about the good times. You can't do anything about the past but you can make the present less painful by remembering the good times with him.

It is certainly not your fault. Where I live in the Northeast, There are government services to look after a severely disabled adult when the family can't handle it.
There would have been somebody checking up. A Homemaker aid or some kind of caretaker. Did his parents even try to get some help before they left?

they had a family friend come stay with him, but more to help the friend out as he was blind and needed a place to live. The blind friend split after a week or so leaving my step brother alone. I remember when my mom told me - holy smokes this may sound made up but its true- when my mom told me he was living alone I said "he is going to die, he needs supervision." He had probably already passed at that momement. I got the call that he died only a few days later.

I think you are amazing for having him as a roommate. You gave him some real happiness and allowed him to feel normal for a while. It wasn't your responsibility to take care of him EVER as he wasn't your brother, but you did it anyway.

I have a disabled brother. In fact, I have two disabled brothers, but one became disabled at age 42 from a brain bleed and does really well on his own. But my first disabled brother had a stroke when he was born. He had other things happen also. He has seizures, too. He does live alone, but my older brother, the other disabled brother, looks in on him several times a day and helps him. The mormon neighbors help him. They are just really wonderful people. My brother and the husband grew up together. They'd be good people whether mormon or not. My brother lives in my parents' home. They died 8 years ago.

I KNOW how difficult it can be to deal with someone disabled and you took care of him. Gave him a bright point in his life. You did a better job of taking care of him than his own parents.

I think you are wonderful! I'm glad you found your way out of mormonism, but be proud of yourself for the type of person you are.

thanks to all for the kind responses. I did not mean to open up about this but- you know- vodka is a real thing haha. I love all of my friends here, thank you all.

aaron, you have the best of my wishes. I've seen early death and it hurts. I too have wondered what I could have done. You are not alone.

thank you donbagley, I am sorry for your early loss as well.

I cried reading your post. For several reasons. Then I cheered for you. Then I thought what a gift you had form your brother. You got out. This "gift" of sight, of hope, of your future. Again, you are NOT alone. Thanks for sharing your story.

butterfly48 I never thought of that, that his passing was a gift to shake me out of the church. I have twin girls that will never be on the records of the mormon church because I resigned before they were born. That is certainly a blessing. Thank you.

Ditto what butterfly 48 said.