I lost my little sister and it’s my fault

[edgaralanfrog]

My little sister was an alcoholic who did not take care of her health. She, along with myself a few years before her, had gastric bypass surgery because we were both overweight. Due to this, her alcoholism seemed to be 10x worse on her body than another’s.

she died a few weeks ago. We had been estranged. We lived in the same house, but we weren’t the best friends we had been growing up. 7+ years before now we had a big falling out and I chose to not bother to acknowledge her. She hurt me deeply and I wasn’t going to take it. I never spoke to her like she was my sister ever again, not until before she died.

i feel so much guilt and anger at myself for not just letting it all go and being close, but cautious, with her. There are literally no pictures of us together since 2015. It hurt to see how many pictures she had with all her friends and our older sister together, but not me. I know I sound selfish about this, I’m just angry at myself for not being there for her, not being apart of her life.

I hated who she was when she was drunk, so I just let that be her personality to me, and hated her if she was sober or not. She had been so horrible to me before she started to drink as well, and I think if I had just brushed it off and maybe given her the silent treatment for a bit, then slowly let her back in, she wouldn’t have been so self destructive and drank and partied so much. 
Maybe if I had been her sister like I am, like I should’ve been, she’d still be here. Our mom wouldn’t be hurting so bad, I wouldn’t be so full of anger at myself, begging time and space to turn back so I can fix it.

It feels like it’s all my fault. Every single bit of her self destructive lifestyle feels like my fault. I even remember making the decision to not bother to talk or see her, or the urge to show her something like I used to, and feeling like ‘I should do it, but I don’t want to be ridiculed, or yelled at, or be embarrassed if she’s with her friends or on the phone with them’ because that’s what she did when I would try and reach back out. I could’ve done more and I didn’t. 

I didn’t do it because I didn’t want to fight with her and make our mom worry or scared or mad if police were called or if we broke something. I chose to close my door and feelings towards her, and let her go wild.

She was only 28.

She died at home after long hospital visits, weeks of sedation with a tube down her throat. My mom knew she was going to die, was preparing us all, but I and our older sister didn’t believe she was. She gotten better from where she was, she was coming home and she’d have hospice care. I would have to help take care of her, I had before, and I was ready to. It felt like it was my chance to just be there for her again, as best as I could, and I hoped we’d be best friends again.

Before she came home, when she wasn’t sedated but had the tube down her throat, I told her how sorry I was for being horrible, for ignoring her, for everything I did wrong, and asks for her forgiveness, and I told her even if she didn’t forgive me, I still wanted her to know I am sorry and I didn’t hate her like I had said so many times. I told her I loved her and I couldn’t wait for her to come home. I told her I never meant any mean thing I ever said and that I missed her. She couldn’t talk but her face would bunch up like she was gonna cry but no tears came out - I think it was because of the medication, because she looked so sad and distressed. 
 

I don’t know if she remembered me visiting her in the hospital and doing all that, but I was ready to do it again when she was home. She was released on April 15th, the hospital bed and oxygen was ready for her, but she didn’t have any pain medication. The hospice nurses didn’t bring anything but the bed pads and wet wipes. My mom had said they’d be back in the morning with morphine for her; the doctors had given her 3 months of life at the most. I didn’t even think that she was going to die. She had been getting better and could talk and make jokes. 
 

At 8, I saw her for the last time. I helped my mom move her and clean her up, and it was hard because she was in so much pain, and she was heavy from the water weight on her thighs and legs. She looked so tired, and she looked a lot worse than the photos my mom and sent me before she left the hospital. I held her hand tight, brushed her hair back, and told her I was sorry she was hurting. She thanked me for helping her, and my mom told me I could go so she can rest. My mom stayed with her, slept on an air mattress beside her. I kissed my sister’s hand and told her, “I’ll see you later, okay?” and she nodded and then I left her bedroom.

At 1:13am I felt this weird feeling. I felt like I should go see if my mom or sister needed anything, then I looked at the clock and saw how late it was and didn’t go to her room, I didn’t want to wake her up. Then at 1:23am I got this big heavy empty feeling in my chest. Like I felt beyond sad, helpless, and tired. I wish I had a better way of explaining it. Still, I laid in bed and tried to sleep.

An hour later my mom came to my room and told me my sister died. She said “She’s gone. She’s cold.” 
 

The guilt, the regret, the anger, the sadness, and so many other things I can’t articulate are like a tornado in my body, in my head. The hate and blame I have towards myself is overwhelming. I’ve always been an introverted person, which has grown into a recluse in the last few years feels deserved. It feels like the universe is rightfully punishing me for abandoning my sister when she needed me; our father abandoned us, and she tried so hard to reconnect with him, and got to before she died, but it feels like I was no better than him. I could’ve done more and I didn’t, my own anger and grudge towards her should’ve been resolved before any of this, but I kept it up to protect my own feelings and becoming a problem if things got bad between us. I was too afraid of the bad possibilities that I didn’t even think of any good ones.

I wish I could go back so badly. I’d do anything to fix the hurt her death has caused all of us, especially our mom’s hurt.

[KayC]

I am so sorry for your loss.  What you are feeling is for "what might have been."  But that isn't what happened, what you wrote was.  You couldn't have done anything for your sister, you couldn't change  her or her decisions, only she could.  Alcohol is a pretty strong addiction, I know, it's in my family.  It affected half of us, my dad, my older sister.  My mom drank and didn't make good choices but I don't think she was alcoholic.  She was mentally ill though, all her life.

My older sister Peggy quit cold turkey when she married, at his request.  Not many do that.  She was diabetic and her drug of choice was sweets, pastries, candy, etc.  It hastened her death, and I miss her very much, I was her caregiver (she would lose her balance and fall and she had dementia).

Now you are left with guilt and regrets, but I want to say to you that what you are feeling is not fact but feeling, and the two are not necessarily the same.  Be kind to yourself.  
 

Grief Process

This is not a one-size-fits-all, what strikes us one day will be different a few months/years from now, so please save/print this for reference!

I want to share an article I wrote of the things I've found helpful over the years, in the hopes something will be of help to you either now or on down the road.

TIPS TO MAKE YOUR WAY THROUGH GRIEF

There's no way to sum up how to go on in a simple easy answer, but I encourage you to read the other threads here, little by little you will learn how to make your way through this.  I do want to give you some pointers though, of some things I've learned on my journey.

• Take one day at a time.  The Bible says each day has enough trouble of its own, I've found that to be true, so don't bite off more than you can chew.  It can be challenging enough just to tackle today.  I tell myself, I only have to get through today.  Then I get up tomorrow and do it all over again.  To think about the "rest of my life" invites anxiety.
• Don't be afraid, grief may not end but it evolves.  The intensity lessens eventually.
• Visit your doctor.  Tell them about your loss, any troubles sleeping, suicidal thoughts, anxiety attacks.  They need to know these things in order to help you through it...this is all part of grief.
• Suicidal thoughts are common in early grief.  If they're reoccurring, call a suicide hotline.  I felt that way early on, but then realized it wasn't that I wanted to die so much as I didn't want to go through what I'd have to face if I lived.  Back to taking a day at a time.  Suicide Hotline - Call 1-800-273-8255 or www.crisis textline.org or US and Canada: text 741741 UK: text 85258 | Ireland: text 50808
• Give yourself permission to smile.  It is not our grief that binds us to them, but our love, and that continues still.
• Try not to isolate too much.  
• There's a balance to reach between taking time to process our grief, and avoiding it...it's good to find that balance for yourself.  We can't keep so busy as to avoid our grief, it has a way of haunting us, finding us, and demanding we pay attention to it!  Some people set aside time every day to grieve.  I didn't have to, it searched and found me!
• Self-care is extremely important, more so than ever.  That person that would have cared for you is gone, now you're it...learn to be your own best friend, your own advocate, practice self-care.  You'll need it more than ever.
• Recognize that your doctor isn't trained in grief, find a professional grief counselor that is.  We need help finding ourselves through this maze of grief, knowing where to start, etc.  They have not only the knowledge, but the resources.
• In time, consider a grief support group.  If your friends have not been through it themselves, they may not understand what you're going through, it helps to find someone somewhere who DOES "get it". 
• Be patient, give yourself time.  There's no hurry or timetable about cleaning out belongings, etc.  They can wait, you can take a year, ten years, or never deal with it.  It's okay, it's what YOU are comfortable with that matters.  
• Know that what we are comfortable with may change from time to time.  That first couple of years I put his pictures up, took them down, up, down, depending on whether it made me feel better or worse.  Finally, they were up to stay.
• Consider a pet.  Not everyone is a pet fan, but I've found that my dog helps immensely.  It's someone to love, someone to come home to, someone happy to see me, someone that gives me a purpose...I have to come home and feed him.  Besides, they're known to relieve stress.  Well maybe not in the puppy stage when they're chewing up everything, but there's older ones to adopt if you don't relish that stage.
• Make yourself get out now and then.  You may not feel interest in anything, things that interested you before seem to feel flat now.  That's normal.  Push yourself out of your comfort zone just a wee bit now and then.  Eating out alone, going to a movie alone or church alone, all of these things are hard to do at first.  You may feel you flunked at it, cried throughout, that's okay, you did it, you tried, and eventually you get a little better at it.  If I waited until I had someone to do things with I'd be stuck at home a lot.
• Keep coming here.  We've been through it and we're all going through this together.
• Look for joy in every day.  It will be hard to find at first, but in practicing this, it will change your focus so you can embrace what IS rather than merely focusing on what ISN'T.  It teaches you to live in the present and appreciate fully.  You have lost your big joy in life, and all other small joys may seem insignificant in comparison, but rather than compare what used to be to what is, learn the ability to appreciate each and every small thing that comes your way...a rainbow, a phone call from a friend, unexpected money, a stranger smiling at you, whatever the small joy, embrace it.  It's an art that takes practice and is life changing if you continue it.
• Eventually consider volunteering.  It helps us when we're outward focused, it's a win/win.

(((hugs)))  Praying for you today.