My send off to DU2 - or "The Straight Story"

[The Straight Story]

Been here over 7 years, was reading the site before then.

To be honest, I was a raving rw idiot in some ways before I came here. But I also was looking for a different point of view. And I found that here.

Over time, reading the responses here, I had realized that I was wrong on some things and found a home on the net. The very people I was making fun of were the ones who were most aligned with how I really felt.

I joined up during what was the best time of my life. I had a good job, had just bought a home next door to mom, was happily married.

August 2004. By the end of the year my life would start unwinding. I was at the 'top'. Went to Chicago for a business trip - the only team lead asked to go to a manager's and director's meeting, it was the first time I had ever been there.

I came home at the top of the world. And then my life came crashing down. Mom was in the hospital and sick. Two months later...we had an ice storm, she had come home and then went back to the hospital on Christmas eve. She died on New Years' eve.

Mom's best friend died some months later, mom #2 we called her. Then my first X died and I found my kids after 8 years of not seeing them. A year later my current X found out she had Parkinson's disease.

I could go on - it was all downhill. Time after time I came to DU and talked about it and had friends here lift me up. I have few friends left, most of my best friends have died. Scott in a car wreck, Brady from an accidental OD, James (as I recently learned) moved back to Ohio and someone broke in and shot him in the head and burned down his house.

Through the biggest problems of my life I have been able to come here and post about them, get them off my chest. And have found people to lift me up. Others in my life just dismissed it all because they only were part of one piece of it. No one in my family understood me losing my kids and not seeing them for years, or my friends dying, they just saw how mom's death affected me - because that is all that affected them.

I found here on DU a group of people that would hear me out, listen, and lift me up on my darkest of nights - and I have not even posted a tenth of what has all went on.

We can argue about lots of topics, do battle over the most silly of things. But when it has come down to the things that have the most impact on me directly you have been a bright light on many a dark nights.

From my son going to Iraq to everything else I found solace here.

Thank you all. I look forward to many more years on DU3.

For mom and my first X:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f5oRMVRFqsY

[tblue]

1. Love to you...

:grouphug:

[shraby]

2. That's what friends are for.

:thumbsup:

[erinlough]

3. Hi Straight Story

we have never talked but I am a daily reader of this site, not a big poster. I don't know why, but I remember you when you came to DU. I wondered if you were in the right place at first, but I have come to look forward to your posts and point of view. In this posting world of DU I come to know people by what they say and I must tell you that I have noticed the change in you and it is a pleasant one (IMHO). I'll see you in DU3! Thanks for sharing.

[erinlough]

4. Actually you were formally here before me!

I had been reading from about 2003, but never registered. I came here from Smirking Chimp, but was afraid to register and certainly afraid to post. Funny how time changes things.

[The Straight Story]

7. Thanks my friend

I have noticed a change in myself here as well. I look forward to seeing all of my friends here on DU3.

It's been a long road, one filled with many new insights and changing world views.

DU was one place in my life that has been there for me and guided me. I still don't agree with folks on some things, suppose I never will, but I am in debt to many here for seeing me through the worst times in my life with caring and compassion.

This is a site my mom would have loved. She taught me, more than others, to care for others.

It was her compassion and love that finally made me see the light.

[housewolf]

5. Straight Story

I came to DU right around the same time you did, and I remember well some of the horrors and suffering you've lived thorough over these past 7+ years. Your vulnerability and your honesty with your feelings, as well as your willingness to ask for and receive solace has been a true inspiration to me. There's such an authenticity about you, you don't hide and you don't pretend. And that's been an inspiration to me over the years.

Thank you for being here. You're a gift to all of us.

:hug:

[The Straight Story]

8. Thanks, it has been a long hard road

There have been so many things I have left unsaid, but the things I have said have been met with a great kindness.

That last night I saw my mom alive is, perhaps, one of the most defining moments of my entire life.

It is only here I can talk about it really. Which is sad to me in a way.

She was not attached to anything. I went there to spend the night with her. I was supposed to relieve my dad for the night. I had my crossword puzzle and my book on number theory. I walked into the room and mom was just talking crazy things.

I stopped in my tracks and asked dad what was wrong. He pulled me out into the hallway and told me mom was dying. She was not supposed to be dying.

Mom yelled out, and dad ran back to the room. I followed. She was worried about the baby in the pillow, she was sure the baby would suffocate. She had always called my daughter the baby. She wanted a knife to cut the baby out of the pillow.

Dad handed her a fake knife and she cut the baby out of the pillow. And then she saw me standing there, crying. And she stopped and asked dad why I was there.

"I don't want him here Mick (my dad's name), send him home" she said. And she smiled at me.

Dad told her I was there to relieve him for the night. She would have none of that. "Send him home, he should not see me like this" He went to tell the nurses that he would be there for the night. In those brief few moments I told mom I would be back later, we would go for a drive and have a smoke and that I would take her home.

I got to the hospital two nights later about 2 minutes too late. She was gone. My sister looked up and said 'She took her last breath a few minutes ago'

I still kick myself for not staying that night - but mom did not want me to stay and see her like that.

[housewolf]

9. Dear SS,

Even after all these years, your pain, sorrow, grief and guilt shine through.

My prayer for you is that you can find forgiveness and peace, and with it, a release of your sorrow and sunshine in your heart again. Not that you'll ever forget - you won't - but with forgiveness and release, your heart can open anew to yourself as you are and to others.

You're not a horrible person. You're not guilty of not being there for your mother, nor for not being able to save her. Not being able to be with her during her final hours and not being able to say good-bye to her don't have to be the defining events of your life. Those things speak nothing to who you are. They have been a burden you have carried that you can put down when you're ready to release that suffering.

You've been through so much, and suffered so much, but that's not who you are. Who you are is a loving, caring, sensitive man who has the creative ability and strength to set the burden of your suffering down and move forward in life in a new light into a world of new possibilities for yourself. Happiness is possible for you. Love is possible for you. Creative expression is possible for you. Joy is possible for you.

I hold you in a bright light and pray for all of those for you.

Peace be with you, dear one.

[Kaleko]

6. Hey buddy,

it's very moving to see a man's heart broken open rather than broken down.

[housewolf]

10. Beautifully put

n/t

[ellisonz]

11. Good to have you here Straight Story

Whenever I see one of your name on a post, I always know there's going to be something solid there. :hi: