I felt like I was sleepwalking and thought it odd, but did not protest. As soon as I emerged from the bedroom, my mother appeared, took me by the hand and led me to my parents’ room. After hours of trying, I decided to go downstairs to have a cup of tea. That first night after the funeral, trying to fall asleep in my childhood bedroom, I tossed and turned and could not sleep at all. Since there was no room for us at my sister-in-law’s residence, we broke from tradition somewhat and stayed at my parents’ home. My parents, sister and I continued the seven days of mourning rituals of our faith. After the funeral, my husband returned to CT with our kids. Ray was very much a part of my childhood memories, though he left the house when I was a little tyke. I had known others who had become ill and died, but this was my first experience as an adult, with the loss of someone so closely related. My brother and I did not see each other often, lived some distance apart, had greatly different views on many issues, but shared some traits of temperament and creativity. The kidney did well, but the patient died, about six weeks later, from cardiac complications. ![]() He received the gift of a kidney through the misfortune of a donor, on the night of his elder son’s wedding. My brother had suffered from Type I Diabetes since his 20’s, had lost a leg and had been on dialysis for some time, due to kidney failure. My brother died a few years before my father, my young nephew, and my young husband. ![]() My brother was nearly 15 years older and my sister was 10 ½ years older, and like a second mother, in some respects. It was extremely meaningful at the time, and continues to be, though it happened such a long time ago. You may consider it peculiar, but I don’t. I will share a very personal story I haven’t told a lot of people. It also depends on the individual nature of the person who has suffered the loss. The long term effects on people, after loss of a sibling, seem to depend on many factors, including age at the time of death, birth order, circumstances, cultural norms, how the family of origin has historically handled loss, stress, and expression of emotions. Meanwhile, three hours away from our residence, my teenage nephew was trying to handle the loss of his brother at age 24, just months before my 38 year old husband’s sudden death, but resources for adolescents and particularly for sibling loss, were glaringly absent. There was really little available at the time to help my kids, who ranged in ages from 4 to almost 14, because our income was very small, though eventually I found some help. I was horrified and persisted until they let me in. I found a structured six session one that was mainly educational, but when I first inquired, I was told it was way “too soon” for me to join. When I was widowed at 35, and had multiple close family deaths in a very short time, there were no such groups in our area. The groups for kids are organized by age and are for kids who have lost any close family member. They also offer a support group for young widows and widowers. ( ) Mary’s Place offers help for kids from ages 3-18, and has activities and small groups for them. We are fortunate in the area where I live, to have a wonderful organization called Mary’s Place, a non-profit Center for Grieving Children and Their Families. I have discovered that sibling loss can often keep people in places of sadness, even of fear and anxiety for a long time. I haven’t noticed programs that specifically address loss of a sibling, whether as a young child, as an adolescent, or as an adult either. Nowadays you can find a variety of groups and resources for widows and widowers, and for those who lose young children. Not a lot of research appears to have been done in this area. Sibling loss at any age can have a longtime effect on many of us. Of course those memories tend to change anyway, as the people who are part of them change, but when siblings have died, there is now a missing link to what is part of your emotional memory. The family of origin you knew as a child, with the important players or figures that were part of it, no longer exists as you remember. If you have been through loss of a sibling, you may feel as I sometimes do, that you have lost a link to a shared family history, and to the family constellation that once was.
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