I haven't posted much in quite a long time. Long time fabbers may remember other posts I made about 4 years ago regarding my brother.
He passed away in early January after a 8 year struggle with Multiple System Atrophy which is very similar to ALS.
I have been heading to Brockenhurst in the UK to see him every 3 months or so since we were able to travel after COVID. We were going January 6th for his birthday on January 9th. Woke up to 4 missed calls from my sister in law so I knew something was up. He had passed away in his sleep in the early hours of that morning. It was actually a shock as I had talked to him a couple of days before and he had been out on his scooter the day prior . He was certainly very weak and I talked to him on the phone very few days as oppose to an actual conversation - he could no longer communicate. We flew that day as planned and celebrated his birthday with his children and their families which was lovely. We stayed for two weeks, came home for 5 days before heading back for the celebration of life. There was over 100 people from all over the world and we played some of his favorite music . I saw some of his friends that I hadn't seen since I was about 17 !
Then it hit me hard.
I am now the only remaining member of our family . He had a lot of my parents memorabilia and all my grandfathers WW1 medals and information plus my fathers merchant navy papers. It was very sad to know that I am now the sole keeper of all this and what to do with it all.
We came home after the funeral and I hibernated until about a month ago when I emerged from the fog . The winter here in PA didn't help either as it was pretty brutal. But I'm here alive and starting to enjoy things again . I really didn't realize how much the last 7 years had affected me.
I'm so thankful that he passed away in his sleep which was what he wanted , he was a Dr and knew he didn't want intervention but was also afraid of the end. My brother's absolutely fantastic wife was amazing throughout his illness and I was so lucky, she was so wonderful with the way she cared for him. She is keeping busy and is re-connecting with all the friends and activities that she had to pause . We head over for a wedding in June and I'm so happy that she will come back with us for two weeks and we can have some fun.
I miss him so much but watching this active vibrant intelligent man suffer was terrible and I was sad I didn't make it in time but it wasn't going to get better and he left the way he wanted.
Thank you for listening