I had never had a good relationship with my mom. It is only recently that we have become close. We still aren't as close as I hope to be with my children but we have come a long way in the past few years. When my parents got divorced I moved in with my dad. I didn't talk to my mom for almost an entire year.

My mom wasn't the only one that I had those feelings about. Feelings as though something could have been done. I blamed everyone at some point during the next week. I blamed my dad for not doing something Sunday night and for yelling at him like he did. I blamed Brandon for doing drugs. I blamed the neighbor that found him for not calling 911 sooner. I even blamed Madison and my husband. Indirectly. Mostly I blamed myself. I had so much going on that I wasn't taking care of him like I did in the past. I should have taken him to the hospital Sunday afternoon.

It seems as though I was always the one that took care of Brandon. We both moved in with my dad when my parents got divorced. Brandon was still young enough that it was court ordered he stay with my mom every other weekend. But when he wasn't with my mom I was the one taking care of him. I always made sure that he had money for whatever he needed. I made sure he went to school and tried to get him to stay out of trouble. I am the one that took him to get his senior pictures taken. His death has made me feel like I failed. Him.

I put all my energy that week into making his funeral what I thought he would want it to be. I'm sure it wasn't exactly what he would have wanted. I know there are things that he would have done differently. But I also know that I did the best I could. I slept a total of maybe 24 hours that entire week. Maybe. I was scared of not knowing what had actually happened and not knowing what the future was going to be like without him. We had to wait for the autopsy before we would know what caused his death. Thoughts of suicide went through all of our minds. Thoughts of a drug overdose. Deep down I knew that it was neither of those. I knew my brother too well to think that he would kill himself. He wasn't that kind of person. Not matter what he knew he always had me. An overdose was possible but I knew it wouldn't have been intentional. We didn't actually get the autopsy results until after his funeral. Weeks after. His death was caused mainly by gastritous. He also had Zanax in his system. He was on prescription pills for his Bypolar. I will never know if those are what his doctor prescribed. But the relief of actually knowing that he didn't do it to himself was good.