I lost my brother, how did I deal with his loss?

It has been six years since my brother died, I was 22, and he was 27. I'm now 28, and every day, I continue to ask why did he go? Why did he die, and why has he left me all alone? My mother only had two children, my brother and me, and now I'm all that's left. I'm the black sheep of my family; I only speak to my mother and grandmother, and the rest outcast me because of the choices I have made in my life.

I'm pursuing my bachelor's degree in Creative Writing as I write, and many people question why, why are you going to college at 28? You should've been done when you were 23 and now have a successful job and a home; I have none of these things. I will tell you why, on 2015 August 25, my father calls me with the news I was preparing for my whole life, just not this soon. He calls and says...

"Darryl is dead, son."

The shock hits you like a rock being thrown at your gut. You can't breathe, and then time stops all around you, and you think to yourself, this is a dream, a bad dream that's all it is, but no, it was real enough. I drove down to my grandmother's house, and my father hugged me so tightly and was crying uncontrollably. To lose the firstborn in the family, I could not imagine my father's sorrow. To get a call from his mother, his son stopped breathing, and he died.

I can still replay that day every moment I wake up on that day, I sit in the backyard, but there was a window I remembered that you could see into the spare room, and being the young individual I was, I wanted to see my brother...every day I wish I did not do what I did, to see my brother's face through the window. To see what I saw, I regret every moment. But it did not really hit me until 2018 when I finally realized my brother was dead.

How did I continue six years later? How have I moved on accepting he is gone? I realized that he never left me. Now I am not a religious man, I don't believe in God, but I believe that when you hold onto valuable possessions, there's a fragment of that person within these items when you hold onto these items. And what I have with me now are the things that he once called treasure.

My mother gave me a necklace he always wore, this necklace bears the Polish Coat of Arms, coming from Poland my brother loved it there, he wanted to go back one day and remain where he called his home. Every day he wore his necklace and looked at that coat of arms; it made him smile knowing that one day, he'd return home. When I wear this necklace, I get the sense that he is watching me, that a small portion of him is traveling with me wherever I go. He may not be there physically, but spiritually he is with me all the time. But, before he left this planet, he gave me some advice.

I still stick to this very day.

"Listen, little man, mom and dad won't be around much longer. When they die, it'll be you and me, but I want you to know something. If I go before them, don't ever stop doing what you love, don't listen to what people say. If they say it's impossible, prove them wrong; if they say you aren't good enough for it, prove them wrong. You are capable of doing great things, and I know you will succeed wherever your life goes."

And I did just that, I graduated from community college with my associate's degree, and now I am pursuing my bachelor's, and soon once that is complete, I aim to go for my master's. I finally accepted he was only gone physically when I scattered his ashes at my grandparents' grave; he's never far from me. I always carry him on my neck, and where I go in this life, he goes with me. There are times where I cry on his birthday because he's not here to celebrate it, but I instead remember all the times he and I got into trouble and what we were planning to do.

I know that many people have a hard time dealing with losing someone you love but, know this, the things that you cherish the most, memories, items they had, photographs, those are the relics that you can never put a price on. They'll always be with you, but they want you to continue in life. My brother said that he did not want me to cry over his death every day but instead laugh when we were foolhardy in our youth and only cry on his birthday. He watches over me every day to keep his little brother safe, and that is enough to make me happy, he may be gone physically, but I know he is still with me. Make them proud, pursue the goals you want to achieve, and know that they're always watching you, and they'll always have your back.