Do I pity Larry, and the pain he must have felt, to make him take the
action that he did? Not really. I try mightily to understand.
I have read volumes on suicide in an effort to understand. I can
almost quote verbatim, the sage advise from the various suicide "experts."
I guess I pity Larry in a detached sort of way, about the same way
as I pity Slobodan Milosevic, the leader of the Serbs. Slobodan lost
both of his parents to suicide. This would send a clear message to
him, that he was not worth staying alive for. Through the unconscionable
act of his parents, he was framed as a victim, a survivor.
Is it any wonder that he trusts no one? If he couldn't trust the two people he loved and trusted most in the world, how could he trust anyone? And, why does his coldness and thirst for power surprise us? In his mind, there are only two roles to play. Victim or Victor. No member of the human race wants to be framed as a victim. Since Slobodan's parents placed no value on human life, neither does he.
I can understand Slobodan's way of thinking, but, I cannot understand how he can allow himself to persecute and slaughter thousands of fellow human beings. Because he has suffered at the hands of his parents, should he now visit a greater torment on other members of the human race? NO NO A THOUSAND TIMES NO! In this, he is more guilty than his own tormentors.
Though
Larry hid it so well, I can understand logically how he must have been
in emotional pain. I realize that I didn't cause him to die.
People with marital problems don't usually kill themselves. They
feel intense pain, but they get through it, whether through marriage counseling,
or divorce. I may have hurt Larry, but I didn't kill him.
His emotional pain was formed long before I knew him. But, whatever
emotional pain he was feeling, like Slobodan, he had no right to take a
human life, even if it was his own.
"Try to dwell on the good memories rather than the bad?"
What good memories? The memories that I thought were good, turned out to be my own foolish perceptions. I believed Larry to be a man of honor and integrity, a kind man. I was wrong on all counts. I cannot remember one instance of empathy in Larry. His word meant nothing. He couldn't be trusted. And, he betrayed me as horribly as one human being can betray another.
"You can't judge a book by it's last chapter?"
I wonder who coined this one! You most certainly can! If the last chapter of a book is less than satisfying, I won't buy a book by the same author again. Larry's last chapter changed the entire meaning of his book. Every memory I have of him, is tainted now, by who he really was, as opposed to who I thought he was.
"Depression kills?" Then I should be dead!
"He loved you and thought that you would be better off without him?"
This was not an act of love! I don't believe Larry was capable of love, not even for himself. And, if you cannot love yourself, you can't love anyone else either. That was my big mistake with Larry. I labored under the foolish delusion that he loved me. I thought we would live out our lives together, drawing comfort from one another. He was either one hell of an actor, or I was the biggest horse's ass this side of the Ohio River. I feel deeply ashamed for having been duped. Like a naive idiot, I was taken in. In retrospect, I believe Larry was looking for a mother, rather than a wife. Larry depended on me for emotional feedback, comfort, and to handle the stresses and conflicts of life for him. I did it gladly. But, when I needed the same from him, he bolted, leaving me utterly alone to clean up the devastating aftermath.
"Suicide happens when our pain exceeds our resources to deal with the pain?"
It has been 14 months since Larry plunged me into this nightmare. My own pain has now "exceeded my resources to deal with the pain." In the morning, I must take my beloved Australian Shepherd into the veterinarian, to have him put to sleep. He lived and worked for Larry and I, all the years we were together. We both loved him . . . or maybe I just thought Larry loved him. There were many emotions I attributed to Larry, that just were not there. I long to be put to sleep right along side of my beloved Dingo dog, but I cannot have my wish. Even if the law allowed me to choose my time and place of death, I could not do it. I have others to think of besides myself. As Robert Frost so aptly put it,
The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
I
am in unbelievable emotional torment tonight. I am bruised and bleeding
inside. Losing Dingo so soon after losing Larry, is almost more than
I can bear. I could escape this pain so easily, the same way Larry
did. I have the blood-splattered gun he used to end his life.
I could slip out of the house tonight with it, and never have to face another
grueling pain-ridden day. I wouldn't have to live on without Dingo,
who is all I have left of the happy little world I thought I had with Larry.
But, Dingo has always depended on me, just as I depended on Larry. Dingo is sick now, suffering with a large inoperable tumor that makes it hard for him to breathe. It is separating his ribs, and pushing in on his lungs. He looks at me with trusting eyes, just as I looked at Larry. Though it is tearing out what's left of my heart, I must not let him down, as Larry let me down, as he let us down.
Every life touches many other lives. My granddaughter, my daughter, my sister, my son-in-law, my mother. I have an unspoken responsibility to them, despite my own suffering. I may not like it, but I am a soldier of life. I will not turn tail and run. There is a line in the movie, "Field Of Dreams" that often plays through my mind. Go the distance. To desert the others suffering in the trenches, would be a reprehensible and dishonorable act, an extremely selfish act.
After 14 months, that is how I still see what Larry did. He took the coward's way out. It takes courage to face the inevitable conflicts that life throws at you. He may have been in extreme mental agony, but then so am I now. His death started an avalanche of crisis' for me, that has been unrelenting for all of these 14 months. And now my dog. But unlike Larry, I love my family enough to spare them the embarrassing stigma, and the long-lasting legacy of self-murder. I love my devoted dog enough to do what is right for him. Larry didn't love me like that.
Do I miss this man who abandoned me while I was drowning? Yes and no. I miss the man I thought he was. I miss the Larry I thought I knew, but I despise the man who killed him! There is a song by Michael Bolton. Part of the first verse goes,
"Don't you know.
So many things, they come and go.
Like your words that once rang true.
Like the love I thought I found in you.
But you walked away
When I needed you most.
The
man I chose to spend the rest of my life with; the man I chose to walk
with me through the mine fields of life, fled like a frightened rabbit,
at the first sign of trouble. He broke all of his promises to me.
He betrayed us all, those of us who loved him.
The man I loved, whom I would have comforted and defended all of my days, didn't even exist. He was only an actor in a mask, giving the best performance of his life.
I mourn mostly for my own loss of innocence. I am changed, altered. I have lost something that I heretofore took for granted, my blind trust in the basic goodness of life. If Larry miraculously came back from the dead tonight, I would never allow him back into my life.
So I grieve for the irreversible damage that has been done, all the "could have beens" and "should have beens", knowing that those halcyon days can never be as they were before. My "happily ever after's" have been shattered, and I will be slow to trust again. I mourn for what I thought I had. I plow onward into my empty days, dreading the endlessness of my future, walking on through the minefields now . . . forever alone.
