A Confession I’ve Made Before

A snapshot I’ve been meaning to write down for a long time.

In the above image, you’re looking at what was very likely my very first birthday present.

Signed C. Carney 1997, a year after I was born, this chair and another like it were made for my sister and I. This picture was taken on one of the worst days of one of the worst times in my life; a period that is still going on as I write this.

If you look closely, you’ll see the beer and cigarettes that have never been far from my reach as of late.

I sat in this chair to take a break from organizing and culling my worldly possessions, a task I’d been putting off for a while. You see, I’m living a fairly transient lifestyle at the moment. I technically have an apartment, but it’s more of a room in an old camping lodge. I technically have storage for all my things, but it’s more of a waterlogged basement that’s slowly destroying my things with mold.

Slimming down my inventory is very necessary to my survival, but I’ve taken to calling it “adapting a minimalist approach” instead.

In this mess of possessions are some items from more than a decade ago: photos and mementos from my late sister.

I won’t go into the details. Just know that she died young, yet old enough to really do some damage. Her life up until her passing was tumultuous and difficult. She suffered from drug abuse, and we suffered alongside her. All of that leads me to this confession:

I’m glad my sister died.

This opinion, which is more of a fact of my mind, always scared me. Before she passed I’d wished she was gone, maybe not necessarily dead, just somewhere else forever. This was a product of the suffering she’d caused me, my parents, and the people closest to her.

After her death I was told by quite a few therapists that this opinion is not something to be scared or ashamed of. It’s quite a normal reaction to a family member passing in this context. I was told that somewhere deep down inside me I was glad her suffering came to an end, and I think that is definitely part of it.

However, it’s been almost ten years. I’ve had time to think.

Sitting on this chair, this first birthday present, I’ve considered the person that I’ve become. In this past six months it’s been very easy to convince myself that I am not a good person. I’m a liar and a cheater and a manipulator and a hundred other awful things; and yes, I do think some of that is ingrained into the person that I am. There are also some tremendously good things within me at the same time.

So that brings me to this sort of discovery of the present through the past. I’m slowly but intentionally trying to unlearn all of these bad character traits that I’ve developed over the years, and doing that by seeking professional help. I’ve been doing this since my sister died, and I really don’t think that I would’ve ever seen a therapist if she hadn’t died so suddenly.

It’s her fault that I’m working so hard on myself, and that I’ve spent so much time learning about my shortcomings. It’s her fault that I’m trying to find myself and that I’m seeking happiness. It’s her fault that I’m not afraid to make mistakes and then learn from them.

I’m glad my sister died.

There is an indescribable sadness that come’s along with this appreciation. It’s an uncomfortable dichotomy of basic emotions that, when I think long and hard about it, I feel thankful to get to experience. The dynamism of the human condition, what a thrill!

Really though, what this all comes down to is that I would not be the person I am today without experiencing my sister’s death. Do I wish she was around to see the person that I’ve become? Absolutely. Do I wish that my parents never had to go through the loss of their first child? Absolutely.

Can I be realistic about her suffering, the conclusion of it, and what that’s meant for my life as a whole? Absolutely.

Can I let go of the guilt I feel from being a survivor? It’s damn hard, and I’m not there yet, but I’m determined I can do that, too.

This confession was always a difficult one to make, even in safe spaces like therapy. I always felt that it made me a worse person, and that it diminished the significance of my sister’s life. One therapist I saw told me that without feeling those specific, difficult emotions I could never make progress with my own self. That I had to choose between progress or wallowing in the past and denying myself the ability to feel new suffering.

Deny your feelings, or feel like the devil but with the ability to move forward; the answer to me was clear.

I’ll not stop sitting in that chair that my grandmother gave me for my first birthday. It’s extremely small and eventually it will break, but until then I’ll use it to think back on my life at its simpler stages. I’ll use it to think back to my sister, and I’ll make sure that each time I thank her for dying and showing me a life I’d never see otherwise.