[Grey Matter]

My birthday is soon. It is nine days after my brother died, it will be a year. I will be the age he was when he died. I feel like this is wrong, like it shouldn't be allowed. I feel guilt. Anger. Exhausted. I want to sleep my birthday away.

I am so scared to grow older than him. It just makes me cry. And no one understands. I am alone.

[winter4me]

My brother will always be young...I wish he were here today...I miss him more as the years go by, although the grief has softened to a weary sadness, and trying, at times to remember whether he was alive for this or for that...
I am so sorry for your loss. He will still live within you for as long as you live, and there is something to that...something about still "being" if alive in the mind/heart of another.
Now, I am truly growing old, and my parents are gone also, and some old friends...others, the world changes, remains the same,
But now, my own children are grown and a grandchild comes running through the world to remind me that this is a way of bringing moments of joy back again...making things seem new again...laughter and tears...let your grief run wild and your heart break and mend again...

[Grey Matter]

"let your grief run wild and your heart break and mend again"

This was, truly and honestly, hands down, the best advice I have been given in nearly a year. I've been told so many times that I am grieving too long. That I am "dragging" it out for pity.

I don't want pity. I want my brother back. And that's never going to happen.

I am so sorry for your losses. Losing a sibling is... indescribable. It's just nearly been a year and I already forget if he was alive for certain things or not. Sometimes I wake up thinking he is still here.

In my head, I like to see him like I did when I was 5 and he was 6. I like remembering that boy. He wasn't in pain then. My birthday is just going to be.. hard. I want to be alone with myself and my memories of him.

[lizardlady]

Ten Idle, grief doesn't have a time table. If other people tell you that you are grieving "too long" and "dragging it out" that is probably because they are uncomfortable dealing with your grief. That's about them, not about you.

I was 15 when my brother died. I'm 59 now. I still miss him. As Winter4Me said though, the pain softens with the passage of time.

There's nothing wrong with wanting to be by yourself on your birthday. Maybe you could do something special to remember your brother that day?