For years, my mission, like so many in this space, centered on suicide awareness and prevention. We learned the warning signs. We memorized the hotline numbers. We trained ourselves to notice the silence that falls right before someone goes quiet for good. That work matters, and it will always matter. But somewhere along the way, I started asking a different question: what if we spent as much energy building lives that never reach that edge as we spend pulling people back

For the last year, we've done what most people in this fight do: we've handed out the pamphlets, posted the hotline numbers, worn the awareness ribbons, and shown up when someone needed to talk. That work matters, and we're not walking away from it. But if you've spent any real time in this space, you already know the uncomfortable truth nobody likes to say out loud: awareness has a ceiling.

NOTE: At just seventeen we are getting our first introduction to bar life instead of just walking in one to get money from our dad to eat on. The 82nd Airborne Division is like no other when it comes to extensive war prep training, and we love it. Train hard all day long and drink harder all night long.

Joe had passed the entry tests with very high scores. He would be eligible for almost any job the army had to offer. But our only thoughts were to get into combat and that is the basis for how we made our job training selections, Airborne, Combat Arms.

NOTE: Getting ourselves kicked out of the house at fifteen and really getting an early dose of street life. If I didn’t know better, I would say all children should have to do this. It was a real wake up call. Problem is I was living in a dream world of the worst kind and was just about to turn 16 again. So here it comes, the unedited version of Bonded a Brother’s Love.

Joe has decided to let dad know I’m here. He can’t find a way to say it directly. So, he tries other methods. First, he writes or has me write in my handwriting a several page letter detailing my presence. Purposely leaving the letter out where our father will accidentally find it. In the letter he calls me an evil presence that is driving him to do terrible things.

NOTE: Two years have gone by since the suicide. Richard is still lost, doing a lot of reminiscing about the time he spent with our mother just prior to the suicide. If he had not already been eaten up with depression and drug use before he got there, he might have made it out of his teens without taking my life or his away.

Continuing the series, bringing out the unedited version of the book BONDED A BROTHER’S LOVE one chapter at a time; here’s CHAPTER 14: ISN’T IT STRANGE? Getting used to that particular piece of this hell was not something that was going to come easy for either one of us. Joe’s acceptance of my being there with him really made life a lot easier for both of us. There was no more fear of the unknown.

NOTE: At this time period I had just dropped out of school at 14. My dad had given up on me enough to just let me do my own thing, so I worked during the day in a restaurant and partied each night. No one really knew where I was at after work, if I told them where I would be, it probably wasn’t true. Looking back on it, I probably spent a lot of nights on the streets that I really didn’t have to, but chose to, just to be away from everyone else.

NOTE: This is the time period I realized that I now lived by a different calendar than all others. Kind of like Christian’s view of B.C. & A.D. My new calendar had started August 18, 1968 “Before Suicide & After Suicide". A very memorable first anniversary for all the wrong reasons. This is the unedited version of Chapters 11 and 12.

NOTE: It was around this time period that it really sank in. We were just a couple of months away from anniversary date #1. Smoking pot had become normalized. My guess is that at 13, I was spending less than 50% of my nights at home and the other 50% who knows where. And I’m not sure anyone even noticed I was gone. I was definitely becoming more Richard than I was Joe.

The bad things I had done in my short sixteen years far outweighed the good. I had turned away from the god my mother had introduced me to long ago. At just 16, the last several years of my life consisted of sex, drugs, alcohol, and hurting the people I loved. I knew it was better for my friends, family, and for myself to be gone from this earth.

At this point in time I was not sure which one of us was taking his death harder, me or Richard. I was no doubt lost with no one stepping up to show me the way. With one exception. Richard, just like he always had been, he was there for me. And really when I think about it, I come up with the same conclusion for him, just like it had always been, there was not anyone there to guide him up the right path. There are two things I no for sure at this point. We were both trapped,

NOTE: Looking back, this was a very critical time in my life. Richard’s shared space so to speak was just getting a foothold on me. Of course, I had not shared that information with my mother yet, or anyone else. Just the fact that they somehow got me to agree to go to Washington was amazing to me.

NOTE: This is where it should have stopped. I still remember one of those sleepwalking nights as though it was yesterday. Because on that particular night my dad decided to confront it. He woke me in the middle of the nightly adventure, yelling at me, that he knew what I was doing, that I was searching for my brother that was gone, dead, never coming back. Truthfully, I don’t remember how I responded to him. But I do know that the “shared space” was already set in place.

I need to caution you that there are two paragraphs contained within this blog that graphically describe the scene of a suicide that was accomplished with a high-powered rifle shot to the head. Very graphic!

This one would definitely require a trip to the emergency room. SureThere would be no mistaking my intention this time. Everyone would hear and understand the seriousness of the problem when I was done tonight. I had stashed one bullet that fit my dad’s eight millimeter (8mm) carbine. I forced mly this would get everyone’s attention. Someone would have to do something to help this time. Lucky for me I still had enough sense and strength to go next door for aide. That was my i

This one would definitely require a trip to the emergency room. Surely this would get everyone’s attention. Someone would have to do something to help this time. Lucky for me I still had enough sense and strength to go next door for aide. That was my intention all along.

Just after midnight on August 18, 1968. I finally accomplished my goal of suicide. Over the three months prior to that I had made a couple of fruitless attempts, or at least what I thought were attempts. Thinking back, it could have just been a couple of unheard cries for help. Unfortunately, no one was listening; no one had a clue what I was going through.

Seven years ago, I learned that I had been living with PTSD for the last 57 years. Before then I had believed I was just a normal guy dealing with depression brought on by my brother’s suicide. I had some very delusional thoughts related to the afterlife. But even with that, I just thought I had a lot more insight into life and death that my brother’s spirit had been sharing with me.