Dear Mental Illness

As far as I am concerned you can fucking suck it. You have taken 2 years of my life and made them a blur. I might be able to forgive you for that, if you had not taken my brother away.

Luke was always incredibly smart. Witty, cutting, charismatic. I have no idea what his IQ was, but I imagine it was well withing the standards to join MENSA.

He was hard to live with growing up because he was so able to cut me quickly and deeply. He was handsome, suave, and popular. Compared to me- socially awkward, chubby, and a loner. I always envied his ability to do things without thinking about the consequences. I realize that sounds so odd. But my brain calculates nearly everything that could go wrong, which often causes me to take decisions after much deliberation.

I have that "stair stepping" wit. The one where you don't realize what you should have said until you are walking away and heading down the stairs after an argument. He was so quick.

Had we known long before all of this came about, we would have seen the symptoms of his illness very early on. Thinking he has ESP, drug use. Perhaps that drug use put him where he is now and fried his brain. Or perhaps he was trying to calm the voices in his head. We won't know.

I lost my brother when he was 19. He flowed in and out of lucidity- and when he was clear minded, he was brilliant. As the years have gone on, he has done what many schizophrenics do. They think they are better and stop taking their meds. Then they slip backwards and often self-sabotage.

I know how it feels to be stuck taking pills everyday. It sucks. Especially because mental illness is still not looked upon as a real illness. But without them, there is no filter for our brains.

I wish I knew how to process this- but all I feel is sad and cheated. I feel like the world was cheated out of a REALLY good lawyer, and a wonderful musician and songwriter. And I lost my brother. My mother lost a son.

So mental illness, you are an unrighteous bastard. And I can't wait until you are snuffed out of existence.