On December 24th, 2008 I was almost 21 and drinking wine at my Grandma’s house with my family. We were having a good time. I don’t really talk to that side of the family anymore though. I got a phone call from my best friend, Kyle. I joking let my uncle answer. Kyle asked to talk to me. He sounded angry.
The next few words he said were like a a fucking nuclear bomb that seared my fucking brain for life. He said, “NineMileTower, Steve died (in Iraq). A bridge gave out, his hummer flipped, and he drowned.”
That was in 2008. I’m 37 now. I have two beautiful girls and an amazing wife. I think of Steve all the time. I ask myself, “Why do I deserve these amazing kids, wife and life, and he had to die?”
I fucking hate Christmas. I hate the stupid music. I hate fake bullshit decorations. I hate that I’m supposed to pretend that every Christmas it doesn’t fucking kill me that he isn’t here. I’m here enjoying my kids and their holiday and he’s dead.
I fucking hate Christmas.
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Traumatic events have a really powerful way of poisoning things for us sometimes. It’s okay to struggle with Christmas. It wreaks havok on my emotional well-being also, but for different reasons. Its okay to not relate to it the way others do and to find pain, rather than joy in what’s supposed to be celebration
🫂 sending love from my corner of the world to yours
I’m sorry dude. That all just sucks.
If I can offer a path of thought, it sounds a bit like you’re punishing yourself for being happy. It sounds like you have sort of a duality… You remember Christmas being a happy time with a lot of togetherness and love. And you also remember that it is the time when you heard this devastating news.
You might sit and try to sort that out… Both of those things in your brain at the same time are certain to drive anyone a bit mad.
But you don’t have to punish yourself for being happy sometimes. It really sounds like you have a big case of survivor’s guilt. There are pathways through that grief that may allow you to be happy and also honor the memory of a dear friend.
There’s no “right” answer, just an answer that’s right for you. You might consider talking to someone to help you unwind this ball of thoughts. Perhaps on the other side is something you can do every holiday in honor of your friend to help pay him back by paying it forward. While he’s not here, maybe you could do something extra to spread Christmas cheer on his behalf. There’s a hole in the world where he used to be - you could potentially help fill that.
It won’t be easy, but I’d encourage you to walk along the path of those thoughts and see if you can find some peace.
I wish you luck, whatever you decide to do.
I think this is what I needed to hear. Thank you
It’s crazy how just a few words can rock your whole world. I’ll never forget the minutes after I learned my brother killer himself. It fucking sucks, but nearly every one of us is going to go through that experience. We are all going to lose those close to us unless we’re the first to go. Momento mori.
I’m sorry you’re having a tough time. Make sure to keep your mental health as the top priority. You can always explain later.
Oh please, show some empathy. Here’s a guy mourning the death oft a loved one and this is the first thing you can think off ? Talking about world politics ?
We all know Iraq was a fucked up war ! We all know Bush junior blatantly violated international law ! We all know american soldiers committed unspeakable crimes against iraqi civillains !
But don’t say that to somebody who just opens up about their grief. That’s just being an asshole, even if you’re supposedly correct. Show some decency.
You can be an empathetic and understanding human being without compromising on your political ideals.
Pissing off your fellow citizen, leads nowhere but to further resentment.
Remember that about half the internet is edgy teenagers
I won’t, I won’t. I won’t stand for it. This post is ridiculous.
When Americans do it it’s “politics”.
When they do it it’s “terrorism”.
Jesus Christ have some fucking empathy. It’s not like his buddy just went and shot ~20 civilians. Actual psychopathic reply.
“My murder buddy deserves children, too” 😔
Hey man, my wife got two all-expense paid vacations to Iraq in 06 and 09 (she’s a lifer so she’s still in). She has lost some folk and it hits her hard. I’m just a civilian, and can’t fully fathom all you went through, but I’m grateful to you.
I will tell you this, you’re buddy Steve would not want you to be miserable at all, and especially at the holidays. I know enough Soldiers to know exactly what he’d be telling you.
Always remember your friend. But give yourself permission to enjoy the holidays.
That’s rough.
My best buddy died 20ish years ago, fell asleep at the wheel on the highway maybe 1km before his exit. There’s no rhyme or reason to this shit, he certainly didn’t deserve to die anymore than I deserve to live.
Yet here we are, and they aren’t.
When it gets harder, I tell myself to enjoy these things; he would if he was here.
Hey, I won’t pretend this actually works much, but it’s still nice to remind myself for a fleeting moment that he wouldn’t want me to stay in this gloomy mood.Sorry this time of year is tough on you. I was last deployed to Iraq in 2006, so before Steve but I’m sorry for your loss. We all grieve in our own way. Just make sure you let it out.
I lost Sgt Perez on one of my deployments. He was a good dude. He said he messed up early in his career but would never explain the details. I guess he would have been picking up a promotion if he didn’t have that bad paperwork. Great NCO. He looked after us. He had 3 kids and a wife. 2 of the kids was with his current wife. He was out walking around base at night when some rockets were shot at the base. He got some sharpnel when it impacted a building and didn’t make it.
I try to live my life in memory of the lost loved ones. They aren’t here anymore to enjoy life, so I try to enjoy it for them. Christmas can be corny and sound torture with all the songs, but some parts are enjoyable.
On another note, you should never drop the news like this on a holiday/celebration.
In particular when someone has passed, nothing is going to change by time, so the timeline to spread the news is largely irrelevant.
Somehow the Christmas movie Jack Frost came up in conversation this week. (Well, the family friendly one…)
It sort of deals with a similar theme, except of course that the christmas-deceased father was reincarnated, sort of, for a time; to help the family heal.
I don’t know if watching it would help in any way. It might just make you more angry. It did help us in some strange way when my partner was dying of cancer.
Sorry for your loss. It never leaves you.
You don’t hate christmas, you hate that christmas reminds you of the loss of your friend.
You’re not “supposed to pretend that it doesn’t kill you that” your friend isnt there. It sounds like you’ve learnt a horrible toxic idea that men aren’t allowed to be emotional or that crying or being sad is weak, or that you have to bottle this up.
You need to allow yourself to grieve. I can understand hiding this from young children, but that doesn’t mean bottling it up entirely. Tall to your wife. Think about ways you could express and release this each year - maybe set a day aside to remember him and celebrate him with other friends?
And maybe think about therapy in the new year - you need to learn how to process and express how you feel, not bottle it up and let it eat your up with resentment and hate. It’s misdirected and is harming you and potentially your loved ones each year.
Would your friend want you to remember him by being miserable and resentful during the holidays? Or would he want you to remember the good times and share why you loved him and missed him with other people so they can know what a great guy he was?
I call bs in the “you’re not allowed to be emotional” you can repeat that all the times you want, but as a man, ESPECIALLY as a family man, you can’t be emotional. You’re the rock of the family and society stomps on weak men.
“Who cares what society thinks!” Unless you live in the woods or middle of nowhere you should care, the way people treat you and “use you” depends of how strong you look. That affects even the way they look at your family.
ESPECIALLY as a family man, you can’t be emotional. You’re the rock of the family and society stomps on weak men.
As a family man, I say fuck that toxic masculinity bullshit. We can improve our society. I’m not going to teach my kid emotions are bad. Sure, there are times to keep them in check, but it’s really unhealthy to just ignore your feelings.
Having the courage to talk about your own feelings is a sign of strength. Letting others control your life is weak.
I have definitely regretted talking openly about my feelings with a partner. It damaged the relationship because she was frustrated and not very understanding.
I don’ thind it matters who you talk to. I think that if noone in your life wants to listen or talk about how you feel, then you should get some new people in your life who will.
You can’t get a new family
I’ve spent many hours on the therapist’s couch and in group therapy. They’ve taught me mindfulness strategies that work on processing how I feel. This has made life dramatically simpler for me. The hard part in life for me now is just the one that’s always been hard: food, rent, bills. As for all other feelings? I know what I want and what to do about it. I’m very much at peace.
If your partner doesn’t properly value your feelings and doesn’t support you in your vulnerable moments, that is a bad sign for the relationship.
The point is many women are also impacted by toxic masculinity and will not positively receive their guy opening up / crying.
It’s not just a “be yourself dude” dynamic for many, many men.
For better or worse everyone in their orbit expects a certain behavior
strongly describes how most women treat men.
I’m sorry you lost someone you cared about so much. For whatever reason grief isnt looked at as serious mental anguish. It hurts to lose someone. It hurts so goddamn much and I’m sorry you are suffering.
And you’re allowed to hate Christmas. No one has to enjoy every holiday. There’s no law requiring you to like it. You’re not a bad person, and it’s perfectly reasonable to feel the way you do.
I fucking hate Christmas too. For similar reasons to yours. My friend was murdered many years ago in December and I still hate Christmas. So at the very least you aren’t alone, not that it takes the pain away or anything.
Remember, It’s okay to not be okay and to not participate if it’s negatively effecting you. Do what you need to do to survive the holidays. You matter too. Your pain is real, and self care is more important now than ever. I don’t care how cheesy or cringe I sound because it’s true. Please be kind to yourself.
Instead of hating Christmas, you should hate the people that sent your friend to Iraq to die for absolutely nothing.
Those people aren’t visibly stamped on his psyche, the Christmas stuff is a trigger
I do. But there’s literally nothing I can do with that hate.
Luigi.
You’re suggesting I kill someone. What the fuck is wrong with you?
The world’s a bad place right now. Sometimes the lesser evil is desirable. Just saying.
You’ve got the right to hate it all. Absolutely. There is no deserving anything.
But you’ve got what you’ve got. There is no sense to any of it. Christmas will come at you again and again and again for the rest of your life.
I hope that you make some peace with it for Steve. Give Steve all the best Christmas that you can every year. Give a fine holiday to your family. Give them to your friends. Give them to strangers.
And eventually I hope that you can give yourself a fine and cozy Christmas, too.
We are at the darkest time of our year together. I hope that someday you can find some light for a Merry Christmas.
You can get help, and likely should, given the impact. Many workplaces offer an Employee Assistance Program, or EAP. It’s not hosted by your employer it’s just easier access to therapy.
Honestly yeah man, this seems like the perfect thing to go to a therapist for - I’m a big believer that paying a person to just listen to you rant and guide you through the sort of thoughts that OP is having is one of the most effective uses for them. I’ve done it with multiple hard things and it helped me a lot.
OP - if you’ve never tried it you should. You can pay a dude to just listen to you rant, and honesty even if they’re not partiality insightful it usually still feels better to tell someone at the very least.
I’m sorry you lost your friend dude, I can only imagine how much that must hurt. I don’t know your friend but from what you’ve posted about him, I bet he wouldn’t want you to feel survivors guilt - i bet he’d want you to hug your kids and live your best life.
My closest genetic link did this, finally, in middle age. They were very resistant to the idea up until this last year. Now, they’d be Oprah on it and hand out free therapy vouchers to everyone they met if they could.
I love it. I call them Name 2.0 now. The first time I said if they stated their best friend, states away from me and someone I haven’t talked to this year, called them the same thing, Name 2.0.
We go to medical doctors for physicals and then rarely do the same for our brains? That’s always presented as a bit off to me.
I feel you.
To date, I’ve lost five people within two days of Christmas. Another two within a week.
You get enough shit built up around any holiday and it starts to grind away at any joy of it. But Christmas? It’s so much worse because there’s the holiday.
So, losing someone on Christmas eve? That is fucking horrible. It just fucks the entire idea of Christmas right out.
And people always seem so surprised about it. Like, how the fuck are you supposed to just forget and enjoy it?
