Hey, I'm Fine. ...or not. (Destiny)

by Morpheus , High Charity, Friday, June 12, 2020, 20:45 (1407 days ago) @ Robot Chickens

You seem to be pretty sensitive about stuff. You doing okay?

I mean, your response was not actually advice. It was just mocking. Pure and simple. Pretending you were trying to be helpful is... odd. Going on a diatribe about the state of the world and assuming people can't handle critique is... really odd.

Shoot man, it's not about whether or not we can critique each other. I mean, I was pretty blunt with you just now, so... maybe you just proved my point.

Seriously, you doing okay? We should do another D1 raid soon.

But...it wasn't mocking, though. It was the truth. And before anyone says "You don't know that", studying that particular clip, in this specific case it is true. None of the other Guardians had their Super active—save for the Dawnblade's Well, which any offensive Super wouldn't care about. From that close of a distance, the only class in the game that could stop SR's Mauls quickly was a Fist of Panic, which no one had or they would've used it on him. And considering most Maul explosions are big and strong enough to kill multiple Guardians in one hit, if Simpsons Rule did indeed move(or again, with honesty, even turned), he guaranteed would've gotten all four. Now in the original post I did say three swings or less. Would that have been guaranteed? No. Would it have been possible? If you click play and immediately pause, you'll see they're practically touching each other. Absolutely!

And I may have laughed, but I meant that statement with all honesty and sincerity. Getting overexcited can literally be the difference between a heartbreaking choke or the best clip of your career. I know because I've experienced it myself, and luckily I have two (very!) recent examples here:

These are two clips where I secured the last kills needed for our team's victory—clips in which we were both behind and I used a Super to win the game.

This first one is an example of how I got too excited and messed up further chances of success. I got a few kills with the Nova Bomb, it recharged almost immediately and instead of pacing myself, I immediately wound up and threw it too high like an idiot. So any further chances of getting a higher spree or more kills went out the window. Literally, it just floated up to the sky uselessly.

This one is where I stayed calm, bode my time and struck at the perfect opportunity. I breathed evenly and adapted to changes as they appeared. I died there, but it was a very well worthy sacrifice. ;-)

So yeah, I told him that because I know the feeling. I've been there too. And you can call it every mean name in the book, but that clip was textbook over-excitement, and that's a brief abbreviation of what I told him.

And honestly, I'm fine....but...not really, no. I've struggled for months about whether to post this or not because this is family business and could be considered private. But...watching her cry today...like, maybe 2 hours before I made that post, I don't even know who to turn to in a situation like this.

One of my uncles (for privacy's sake I'll just use the NATO) was one of the most famously skilled navigators in the family. Before there were iPhones and Google Maps, Uncle Echo knew his way everywhere. He'd almost always drive, and if someone else insisted and got lost, he'd drive them back on track all while hiding a boastful smirk. About a year ago, I first noticed signs of him getting lost. Not 'accidentally turning back the way you came out of the Chevron lost'. Completely missing for hours or even days lost. This had been going on for a while, but the first time I (and the rest of the family) learned of this was at our family reunion in New Orleans. At some point we had run out of napkins and Uncle Echo cheerfully volunteered to go to the store for more. He never came back. That was the last anyone had heard from him for a good 10 hours. When we finally got back in touch with him, he was all the way back at their house, in Houston, asking us where we were. He had no idea—none—that he went to get napkins and ended up leaving his wife, three of their adult children(and the wife of one of them) nearly 400 miles away with absolutely no way back home. My other Aunt Juliett(who by the way DROVE in from California) had to take all four of them BACK to the three different parts of the city of Houston in which they live(none of them live together except for the couple obviously) and check up on Echo. I went with them out of fear for her life because it was a total of more than 2,000 miles to drive in one day!

We get to his house? He's grinning ear to ear like we're joining him to watch the game. Again, not a clue.

This was my first time experiencing it, but I immediately knew it hit me so hard it ran me over.

Dementia.

And I didn't find out until much much later, this had been going on for at least a full year beforehand.

So this was in early 2019. It's only gotten worse and worse and worse. His wife, my aunt—and my mother's sister—is drifting aimlessly. She's still trying to hide this and pretend that everything is fine. She doesn't do anything to help Echo with this growing problem. In fact, she's actually been enabling him. It's as circular is a wash cycle: He goes blank and leaves the house for something short, he's gone for hours or days, ending up at his old job—in Katy or his sister's house...in Lafayette...either she or they convince him to turn back, he shows up days later, the family tells her to take the keys from him, she does, he asks for the keys and she gives them to him. It's gotten to the point where she had to buy and attach one of those Link things--whatever with the GPS--to track him whenever he runs away!

November constantly flocks to the nearest family member in the state—my mother. Calling her every. Single. Day.

Monday:"Echo's missing again, Golf...I need your help, what do I do? Do I call the police? Can you come help me find him?"
Tuesday:"Heeeey, guuuurll! What? Oh no, he's fine, he just came in this morning. It's a beautiful day out today, huh?"
Thursday: "I can't handle this, he's getting angry again Golf. Tell me what to do, I don't know what to do with him."
Thursday NIGHT: "Girl, we all had a blast at Applebee's! Delta got off work early tonight, so we had the whole family there!"

And so on.

Every single day, all hours of the day OR night. She wants everyone to do everything for her. The paperwork. The support groups. The facility research. If there is any sign of difficulty or aggression, November wants no part of it. Now, mom tells me that something very traumatizing happened to November in her childhood. I don't know the details, I obviously wasn't there—but November avoids conflict at all costs. Which is why she hands him the keys every time, knowing that's all kinds of dangerous to himself and others, and why she falls to pieces if anything is out of place. She even stayed at our house for two days, quote: "just to get away from him".

My uncle Echo needs serious help. This. man. is. sick.

He doesn't know.

His kids are powerless to help.

The only person who has the power to get him the support and care he needs is in complete and utter shutdown denial.

And the only living family member in the entire state is trapped under her thumb.

How can you tell someone that their brain is no longer functioning? How can you talk sense into a woman whose trauma of abuse has closed her off into a bubble that abuses everyone else? How do sit there and watch your mother boil over with frustration as her sister begs everyone for help only to ignore it and do whatever pleases her in the now?

I just don't know anymore.

So I guess that's a yes and no.