Gone But Still Alive

[LoveinGreece]

I'm new to all this: posting, grieving, letting go of someone I love. I've been drowning in depression and tears for weeks, dragging myself out of bed in the afternoon and running over memories and WHY's in my head constantly. I don't know what to do or how to let go. My love is still alive but no longer who he was.

A year ago, almost to the day, I met him in Greece. I was there most of the year and in that time we fell in love slowly but surely. I'm not the type to open my heart and fall but I slowly let him in as I stopped being able to consider anything else, he made me very happy in light of our differences We come from different worlds (he's from N Africa), education levels, financial situations, experiences in life. We were not a likely, reasonable match but we connected amazingly.

Back in April I had to leave Greece due to Visa issues and stay out 90 days. We decide to wait for each other and even started talking marriage, which I never considered with anyone before (I am 35).

5 days after I left my love was in a terrible accident, that we still don't know how it happened. He lost the memory of what happened and was in a coma 2 days. He fell down a cliff that left him in the hospital for a month with a broken hip, ankle, elbow, fractured skull and other injuries. We talked every day but I was unable to get back in the country for 3 months. He was himself in the hospital but after he left he started to slowly change. When I got to Greece he was OK but really starting to obsess about how he fell. He started to feel like he was pushed which progressed into a paranoid obsession that consumed him. He believed people were out to get him and his family. It was a gradual change, he was in and out of being like himself but after a month of that he went to a dark place I may never know if he gets out of.

When I was there he wouldn't stay with me, occasionally he was affectionate but we were no longer intimate. He thought there were cameras at my house, he wouldn't leave a certain area of the town and other odd behavior. He slipped further and further away from me and reality. I saw essence of his past self at times until the last few days I was in Greece, he was gone. I made appointments to help him including mental health, which he agreed to, but these last days he would't get out of bed, he wouldn't leave his house, he kept saying we'd met and not show up. In one of our last phone conversations he began to yell at me calling me a criminal for what I did to him. His paranoia turned to believe I had something to do with this fall. The last time I saw him he violently attacked me wanting to "do to me what I did to him". It was very scary and I have not talked to him since. Almost a month ago. Prior to this we talked every day.

He suffers from PTSD perhaps, maybe brain injury, depression... ??? All I know is he was the sweetest, calmest person before this happened. We were very in love and I have hundred of pictures of us with the biggest smiles that now just haunt me and torture me. We just loved to be around each other, cook meals together, watch TV together, hike together. Everything was better together and we both felt it and were happier for it. Now he is gone, he is alive but no longer that person. Its like he died but he didn't. Its like he has alzheimer's but he doesn't. It is possible he could recover and call me someday but I can't assume that will ever happen.

I sent him 2 text messages and tried to call one day but he didn't answer and has never tried to contact me since the night he attacked me. I am back in the US now trying to move on but struggling and hurting so much. I wanted to be with him. I wanted a chance to really be with him and it was all taken away with that fall and now I don't know if he will ever be ok, ever enjoy life again. its so sad for the loss of our love, our friendship and most of all of his life.

I don't know how to do this, I don't know how to stop crying and I can't even begin to think about being close to anyone again. I want to call him everyday, I want to get on a plane and go back to Greece to be with him, I want to fix something I have no control over. I want to just talk to him but I can't. He is obviously in a very different place, a very different person, or he would have called.

I guess I am looking for any advice on how to do this, move on, stop crying, let go, think of the good times with him without dying inside. Be supportive of him from afar without feeling like I can't breath.

Anything would help I think. I am a smart, strong person who has overcome many things in my life but for some reason I feel like I fell right along with him and I can't figure out how to get up. I know there are so many worse things in life and so much deeper suffering in this world but for some reason I can't get over this and feel good again. I'm trying. I'm borrowing a dog and starting therapy next week, any other advice is welcome. Thank you!! Thank you for your time! Many blessings to you!

[kayc]

I am so so sorry. I can't help but feel that if the accident had not happened, you two would still be together, happy and in love. But it did happen, and it changed the course of both of your lives...it is not his fault, it is not yours, it just is what it is, not unlike the death of my husband that shockingly forever changed my life into a "before...and after" from that moment.

My sister had a car accident 43 years ago...it damaged her brain, left her baby son dead and her a quadriplegic. Her memory is clear, she is still as smart as she always was, but she was altered...not only physically, but she became paranoid. She hears voices, and she thinks computers are trying to take over her brain, and she thinks her baby son is now a man living in Texas and she saves up things to "take to Texas" with her when she goes. Of course, he's not alive and she'll never go there. We humor her, what else can we do? To stress that he is dead would hurt her and she would not believe us. She is now 68 years old...any measure of happiness we can allot her we view as a good thing. She has been on medication for the paranoia and it seemed to help her mental state, but it left her with physical ramification which combined with her quadriplegia, she found unacceptable...it took away the tiny bit of physical control she could muster, so she has opted to live with the paranoia so she can continue to lift her fork or her cup of coffee to her mouth or laboriously sign a greeting card to us for our birthdays. Although his paranoia is not exactly the same as hers, please realize it is paranoia all the same, brought about by this injury, and paranoia can display in many different forms.

Your friend might be helped by medication. It, unfortunately, does come with side affects...only he can try it and decide which outweighs the other in measure of benefit.

Unless you are privy to what his doctors say, you cannot know their prognosis or how all he is affected by his injuries. It is possible they might benefit from knowing what you have witnessed in deciding a course of treatment for him, but they will not be able to tell you anything because of privacy laws.

You ask what can you do...the same as all of us who have lost someone we love...it takes time. It doesn't seem to matter what the reason is that separates us, whether death or injury of their grieving or change of heart...it takes time to heal the wounds of a broken heart and broken dreams. It helps to keep busy, talk to a doctor if you suffer from depression or have difficulty sleeping. Be careful not to isolate yourself unduly. Life will come back for you gradually but oh how we all wish time would speed up when we are suffering from such grief! My heart goes out to you. This was a freak accident. I've learned it doesn't do any good to ask "why" but rather to ask myself "what now?" What now is what you will have to discover..."why" reverberates back with a hollow empty sound of nothingness.

Good luck to you in your journey. Perhaps with time you can view your time together as a special time, a time when two souls met and shared and felt each other's heart beat. I'm sorry it changed.

[beakerj]

Goodness me, what an awful thing to have happened to you both, in different ways. I'm so sorry to hear about it.

It really does sound like talking to someone would be helpful.You've been through a really shocking time, so happy, then relieved he didn't die, then shocked at the terrible changes...A lot of serious events & emotions in a relatively short time. It all adds up, stresswise. I'm sure it would be helpful to think it all through with someone, & consider what your best options are now, & how to get through this.

It may also be helpful to do a little bit of reading about the results of head trauma, & PTSD, because his symptoms fit into both categories, it may help you to understand the changes in him, & realise what can & can't be done to help in these situations.

It's a huge loss to you, I'm not surprised you feel so rubbish, there's no real secret as to why you feel this is so much harder to get over than anything you've been through before.

Just hang in there, & try & make it to therapy. Dogs are excellent when you feel like crap...my two are the light of my day.

I really hope that things start to move forward in a healing way, & the same for your friend, I hope he gets what he needs to help him heal too.

Wishing you all the best