Trista Sullivan

Honors English III

Mr. Jennings

December 6th, 2011

Growing Up With Brendan

Growing up, I always believed that I had the best family: We were all happy, living together under the same roof, with little dispute. My Dad and Mom always seemed so happy together. My brother and I would rarely fight, unless it was over our dog, Oscar.

Back then I was naïve. I would have never been able to see what was coming for our family in just a few short years. No one in the family saw as this problem, that would so drastically affect our family, rose to the surface. This is going to be a story about my older brother, Brendan. Let me introduce him to you. Brendan is a very tall, has very long brown hair, and a full beard. He spends the majority of his time reading about space and life and playing video games. He dropped out of high school his senior year and got his

GED. He then went to Meramec for a few months, but dropped that as well. This isn’t because he is stupid, because he is actually very intellectual. This is because he has chemical imbalances in his brain, severe anxiety and depression, and bi-polar II disorder.

Everything started around the time my parents got their divorce. I was about 6 or

7 years old and my brother was either 9 or 10. The divorce took a toll on our family, as divorce does with most, and challenged my brother and I to grow up a bit more and accept the fact that our parents would be with other people and living in separate houses.

Throughout the whole divorce, my parents had a therapist for the two of them and a family therapist. After a few individual sessions with this therapist, my brother was recommended to be sent to a child counseling center called “Kids in the Middle.” It was designed for kids who felt as if divorce was their fault and that they would always be stuck in the middle of their two parents. While my brother was going through all of this,

I was quietly sitting outside the waiting room while my mother read books and I played with old toys. I never complained much about all the time we spent waiting around for

Brendan, even though it did take up a lot more time than my mother and I would have wanted. But, time was one of the many sacrifices I gave to this disorder of his.

When I look back onto my child hood, I see a lot of crying, uncertainty, and hatred, all brought on by Brendan. I can remember coming home from school in 4th grade: finally my parents trusted me home alone and not at after care. I would get off of my bus and run down to my house and Brendan would be home. At this point in time, he was being home schooled by my mom. I would try my best to avoid him, in hopes to prevent a fight, which was a hard task to do at this time. Anything that would slightly upset and average person would send him into rage. He would say things, that at the time

I believed, to me that would break me completely. He would call me worthless. He would tell me I’m the reason our parents aren’t together. He would tell me to kill me self. He would tell me he wanted to kill me. One day, a fight escalated. There was running, yelling, crying all around the house. Items were thrown, as were fists and kicks. The most vivid memory I have of my child hood is sitting on my top bunk of my bed in the corner, wrapped in a blanket, door locked, crying. The sounds of shouting and banging on the locked door with his fists and a knife drowned out the sounds of my crying; the screams exclaiming their hatred for me and their hatred for my life. “I’m going to kill you. If I get in there, you are dead.” These words still echo through my mind in my darkest hours.

This is one of the few events that express the severity of how this disorder messed with his mind. I know deep down that my brother loves me, and that day, those years he acted in his worst, it was not his heart that was screaming, but his messed up mind. Not only does his disorder impair his home life and how he acts with his family, it becomes even worse when it involves the people outside of our house. Teachers, waiters, employers, family friends, and strangers: these are things that my brother cannot handle.

Brendan first started his schooling off at a Gateway Pre-school. At this school, his learning capabilities were much higher than his peers, and the kids didn’t take kindly to him. While my brother kept to himself and did what he was asked, these other children had disciplinary problems. Brendan stuck out like a sore thumb, and the teachers noticed this and advised after his pre-school year to be taken out of the Gateway School System. For Kindergarten up to 4th grade, Brendan and I attended Salem Lutheran School.

Brendan never seemed to fit in with the kids at the school, for his quiet and awkward nature when it came to people he didn’t know, and the kids always enjoyed bullying him.

“One day, Brendan came home and told your father and I about how on the play ground some of his friends were beating him with wiffel ball bats. After the principle took no effort in correcting the behavior of the children, we decided to take you and your brother out of Salem. After Salem, we were sent into the big world of the public school system. I was in 2nd grade and my brother 5th grade. Around this time, Brendan had been put onto some medications to help with the chemicals in his brain. They worked up until his 8th grade year. Brendan started fearing school; he would do everything in his will to stay home. One day, my mother was driving us to school; Brendan was yelling and trying to fight his way into staying home after not being at school for a week. We pulled up to a stop sign in a neighborhood behind the middle school and Brendan got out of the car and ran. He just ran away. After so many absences at school, we were told that Brendan was going to fail his classes if he missed anymore school. At this point, my parents, the school, and all of the therapists saw it best that Brendan should be home schooled. He was only homeschooled for about a semester. For his freshman year, and my 6th grade year, my brother and I went to Rivers of Life Christian School. There were about 2-6 kids per grade level, and all the classes were mixed grade levels. My parents thought that the smaller amount of people would help. It did up until his senior year. Something inside

Brendan drove him to what he had done in 8th grade. He stopped going to school, but this time he all together dropped out. He got his GED a few months later and set off for

Meramec. Sadly, the same thing happened. He just stopped going, and it wasn’t til his time at Meramec until I realized why he does this. Brendan is too afraid to fail, that he feels he shouldn’t try. He would get so far behind in work and be terrified to confront his teachers about it and get the help he needed. “Whenever I’d sit in class, I’d start having a panic attack. Have you ever had a panic attack? It seriously feels like the world is going to end in that moment and time, and there is nothing you can do about it. This is how I felt every day in class.” Brendan had confessed to me.

Throughout my childhood, I always had to sacrifice so much for Brendan. Money that was meant to be spent on school clothes was spent on medication and doctors. Time with my parents was spent talking to Brendan or fighting with Brendan. Whenever my brother and I argued, my parents, even if I was right, made me be the bigger person and just give up. For me, that was the biggest sacrifice of all. Giving up on my voice and standing with what I believed. I wasn’t allowed to do this when it came to talking to

Brendan. I always had to be the bigger person so Brendan wouldn’t get angry. One year while in Florida on vacation, my mother planned for the 3 of us to see the Blue Angels. I was ecstatic. I could barely sleep the night before. The next morning I woke up, got ready as fast as I could and waited for my family members to get ready. Brendan couldn’t sleep that night before. He refused to get out of bed. This led into a fight between my brother and my mom about obligations to the family vacation and doing what you say you’re going to do. We ended up not going to see the Blue Angels because Brendan just refused to get out of bed that day. This, among many other sacrifices I made for my brother over the years has made me feel almost as if I have been expected to act like and adult since I was very little. On a sour day, I would blame Brendan and say that he robbed me from my child hood.

Though it may seem that the majority of my life spent with my brother was bad, that is not the case. My brother and I, over the years, have shared many positive memories as well. Just like the disorder itself, changing Brendan’s feelings from the worst to the best, this is how our relationship as siblings was as well. Looking back at photos during the time I was still just a little baby and my brother about 3 or 4 years old, I see a very happy moment in our young lives. Upon a quilted blanket, decorated with a rainbow zebra and a few flowers, I lay surrounded by blue and yellow plastic doctor tools. Next to me, is Brendan, wearing a doctor’s costume that matched the tools. The both of us are smiling. Another photograph shows Brendan and I hiding behind a bush of flowers. My brother’s face is turning read from embarrassment as I stand next to him attempting to eat one of the flowers. I can see the happiness in the picture. One more picture. Brendan and I sit, in front of a navy blue canvas, both wearing matching plaid outfits. I am sitting on his lap, looking to be about 3 years old, and he is kissing me on the cheek. But on the photograph, there is a rip in between my brother and I that I made one day when he was acting out on his depression and hurting me emotionally and physically.

But over the giant rip between the two of us, is scotch tape, which I later on repaired this photo with. Our relationship is that photo.

I could go on and on about things I disliked about my brother and about my child hood, but in the end, I can’t say that I would change any of it. Brendan wasn’t all bad.

We’ve had our moments over the past 16 years. When I was little, he would give up his toys if I wanted to play with them. He was there for me to grab onto when he was teaching me how to roller skate. He was there, sharing the feelings I was when our parents were going through their divorce. He is here for me now whenever I need him and even when I don’t, he still tries to protect me. He is a friend of mine, and always will be and I will always only wish the best for him. I know that everything that happened to me during my child hood, growing up with Brendan, made me who I am today: a strong, mature, understanding, young adult. Though, if I were given the chance to sacrifice the person I am today, whom I love very much, to allow my brother to have the same healthy brain as any other person, for him I would.