I don't know if this is the right thread for this, but I need to vent. If it's not, sorry; neg the fuck out of me, I don't care.
I just spent a week driving over 2000 miles to have my brother cremated. I knew from childhood that he liked to drink, more than was good for him, but apparently he was very good at hiding exactly how much he liked to drink. His wife had been out of the country for several months and he had been living alone, and when she was unable to contact him for a few days I called the police and had them check on him. He was dead in his bed. I drove up there and was the first to see the life he'd been living in all its splendor. First thing I noticed was the 6 empty vodka bottles on the kitchen counter, and the one that was still 2/3 full. Liter bottles - the plastic bottles of the cheapest, shittiest vodka available. Many empties of diet 7-up, which seemed to be his preferred mixer. Next thing I saw was the huge pile of trash in the middle of the living room floor, mostly consisting of empty vodka and diet 7-up bottles. And the piles of other types of trash all over the house. His wife was right behind me, and got to see all this stuff too; it was hard on me, but I'm sure it was harder on her. When she started bagging up the trash the next day I asked her how many empties she'd found. She said she stopped counting at 60.
His life was out of control. I went through the papers I could find, and discovered massive amounts of debt and other fuckery. There was no way he was going to climb out of that hole in less than many years even if he lived a perfect life, which was apparently not an option. So I've got a question. I don't know if there's an answer that will mean anything, but how the fuck does someone get to that point? How does your life spiral out of control so badly? The one that kept going through my mind was, how did he get so far off track? For what it's worth, he was still holding down a job - he was a professor, and had turned in his grades for the semester the day he apparently died. I have no idea how he was able to do that, either.
Again, sorry if this is not the right place, but I'm frustrated and angry and heartbroken. I'm going to be having nightmares about this for a long time.