funkatron · November 26, 2013 02:57
diff --git a/jim_on_brian.txt b/jim_on_brian.txt
 Thank you--long overdue--to all of the kind folks who offered their condolences for my brother Brian passing away recently. 
 It's been a week since he was laid to rest. He'd had liver disease for about two years, the result of an infection that affected most of the organs in his abdomen and for which he delayed seeing a doctor until he'd become swollen all over. 

 Brian was my brother closest in age (I have two other brothers, Mike and Ed). We shared a bedroom until I was about 12, we shared an apartment when I graduated from college, and Noreen and I shared our home with Brian for several months in the early 1990's. He ended up developing a close friendship with my long-time best friend Ed Bryan and shared an apartment with Ed for a year or so. Ed was my Best Man, I was Brian's Best Man at his first wedding, and Brian was Ed's Best Man. 

 Even though he lived just a few miles away and was my only sibling in PA, after the mid 1990's there were lots of times where he and I weren't in contact for months because of his work schedule, priorities, etc. 

 Brian was incredibly smart but never went to college. A great "what if?" for another day.

 Brian and I started spending some time together almost every day after Penn College cut my position in May 2012. It really gave us a chance to build our strong brotherhood into a strong friendship. It also gave me plenty of opportunity to keep an eye on his health. In January of this year I had to haul him to Geisinger Medical Center with a variety of problems that might have taken his life then if we'd delayed by a day or two. A big part of what happened was Brian's skipping taking medicines (he had about 20), so after that round, Noreen undertook the highly important job of getting Brian's medicines organized in daily bags marked with the times to take them. 

 He did pretty well keeping up with the medicines for a while, but this summer his pancreas started going bad, sending his blood sugar sky-high. Then toward the end of summer and start of fall it started becoming obvious that his health was sliding--not as bad as in January, but he was having trouble speaking clearly and he wasn't keeping up on taking his medicines. At my urging he went for an appointment with the transplant surgeon on 10/31. They admitted him, saying he was losing blood somewhere and needed a transfusion. They also wanted to check a shunt that had been installed to divert blood away from his liver (turned out that was fine). But by Monday he'd developed "sudden bacterial peritonitis" which proceeded to shut down his kidneys with no hope of reversing the damage.

 Our parents and three of my sisters were with Brian when he passed away on November 6.
	Thank you--long overdue--to all of the kind folks who offered their condolences for my brother Brian passing away recently.
	It's been a week since he was laid to rest. He'd had liver disease for about two years, the result of an infection that affected most of the organs in his abdomen and for which he delayed seeing a doctor until he'd become swollen all over.

	Brian was my brother closest in age (I have two other brothers, Mike and Ed). We shared a bedroom until I was about 12, we shared an apartment when I graduated from college, and Noreen and I shared our home with Brian for several months in the early 1990's. He ended up developing a close friendship with my long-time best friend Ed Bryan and shared an apartment with Ed for a year or so. Ed was my Best Man, I was Brian's Best Man at his first wedding, and Brian was Ed's Best Man.

	Even though he lived just a few miles away and was my only sibling in PA, after the mid 1990's there were lots of times where he and I weren't in contact for months because of his work schedule, priorities, etc.

	Brian was incredibly smart but never went to college. A great "what if?" for another day.

	Brian and I started spending some time together almost every day after Penn College cut my position in May 2012. It really gave us a chance to build our strong brotherhood into a strong friendship. It also gave me plenty of opportunity to keep an eye on his health. In January of this year I had to haul him to Geisinger Medical Center with a variety of problems that might have taken his life then if we'd delayed by a day or two. A big part of what happened was Brian's skipping taking medicines (he had about 20), so after that round, Noreen undertook the highly important job of getting Brian's medicines organized in daily bags marked with the times to take them.

	He did pretty well keeping up with the medicines for a while, but this summer his pancreas started going bad, sending his blood sugar sky-high. Then toward the end of summer and start of fall it started becoming obvious that his health was sliding--not as bad as in January, but he was having trouble speaking clearly and he wasn't keeping up on taking his medicines. At my urging he went for an appointment with the transplant surgeon on 10/31. They admitted him, saying he was losing blood somewhere and needed a transfusion. They also wanted to check a shunt that had been installed to divert blood away from his liver (turned out that was fine). But by Monday he'd developed "sudden bacterial peritonitis" which proceeded to shut down his kidneys with no hope of reversing the damage.

	Our parents and three of my sisters were with Brian when he passed away on November 6.
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