Content Warnings: Death, Mortality, Suicide, Medical Anxiety

Around five years ago, around this very week in March, something bad had happened to one of my internet writing buddy besties. I had no clue yet, and wouldn’t know until April 2nd when the news broke in my friend group. But during that month of March, I was still dealing with a backlog of queue stuff, but nothing akin to what would come. Dealing with College on a weekday basis, then spending my weekends or evenings working on playing games for review, before the latter half of March would truly excite me with the shadowdrop of Blaster Master Zero 2. I was goofing off with friends on Discord and Twitter, enjoying a wonderful sequel, and was generally in good spirits.

Then April Fools day ended and after goofing with some friends in Smash Ultimate, we were told bad news. News that hit me like a train, to the point I can’t say I’m even over it, five years later. And it wouldn’t even be the worst thing to happen that year.

One of my best online friends had died unexpectedly. And I had no idea how to process it.

I thought about organizing this like a usual opinion piece and broken up into subsections and whatnot, but I didn’t feel like that would be good. I debated against doing it like a rambly mess, but I feel like expressing raw emotions like a rambly mess is the best way I can describe my emotions on the matter. This is very difficult and if you didn’t see the content warnings, this is your last warning. I’m pretty much just gonna go into how wild my mind went about my own mortality and relate a bit to my darker past, too. I held off on going this deep about how I was derailed by this so it wouldn’t seem like an excuse for why I’ve been slow at the review queue, but with me picking up pace on that again and getting very productive in life once more, I feel it’s no longer a worry and I’ve moved on for the most part.

That doesn’t mean it doesn’t still hurt though. That loss was just the first of many rough events in my life that year, but while the others were awful I felt those had a bit of a warning that something bad may happen; this loss, was outta nowhere. And I still blame myself for it to an extent.

See, the friend of mine in question is someone I’ll just nickname “Toony”. He wasn’t my closest friend on the entire internet or anything, but he wasn’t someone I forgot about either. He was my exact same age, and we had pretty similar interests. Mainly, being huge fans of PMD stuff and just being writers in general.

Meeting him and actively starting to talk more on discord was back during my early SFG review heavy phase when I was 2 years new at this review thing still. (so around 2016), and thus my backup writing activity when not working on reviews but wanting to write something was taking on writing commissions people threw my way for me to do. Surely if people want me to write something within guidelines I set up as things I would allow, that means they like how I write in general, and if it got me extra funds to save up, that helps too.

After all, lots of artists make money and do stuff, and while I can’t draw to save my life, I can write. And having people pay me for stuff was pretty alien to me back then. I literally wrote a so bad it’s funny Ys X Looney Tunes crossover fanfic back in my teenage days, for christ sakes! Nowadays that I’ve been paid for a tiny selection of unpublished gaming book articles (RIP Road Fighter/King and Balloon reviews, doomed to never see a printing press) I’m more used to how i’d get paid in the field I currently write in, but back then it was a bit odd to meet people through that. Such is that nature of being in the furry fandom, but I really met some people through that, and thus, I met Toony when browsing similar furry writing content to my own.

And through him, I met a few other friends. Some really, really outstanding people that I grew to know as people beyond the confines of the site we were on at the time, and artist/writer pals I was able to talk with, chat with, play games with, eventually meet at MFF in person in 2022. I talked with Toony quite a bit often shortly after we met, and being able to gush about PMD or our made up characters or other games or favorite pokemon was just very fun to do. I did it with other internet besties, but me and Toony had way more in common than I expected with how we liked PMD in particular, to the point I wondered if he was a mirror of me at times. Granted he wasn’t a “chunsoft fan to the point he knows the name of the people who worked on the games” kinda of guy, but rather a “omg this game changed my life and gave me super happy memories and I can write about worlds like that for days” kind of guy.

I was going through a ton back then though on a mental level, and having nightmares of your abusive past pop up at you via nightmares and flashbacks is never fun. Sometimes writing a random story would get my mind off it, or make me feel empowered against the usual fears I had, but I was also very prone to snapping or getting defensive. I’ve had trust issues for a long time post my adoption, and I still do to an extent, and that would often boil over. But I was gaining a bit of my cool back for a few years then, as I aged and generally grew more mature. I had lots more friends in the furry community, and thus I’d try to hang out more in discord chats of the like.

Needless to say though, trying to be everywhere at once, leads you to being almost nowhere at once. Sometimes I’d just stick to 2 or 3 servers and neglect the others. Not because of apathy or dislike, but rather because I was just so darn busy or fixated on the top ones in my folder. Sometimes those further down slip out of your mind, and the same goes for contacts on your discord. I’d stay in touch with Toony off and on for years, but a lot of the time it was if he or I wanted to RP or just talk about characters again. Eventually I saw him around a discord server I was actively in, and we chatted with him whenever he came by, and he was always a delight. I was meaning to play online games with him sometime, but I don’t believe he picked up smash ultimate so I wasn’t able to get in some games with him during the time that discord server did a lot of SSBU matchups.

Still, seeing him in the server was enough for me to chat with him, though he noted he was gonna be busy at a new job, while I told him I was still in college and thus very busy myself, but was eager to talk more and maybe get to some switch games.

Early 2019, Pokemon Sword and Shield got revealed, and he seemed pretty excited. New Pokemon games, thus new games to play with friends. I thought of him and how we’d probably do a lot of online battling/trading in those games, and indeed, post launch I did just that with a lot of my other pals. But I hadn’t messaged him since late 2018, mostly just saying hi to him infrequently via that discord server instead.

March went by. Like I started out saying, I was enjoying the new Blaster Master Zero 2 game and still hanging out in some discords to goof off with friends, even as I was still my usual socially awkward self.

Then April 2nd we got the news. Someone who had known a friend of his IRL (later I’d find that friend to be his roommate), had informed us in the server that he passed away in the middle of march.

Half a year ago I was talking to him about our characters and how I’d love to play Switch games with him, and would maybe get over my general slowness on Steam and play some games with him. He was a really big Spiral Knights fan, which was a game I only know as the first thing I played on my Mac on Steam because it was free. I didn’t play it for long, but he at least loved it.

Now, out of literal nowhere, he was dead. The same age I was at the time, 21 years old. Everyone in that server was upset. It is not just about me, and I need to stress that before the rest of this article may make me look incredibly selfish. His loss upset everyone there who knew him and it was incredibly sad. The friend who relayed the information even got in touch with several of his closest pals to get permission for an artist to make a sendoff pic of their OC and his OC, a Sandshrew/Sandslash. I got one of these pics, and I’d gladly share it here with full credit the artist, but unfortunately, this friend who relayed and got the pic for me/others has long since deactivated his discord, and I have no idea who he went to for getting the pics drawn because they didn’t watermark it or upload it publicly. So I’ll just refrain from sharing unless I get consent to, but the one I got was a very sweet picture of me crowning his Sandshrew sona with a PMD rescue team badge.

This was a sad moment for all there. Losing someone in your friend group is never fun or easy to deal with. But for it to be sudden, and so young… That hits a lot of people harder. Especially if you were close friends. For me though, it was impossible to comprehend at first.

He was just fine a few months ago!

Shit, did that new job overwork him and cause an accident?

What if something went wrong?

Or what if I talked to him more and maybe had him doing something else the night he died, maybe that would make him still be alive?

Was that brief inactivity my fault?

Maybe there’s a way to somehow bring him back…

I was a complete mental wreck at the time. Just going through so many what if scenarios and blaming myself for it. And most importantly, wanting answers ASAP. I poked the mutual and hoped he’d know something. I was worried and I even told my grandparents who suggested sending him flowers, if I knew how to. Of course, I didn’t know him IRL, so that was outta the question. But the many, many “why or how did that happen to someone so young” worried the shit out of me, and made me fear my own mortality; after all, having a big bad death phobia since you were 8 and now having someone you know that was your age doesn’t help a person one bit.

You wouldn’t quite know I was a mental wreck via the Site side of things though, since I still got some pretty big reviews done at the time, though my attention span for doing them was much, much shorter. I barely could focus. I barely could touch a game that wasn’t a quick pick up and play in case feelings of sadness rushed over me. Still, I just kept myself busy and went to college.

But my mind was scattered. The closest to a loss in my age group I’d dealt with beforehand, was a kid in my school I knew after I first got adopted, as he was in my third grade class at the time. A lot of those people became my friends, I grew up, they even went to my birthday parties, but as you probably know, older kids end up in different cliches and fall apart, and thus I barely heard from many of them anymore. Still, I saw one of them occasionally at my high school, and he seemed nicer than I even remembered him back then. He was helping out with kids in need and doing his best, and then months later, he took his own life, again, without warning.

It hit hard too. But that longer gap of not communicating with him made me not dwell on it long. I just felt sad for his family, and sad that a nice man ended up getting bullied into his death. Which also led to another worry about Toony; what if someone did this to him? I must have revenge if so. I must do everything it takes to get to the bottom of this loss happening at a young age. Nothing makes sense.

The more I obsessed on what ifs, the crazier my mind became. I’d spend classes in college thinking and wandering off about a bajillion possibilities for why my young friend suddenly died. It wasn’t a car accident, as the little info his mutual knew was that it was at home somehow. Then, I’d turn to random rage and frustration, especially anytime I came across someone I didn’t trust or someone who I saw as “in my way”. Urgh, you’re just an obstacle! if I could trade you to bring my friend back, I’d gladly do so. I’ll never see you again after this semester anyway, so what does it matter if that were possible?

Yeah, it really wasn’t good for me. The whole loss became a logic puzzle I hyperfixated on, and just couldn’t let go for the longest time. That month of april felt painfully slow. The lack of answers drove me nuts, and for a while, I felt like i’d never get any, as my mind continued to come up with crazy theories and desperate, crazy dreams to get out of this nightmare. What if Necromancy is real, and if I prayed hard enough, it could bring him back? or What if I could communicate with the dead through my dreams, to at least say goodbye? the stuff you think about when you grieve, especially when not mourning that much before in your life, can be pretty wild. And honestly, considering how there are some things in life you just won’t ever get answers to, it could have just ended with a simple “We don’t know how he died, but he’s gone now.” and it would have eaten at me for the rest of my life, mainly the whole regret of not talking more and not saying goodbye somehow.

But then I got some hope. I managed to learn from the mutual who his roommate was, and was told I’d probably be OK giving condolences to them and the family. I did so, and me and this roommate talked for a bit. She really was thankful to hear someone else remembered Toony fondly, and how the whole family and her were very sad about it. They still weren’t sure what happened exactly, but the loss was hard for all. I didn’t get answers, but neither had they, and the fact I at least had someone to grieve with about that, was something. I was just someone who knew him online for a few years and was somewhat close but not quite; they were people who lived with him daily and knew him for years. If anyone was hurting the most, it was them, not me.

May would be rough, but I still kept at my routine. Talking to my therapist and family about my thoughts helped me understand the nature of grief and my wild mood swings related to it way more, especially with how the pain and frustration stemmed from the uncertainty of it all. They also noted that he wouldn’t want me to be all that upset for him for so long either, so maybe if I mailed a card to their family, I’d be able to have closure. Thus, I asked for permission and was allowed to do so.

It took me weeks to write that card and have the courage to. I felt like if I did, it would be closing the book forever on a friendship. Eventually around Summertime, I wrote it and mailed it out. I never heard back from the family, but I heard back from the roommate at least that it seemed like they had an idea on what caused it; Type 1 Diabetes.

I won’t go into more details to respect their privacy. But it did seem like he always had it, and just didn’t tell me or anyone else in the server about it. Not that he needed to! But all that time, I was coming up with wild theories in my brain and worries about something sinister, only for it to be a nasty, awful condition that hurts so many people every year.

On one hand, kinda knowing why made me relieved it wasn’t anything foul play related or something crazy from my brain like that. But here I was, ignorant about Type 1 as a whole, yet now I knew it can kill and it can kill young. I asked my family what should I do to help fight Type 1 or do something in his honor, and they suggested a Diabetes Walk or donating to a cause.

I never got to do either. I still want to though, but something else would quickly take over my mind that made me realize that my sadness about Toony had reached the limit, I’d have to focus on moving on, and that i’d go back to my usual writing routine as I took summer vacation.

Except my Grandfather’s cancer came back. From being defeated in the Thyroid back in 2014, to Lung Cancer. June 2019 was a whiplash of sadness. I had just started to get over the loss of my friend, and now I had another, bigger loss incoming. I was starting to curse the world and worry more about if I was truly safe. Still, I wanted to try and help my grandfather as much as I could. I’d go to hospital visits with him, I’d use this chance to motivate myself to get over my fear of driving and drive a bit more in my new car, and I’d try my damnest to impress him during his final year.

Except that final year turned to final months. July, he was starting to be in a hospice place, and had a horrifying breakdown where he cried about losing people in the Vietnam War and how we shouldn’t have gone there. Being that this was a man who was of the “men don’t cry” mindset, this tonal whiplash really scared the shit outta me. It made me realize he knew his time was up.

August 7th 2019. He was back in the hospital, and they were doing more work on him. I had to come in the middle of the week to stay overnight, and he was in a coma. I thought I was too late, but then he woke up, enough to laugh and talk with us for a bit longer. I hoped foolishly he would at least beat it or push it off for another few months. During this convo, I told him how I couldn’t deal with losing him, as I barely was getting over the loss of an internet bestie, and my grandfather who helped to save my life would hit way, way more. He told me to not let it take over my mind, and to just live the best life I can the same way he did at 79 1/2.

We went to bed. Me, my grandma, and my dad. Grandpa went back to sleep in that bed with all the creepy wires.

6 AM, we were woken up. Grandpa was not feeling good and was in very, very bad pain. I was having a full blown panic attack and paced myself in the room. Grandma went out to get a nurse, and my dad went out to do… something that wasn’t that to take his mind off it. While I was breaking down and begging grandpa to not go, Grandpa was telling me to please, please rip the morphine mask off him. He didn’t want to be in pain anymore, and he wanted to just go. He had dreamed of his relatives weeks prior and wanted to be with them again, as he believed. I refused. I did not want to make things worse and I instead hoped for a miracle. I told him goodbye and I loved him and I really would never be the same.

Grandma and the nurse came back and they turned on the morphine. 10 mins later, at around 7:05 AM, my grandpa was dead. I took a photo of the minute he passed, to signify and always have proof that no, he did die. It wasn’t just a bad dream, he wasn’t in a hospice home ready to come home any day now. But being that I spent tons of time and money after the 2022 data crash trying to get that photo back to no avail, it seems the universe gave me a sign to not retain such a picture.

I played Columns II, for what felt like ages. I kept trying to put my mind off the loss we just dealt with, hoping for some miracle, but knowing that there is no such thing as a god, there would not be. I just wanted to escape into a world of gems to keep my mind off the horrors I had dealt with.

4 months ago, I lost a bestie.

Now, I lost my grandfather. Even with the warning, it still hurt badly.

I wasn’t the same.

Weeks would go by. Every month was an anniversary of sorts and it felt weird with him not being around. I neglected my health. I oversnacked, ate lots of stuff, and just threw away every sort of precaution to focus on having the days go by in my final semester of College. I took it out on friends, I had way more ragey moments, and I just lost my shit all around that whole fall. My reviews started to slip in production, and my mental health cratered. There felt like no escape; those you treasure will die before the true evil of the world.

Then well, 2019 ended with a pandemic kicking off, and 2020 was extreme anxiety with me worrying my grandma would soon pass and get COVID, or hell, that I’d die due to COVID. I kept trucking away at my queue, but it was blatant the whole “accept every game offered and ask for every new game you’re eligable for” routine was a bad, bad idea. And it was coming to bite me in the ass even if I pretended for a bit that everything was fine. I still got reviews out, I even got bigger reviews out, but I still lacked my focus and any sort of mental stability. Just constant anxiety.

Constant fearing of death

Constant fearing of loss

and constant feeling of everything eventually being in a black void of nothing.

2021 wasn’t much better, but that was when I started my new job. This helped a bit, but my productivity would slow in general due to the new job. I was starting to slowly chip away at the queue I built up though, and had enacted a much stricter acceptance gate toward stuff companies would randomly send me. I much preferred to only accept/request what I knew I could do quickly, with only a few exceptions slipping through over the years. (and most of them having been caught up now)

2022, I had my big moment with landing the Tomie interview. This was huge, and me spending the second half of that year on a video that didn’t do so well was bad for my writing productivity, but making that video would still mean it was the most productive in general I had been in ages.

2023, I got better. I talked more to therapists, had an experience that (for better or worse) let me to flashbacking to my near death experiences as a kid to the point I had my therapist give me lots more help and eventually motivating me to focus on my own self-care rather than worrying so much about everyone else (neglecting my own health is a bad, bad habit i still have)

and 2024… Well, I’m still here, struggling with the punches. We’re nearing five years of the day that I lost a bestie, and I’ve lost more people besides my grandpa and him since then. Family friends, online friends, etc. But even despite that, nothing will equate to the grief I felt being blindsided by Toony’s loss.

Every time I play Pokemon I think about what he’d think of the games. Would he laugh at Scarlet/Violet with me, or would he find something cool to like? Probably the latter.

What would he think of PMD DX? That art style is absolutely up his alley.

Anytime I catch a Sandslash, I name it after his real name. A Sandshrew, his sona’s name. One of my strongest pokemon in Let’s Go Pikachu when I finally picked it up, was a Sandslash.

Would he be proud of me for the Tomie interview? I sure hope he would have.

Even now that I know about the Type 1 Diabetes, I realize he probably didn’t want it to define him. Still, I pledged to my family that I’d try to do a diabetes walk/drive someday, and I’m still aiming to do that. No matter how long it takes, I at least want to do something in return. Something to try and help someone else avoid the grief I dealt with, and to help us ultimately find a solution to this painful disease.

I’m back to writing way more in general now. Rambly like this post, or not. Still, this article was beyond hard to write for me. And that’s disregarding the fact his loss hurt other people, way more than it did me. I just was one to handle it the worst due to the blindsided nature of it all. Maybe today after this goes live, I should reach out to some of them. See how they’re doing.

Whatever the case, five years later, and I’m still “not over” the loss. It hurts the hardest due to how sudden it was and me never getting to say goodbye. Me wishing he could have seen so many things. My grandpa’s loss was horrible too, but he at least told me not to dwell on it and I got to say goodbye. I got to honor him, I got to donate to cancer research in his honor, (as much good as that does) and grandma and I helped him get a much-desired military grave he wanted.

Today, would have been his 84th birthday. When I got the responses from Tomie in 2022, it was on the 18th. I like to think that was a sign from him, despite my atheism.

Whatever the case, the loss will haunt me forever. But I have tried to move on, and done so much strides since then, and have made a lot more friends, improved my mental health more and more over time, and have tried to just be the best writer I can. I know Toony would be proud of me, as would grandpa.

Such is the sorrow of one who barely knew grief, until it blindsided them in the worst way…