Date: 10-10-2021
Last night I dreamt about my brother. It was such a weird dream! The story took place at our parents’ house. Dad was still alive, but at the same time there was a reunion for family and friends of his in commemoration of him. And so, my brother was here too, but I had not recognised him at first. I sat at a table with a few people, and next to me sat a huge man. He was shaven bald, his chin, his head, just completely hairless. And he was incredibly fat. I had no idea who this was. He stank, and it was genuinely unpleasant to look at this man. He was a stereotypical morbidly obese man.
There were other people sitting at this table, and these people and the fatman were talking loudly and laughing hard. I was just an extra, as I did not participate at first. But this fatman knew things about my youth he couldn’t possibly know. And he made the occasional joke at my expense, with knowledge about the past he couldn’t possibly have. Something about him was familiar, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. The jokes at my expense didn’t hit target as I did not engage. I was just trying to figure out who this guy is.
But then the mannerisms and things he said made me realise… this is my brother. My brother used to be a big long strong man. We both grew up with a skinny body plan, but he didn’t want that and started doing fitness and some body building in his teen years. As he was 6ft. 6″ tall that meant he grew into a big hulk. Tender, still, but strong. And he ate healthy. His body was his temple. It seemed that in this dream reality, he had completely let go of that philosophy.
He was so incredibly fat that even his face had a different form. I barely recognised him in it. And his completely shaven appearance where he used to sport a beard and moustache made him even more unrecognisable. He used to love his wild hair! With my mouth fallen open I had stared at him the moment I realised this was my brother, looking for words to start a conversation. But I found that to be difficult. He was still in a very lively conversation with the other people sitting at our table. I remained a spectator, mostly. I did not engage.
At one point he looked and smiled a certain way, and then I recognised something of my brother. And now a few people at our table stood up and left, maybe to get a drink or talk to someone else. My brother turned to me. Of course he had recognised me, as I still hadn’t changed much. It was an awkward moment cause he knew I had not seen him grow into this, and it seemed he didn’t want to talk about it. He tried to pick up our old joke routine, but it didn’t work. I was still processing this change. Carefully I uttered the words: “Bro, I had not even recognised you…” He interjected before I could say anything about the weight or how he used to look: “Yeah, new me. Let the past be the past.”
He then tried to start joke routines we used to do, but these routines and facial expressions we used to do didn’t work on his new image. His clownish imago routine just wasn’t funny any more. He had changed into a different person. And he noticed. He stopped and there was an awkward silence. I had now found the courage to bring it up again and ask him the question he was evading. I tried it jokingly first: “But seriously though; what happened to that long and muscular brother of mine, and who is this fatty sitting in front of me?” “Yeah, things happen. Not important.” He evaded again.
But I changed my joking tone, as now the question had been asked: “Dude, really… What happened to you? How have you changed so much in such a short time? This isn’t what you wanted for yourself, right? You lived so healthy, ate healthy food, kept in shape… How?” He got a bit aggravated, and threw me something along the lines that I should stop living in the past, as if that is what this was about. I mean, aren’t we there to commemorate dad, who is from our past? But he made it clear; the topic of his new appearance was off limits.
He just wanted to pick things up where we left them, and whenever anyone would ask about his bodily transformation he was short to answer something along the lines that “we should just get used to it cause he won’t change back”, after which he would then change the topic. He didn’t want to be confronted with it, at all. But I didn’t see a way to get used to it, and that was emphasised by how he handled himself now. The old M would not evade questions like this. He knew his body, and was confident about it, and conscious of its shortcomings.
I realised this was not the same person I grew up with. Not only had he changed on the outside, he had also changed on the inside. The brother I knew was gone. He no longer felt like him. I didn’t see how I could get used to this. I just couldn’t do it. It was so weird. And his reaction to questions gave me an unpleasant familiar vibe from our upbringing. Some things were also non-discussable. No more off limit topics. I was done with off limit topics.
