All is not lost

This Saturday October 29th is the 1 year anniversary of the last time I saw and spoke to my brother John before his unfortunate suicide on November 4th, 2010.
Why is this date more significant to me than the anniversary of his death? It's more significant because, to me it was the last day He was still here mentally. He checked out of this world somewhere between Friday October 29th 2010, and the time he went missing Tuesday November 2nd, 2010. What still plauges my mind is what could have happened, been said or done to him, or what did he know about his future, that would have caused him to choose death over life? The last time I saw him, he was preparing for a test on docking and air brakes. He was in a tractor trailer driving training program, and he had just obtained his DOT Permit. He was excited about the permit, but he was nervous about the coming test, saying what if I fail? I remember saying what if you pass? I told him not to worry about failing, because then you will make yourself fail, instead just pass! He was worried what people would think of him driving a truck, instead of being in construction, and I simply said, who pays your bills? Certainly not the people you worry will judge you on trying to support your family. I told him that I was proud of him for trying something new, and I loved him. I sent him a good luck text on Monday morning the day of his test. I do not know if he ever took it, but I know he would have passed if he did.
As the one year anniversary approaches, I look back, on a year that went by too fast. I have struggled in many areas of my day to day life. I now need to take an anxiety pill in order to make it through a day at work. I worry that I have had too many fun times throughout the course of the year, I worry that I have not supported his family in the way he would have wanted. I find I use the word Careful too fruequently with my kids, and I am always waiting for something bad to happen. I think of him everyday, I miss him everyday, and he has only been in one dream of mine in a year. When you have spoken to someone almost everyday for most of your life, and you do not speak to them anymore there is an emptiness there.
There is a void that can never be filled in all of us. There are questions that can never be answered, and there's a loss that can never be overcome. Whoever coined the phrase "What doesn'nt kill us makes us stronger" clearly did not lose a sibling to suicide, because even though I'm not dead, I am clearly a lot weaker in many areas, than I was a year ago.
I'm not sure if I will ever be close to the way I was before he died, I am trying so hard it hurts, but I am trying. God Bless you my friend.....I miss you, and love you!
Norm