I’m not changing any damned names, because privacy doesn’t matter any more as far as this piece is concerned. Besides, Alex Gibbs deserves to have the world know him. This anonymous man who took his own life just over 24 hours ago deserves to have people know who he was.
Alex didn’t have a chance in this world. From the time he was four years old until he was fifteen, he was shuffled, alone, between twenty-three different foster homes. TWENTY-THREE DIFFERENT FOSTER HOMES!
This constant moving between adults who would bring him into their home, smile at him and say “We love you, Alex. Welcome to our family,” and then several months later ship him off to someone else who would tell him the same lie with the same false smile destroyed him. It destroyed what God wants for each of us: to simply be loved and be able to love: to be able to connect.
Alex’s ability to love and connect with others was destroyed, and as this destruction set in and became more and more a major part of him, he became mentally ill. Try to imagine yourself in those little shoes of the childhood Alex had to endure. As you can imagine, Alex’s mental illness often expressed itself as anger, and I don’t blame him. Who can blame the child who lives in a world of false and temporary love from being angry? Who can blame him for lashing out at a world that seems so unfair? You think the world’s unfair, Alex? No shit!
Alex lived in twenty-three different foster homes. I’m sure that many of these were, indeed, loving environments. The families seeking to give what they could to children who have so little. Unfortunately, I am just as sure that many of these homes were nightmarish hell-holes in which Alex was physically beaten and abused in every manner imaginable; verbally, emotionally, spiritually, and yes, sexually. You think the world’s unfair, Alex? No shit!
When he was fifteen he was adopted by one of his foster parents. Alex entered this home angry, abused, cast aside and shipped out so many times he probably didn’t care anymore. Adopted? So what. These people would just get rid of him soon enough. Were they qualified to adopt a child with the afflictions Alex carried inside of him? I don’t know the answer to that, but I suspect that they weren’t.
Not long after he was adopted, Alex molested his twelve-year old sister. To their credit, this family, who had compassion for Alex because of his history, did what the law required them to do (inform the police), but they also hired an attorney to defend Alex as he entered the vengeance system (We no longer have a ‘legal system’ in this country. We now have what has degenerated into a zero-tolerance, zero-compassion ‘vengeance system.’).
The attorney collected his healthy fee, and smiled as Alex was shipped off into the “juvenile justice system.” He would spend the remaining time until he was eighteen in juvenile detention, whereupon, he would be spat out into the world as an adult: battered, bruised, uneducated, mentally ill, scared to death, and of course, now a registered sex offender. You think the world’s unfair Alex? No shit!
Alex drifted, homeless as you might imagine, but eventually God led him to Joe’s Addiction. Over almost half a year, Alex drifted in and out of Community with us, until finally settling in and believing, as best he could, I hope, that we loved him. We did. We did as best we could. Alex had issues and we knew it. Hell, who doesn’t.
In talking to my best friend about this I said “God knew this day would come. He knew that Alex would find himself at the crossroads of life and death and hope he would choose life. He led Alex to Joe’s for this very purpose, to show him that there is always hope, and there are people who truly love you for whoever you are…there’s a family for you. But Alex couldn’t see it. Alex couldn’t grab onto that hope. All he could see was hopeless darkness. So much so that he didn’t even know it was a tunnel with light at the end. He just thought it was the universe as it’s supposed to be. The kingdom was at hand, and he couldn’t see it enough to reach out and take hold of it.
So, early on morning of June 5th, 2015, Alex was found hanging from a tree in the forest in which he lived.
I’m lucky. Aside from the occasional ‘hi’ and ‘how are you,’ the last thing I said to Alex was “We love you.” Although this was preceded by a talk about the shop rules and not going off on the barista if they ask you to turn your phone down. Still, the talk was with compassion and respect, and concluded with “we love you.”
We love you Alex, and I’m so sorry for all you had to endure at the hands of America.
So, here’s the part that pisses me off. Josh Duggar will go on. He’ll have jobs, homes, all the trappings of this evil world, and Alex is gone. Josh Duggar will never live in a tent hidden in a forest and, more than likely, he will never have to hive with the scarlet letters “S.O.” branded on his forehead. I don’t know what to say beyond that other than “You think the world is unfair, Alex? No shit!”
Alex, we will miss you. In the end, God made sure you had what you needed; people who loved you. Rest in peace in the Father’s loving arms, my friend.
Love and peace to all,
Niemand