"Crickets" from your own brother reminds me of when Flying Solo and I both left at the same time. I'd become increasingly alienated from premies in our community essentially because their approach to things made no sense to me. Since I could no longer do what I was doing with any enthusiasm, my only option was to step back, which only led to further alienation. That's when I took my first peek at EPO and dove into the archives.
Flying Solo and I were both deeply involved in our community for decades, so when we both left abruptly (shocking revelations from EPO and the forum), I'm sure it was a bit of a shock. Long story short, not one phone call from people we called friends and socialized with for thirty years to see if we were okay. Just an abrupt end to what were beautiful relationships.
Perhaps the only thing worse than having to recover from the personal harm and derailment is the ongoing damage done to countless close relationships based on something as stupid as "is he or isn't he?" Simply put, premie/non-premie doesn't mix well in close relationships, especially with heavily devoted premies. It seems the only way to get along is to ignore the elephant in the room and not talk about it, which is no way to bring about any genuine peace.*
I hope the day comes when you and your brother can look back and laugh about it - or anything - together again.
* That's just one example of when - for a premie - Knowledge becomes a healing balm to ease pain caused by Prem Rawat and his Knowledge.
