Hi, the only reason I joint this forum is to reed about the post of Virola78. He was my son.
A friend of him drew my attention to this forum and told me Martijn (that was his real name) wrote all sorts of things about psychedelica but also about us, his family and how he felt after the tumor was discovered. Helas Martijn died on the 14th of Feb. 2014.
We knew his passion for psychedelics and his wish to have a DMT experience. We Always encouraged him to learn more about his favorite subjects and his father was a great sparring partner (verbal ofcourse) in his fearce discussions about the do's and don'ts of taking (using) drugs. I shall not be posting much but if anyone is interested how his last few years went on I shall be happy to provide this information. Unfortunately I only can find the first and last 10 posts of him. I don't have much experience with forums and how they work. Perhaps somebody can help me with this.
Monique

Welcome. I'm sorry to hear about your son. My sincerest condolences. There is nothing worse than enduring the death of ones own child.

To find all his posts, use the search function (top right corner) and search using his username. I hope this helps you find what you're looking for.

hello myristica,

I am sorry to hear about your son. I hope all is well with you and my thoughts go out to your family.

As for your wish to read more of your sons posts, if you click on the search button on the top right corner of the forum and type in his username in the "posted by" field it should populate more threads for you.

Welcome to the Nexus!

We were very sorry to lose Virola78, and we didn't even know him in real life.. I can't imagine how hard it was for you! My sincere condolences.

We will talk to The Traveler, who's the admin, and see if there's a way to easily link you to all his posts. I'm sure something can be worked out!

May I ask about how was his mindset and attitude regarding the disease and the possibility of dying?

All the best! <3

Hi Monique,

Virola78 was an amazing person to have on the forum and I have such fond memories. He has been truly missed and my deepest sympathies go out to you and your family.

As Endlessness stated, the Traveler will be able to help out in gathering his posts.

Take care

Hello Monique

come to the chat sometimes

Dear Monique,

Martijn has always been a member that you can be proud of as a parent. Virola78, as we knew him in this forum, was a person that always wrote with respect to others and to safety, a person that you could have a good chat with and that you could trust.

As such I want to give you my condolences for the loss of your son, something that must have been very hard for you as a parent.

I would love to hear about his last years, how he found out about his brain tumor and how he was coping with that in his real life (thus outside of this forum). So please write something about that when you have the time for it.

As a courtesy to you and your son I have made a special Excel sheet that contains every post he ever made on this forum. Since the text also contains markup for this forum that might make it hard to read in the Excel sheet I made two hyperlinks with each message he wrote so that you can click on those to see that message on this site with the correct layout.

The first hyperlink is in de A column and that will take you to the topic where he posted, the second hyperlink is in column E and that will take you directly to the post he made.


Als je nog vragen hebt dan kan je het ook altijd in het Nederlands vragen indien nodig. Mijn medeleven aan de familie en ik hoop dat jullie een manier hebben gevonden om hier mee om te gaan.


Met vriendelijke groet,

The Traveler

<3 <3

Hi there and welcome,

I am very sorry to hear the news about your son. These must be very difficult times. I wish you the very best of luck in finding the information you seek in regards to your son. My heart goes out to you and your family.

Hello,

Virola seemed to be a cool guy. I always enjoyed reading his posts even though i didn't know him well. I was saddened to hear about his condition and...and who wouldn't be upset to hear, that mortal ways had really come to an end. Even though most of us probably have suspected it after he stopped posting.

Thank you for telling us though, it is good to have closure. I hope you will find closure as well and that his postings will contribute to your memories of him.

All the best in these troubling times...

Hello you all.

Thank you very much for your warm words of welcome and sympathie regarding the dead of our son. It was very good for us to hear that he was a well respected member of this forum. We Always got the impression that the forum and its members were his second family. He spoke with great respect of each and every one of you.

After Martijn's operation and the following Chemo therapy he was doing quite well. We travelled to Egypt to see the pyramids and made a nile cruise. During that trip he became very disaranged. Compulsive in his actions, and behaving and acting like a four years old child. We took him back to the hospital and found out that his tumor was growing fast. We were literally told: Take him home, enjoy the time that is coming and be prepared for the worse.

So, we did. The medicine (dexamethason) they gave him made him feel better, he was his old self again, no more disarrangement, he was alright. We went to Curacao to visit his friend and he enjoyed fishing there. He was very calm about his approaching death, accepted it, but was determined to make the most of his remaining time. After Curacao time went on, and nothing happened. Fortunatelly. After a few month we went back to the hospital for another MRI. This showed that the tumor had decreased from 7 cm to 4 cm. That was wonderfull news. The chemo had worked. The following months were happy months, yes, he was very tired and yes he still had a tumor in his head, but we enjoyed several holidays with his sister, her husband and his little niece, whom he called "popje".

After a few months, it is august 2012, he heard a "crack" in his back. The pain became from a bit to the point that he could not get out of bed anymore. Every move made him scream of pain. He laid in bed for almost 7 months, visiting the hospital (with an ambulance) several time, but no one could tell us what the pain was or were it came from. Finally in January 2013, after a second opinion, they found that his back was broken. This was due to the high
dosage of Dexamethason that was prescribed. After a small operation, a vertibrea plastic, he could start his revalidation. He could not walk anymore, because of the deteriation of his muscles. After 3 months of revalidation he could walk again behind his wheelchair.

All this time he kept his humor, sarcasm and intelligence. The only thing was his short time memory. He knew all about his former job, but could not remember what he had for lunch when it was dinner time. He also did not know how to work on a computer, didn't know his paswords etc.

It is the middle of 2013. Martijn is getting stronger every day, but the tumor is growing again. His intelligence is not effected. He is waching Discovery, following difficult discussions about all sorts or things, but his memory is almost gone. We still have a lot of fun with him and he is flirting with several of his nurses who assist us in taking care of him. He is still the cheecky bastard he Always was.
He wants to try a last extasy trip with his best friend and we agree to that. Why not, it won't kill him! But after this trip he is getting worse. The second trip we planned to Curacao is a living hell for him. Not the first week, he is "alright" then, but the second week he is hit by a massive epileptic attack. He falls out of bed and suffers a major head wound.

After that trip he has not been out of bed. He is slowly slipping away. Also due to the morfine.
On Feb. 14th 2014 he dies as a result of pneumonia.

He was not affraid to die and especially in the beginning of his illness he was determined to beat the cancer. He Always was happy, cheerful, even in the period he sufferd from his back pain. He even drove his PD to despair with his knowledge of ingredients of his prescribed medicin. Always wanted to presude her to try out a different kind of psychedellic medicin. Just for the experience as he would say, and in many times she gave him that medicin.

Sorry for my long story. Just wanted to share with you what a great guy he was.
Monique

Hello again, Monique

Thank you so much for sharing that with us. I couldn't help but tear up while reading your post.

I learned so much from Martijn on this forum and I have no doubt he was a beautiful person in real life too. The way you describe what he went through and how he coped with such challenges proves even more what an amazing guy he really was. I am forever grateful for having the chance to have met such a lovely person.

My thoughts are with you.

Monique,

Thank you thank you thank you. I am stunned and so pleased by your level of sharing. I really really enjoyed your son's presence here and followed his posts pretty compulsively. If I recall correctly one of our posts were so similar in time and content (thanking DMT) that he and I jokingly said we should trade the Titles/Subjects of the posts, .

I had been left thinking of him periodically and wondering. . . . I knew of course, but your telling us what happened and how he dealt with it was inspirational.

Cancer is such a blight on our society. I am very very sorry for this loss. We are all diminished by it. Yet I feel enhanced by both you and the memory of your son, not only through my memories of his presence here but by you filling in the blanks and being so willing to not only share but be open to your sons' ideas/thinking about entheogens.

We love you and we love your son and always will.

Welcome to the Nexus.

While the loss of a loved one is always a tragedy, it sounds like, following his diagnosis, martijn was able to enjoy and appreciate his life to the fullest degree. I was told by a friend who had been diagnosed with terminal cancer (only weeks before his untimely death) that the diagnosis was the best thing to ever happen to him. He said that, while it shook him to his core, it gave life a certain inexplicable beauty knowing that it could end at any minute.

"I always thought death would come on the freeway in a few horrifying moments, so you'd have no time to sort it out. Having months and months to look at it and think about it and talk to people and hear what they have to say, it's a kind of blessing. It's certainly an opportunity to grow up and get a grip and sort it all out. Just being told by an unsmiling guy in a white coat that you're going to be dead in four months definitely turns on the lights. ... It makes life rich and poignant. When it first happened, and I got these diagnoses, I could see the light of eternity, a la William Blake, shining through every leaf. I mean, a bug walking across the ground moved me to tears." -Terrence McKenna

Peace and love to you and your famy Monique

I am new to the forum and while I haven't seen your son's posts on here, he seems to have been well-respected on here and in real life. Sorry for your loss and I hope you have good support in and out of this forum! Wishing you well during this difficult time!
-LSDvibes

I lost my own son some months back, He was young, the few months he spent on earth blessed us. Losing someone so close to you is almost impossible to explain until it happens to yourself. I hope you find comfort in your sons word's. My heart goes out to you and your family.