A devastating beat

I just came within a whisker of a monster score.
If my tear ducts worked, I would be crying as I typed this. I just finished 13th out of 1,213 players in a $20 multi-table tournament, and I exited in the most devastating fashion.
We'll start from the beginnning. This morning I bought into three MTTs: a $10 turbo, a deep-stack $10, and a standard-speed $20. I wasn't able to get anything going in the turbo, and I busted out of the deep-stack event a couple hours in when I flopped bottom set against my opponent's top set. Nothing you can do about that.
But I made a monster run in the $20, which had a guaranteed prize pool of $20,000. I just played real solid, disciplined poker and steadily built my stack.
With about 250 players left, I was in fifth place with around 30k, but at that point I lost a pot that would have given me the chip lead. A middle-position player made a small raise, and was called in three spots before it got to me in the big blind with JJ. I made a nice reraise, and the original raiser thought for quite a while before shipping all in. Everyone else folded, and I had great odds to call. He had AK, and I was safe through the flop and turn before a king appeared on the river. Dang.
I grinded my stack back up, only to fall back to 20k when my AQ lost to a short stack's A9, all in preflop. But 20k was the average when the money bubble burst with 180 players left, so I was content to ride it out and avoid confrontations.
At that point, I simply went card dead and pretty much didn't play a hand for an hour. I did make one nice hero call to maintain a playable stack. A player in the cutoff raised, and I flat-called on the button with 88. The big blind called as well, and we saw a flop of 643, two clubs. It was checked around to me, and I bet about two-thirds the pot. The BB folded, but the original raiser reraised all in. I just felt like he was full of crap. He'd been stealing preflop, and I figured he put me on two big cards that had missed the flop. I called off my stack, and he had Q4 offsuit. Booya. I managed to dodge his five outs to double to about 60k.
With about 50 players left and the blinds at 2000-4000, I was basically treading water at 60k (15xBB) when I finally picked up a couple hands. The new player to my right had been raising every second pot, and when he min-raised in the cutoff, I shipped with AdQd on the button. He called with 56 offsuit (?!?!?!), and I was fortunate enough to flop a queen. Two hands later, I had KK and found a customer who called a nice big bet on the flop before folding the turn. All of a sudden, I had 170k.
My stack probably peaked around 190k, and I cruised through to the final two tables. There was this Russian dude a couple seats to my right who was extremely aggressive preflop. I pretty much stayed out of his way, except for one pot where I made a nice resteal out of the small blind.
Anyway, that brings us to our crucial hand. We were six-handed at my table when the pesky Russian raised under the gun. I was ecstatic because I had AA on the button. I reraised, he called, and we saw a flop of KQ3. The pot was around 100k at this point. He checked, and I bet about half the pot, leaving myself 50k behind. He reraised all in, I called, and he showed QJ offsuit. What a donkey. The turn was safe, but he rivered a third queen to bust me in 13th place, good for $182. Unlucky freaking 13.
Did I mention first place was $4,300, which would have been the biggest score of my fledgling poker career? And that the pot I lost contained 331k, which would have put me in fifth place when they got down to the final table? What a spot that would have been. Even sixth place paid a grand. Talk about a brutal beat.
The good news is, the Saskatchewan Roughriders crushed the B.C. Lions in CFL action last night. So I've got that going for me, which is nice.
What's also clear is, these MTTs have great potential for profit for me. To recap, I've had recent finishes of 37th out of 1,551 players; 3rd out of 228; and 13th out of 1,213. I am going to win one of these. It's only a matter of time. I just need my aces to hold up ONE TIME!
For the time being, though, I need to take a breather from poker. I need a mental break to get my confidence back in the sit-n-gos, and to be honest, I'm just a little bit tired of cards right now.
Bankroll = $5,150