30 Things: Day 3

Day 3: Describe your relationship with your parents.

 Well, my dad's dead. So there isn't much of a relationship there anymore.  Not that there was one there to begin with.  I barely remember the man my dad was before he got sick the first time around.  I was only six... I have these terribly brief recollections of the time I spent with him, and I get choked up just thinking about them.  I remember driving home from the beach and getting to press the "red and blue buttons" on the dash. I've only recently realized that I thought they were rocketship transformer buttons, when in reality they were the "heat" and "air conditioning" buttons.  I remember not wanting to go to dance class one day (Barney was on, and I was watching with my little sister), and had to be carried kicking and screaming to the car.  I got to dance, went into my classroom, and when I didn't see my dad at the window, I freaked out, started hysterically crying, thinking he had left me there.  He was actually only upstairs paying the bill for that month.

And I remember when he passed out and went into cardiac arrest the first time.  I was sitting at the dining room table, working on my fractions (or maybe it was measurement) homework.  He was reaching on top of the fridge to get the address book to call his buddy for a ride to work.  He said he didn't feel well, and reached for the chair to sit down. And then he was on the floor, unconscious.  My mom had me run downstairs to get my uncle, who luckily was home.  My uncle started CPR while my mom called 911.  Had we had an AED (automatic external defibrilator) in the house, I most likely wouldn't be writing this.  But he was without oxygen to his brain for too long and ended up with permanent brain damage.  Short term memory- poof! Gone. So that really sucked. And that's about all I remember. He was in the hospital for a long time, then he went to live with his father, then his brother, then I stopped talking to him because I hated his brother and how he ruined our lives with divorce nonsense and money troubles.  I talked to my dad December 2008, 2 months before he died.  He had called my house, which he hadn't done in a while.  I answered the phone and spoke in clipped, short sentences.  I had nothing to say to him.  Then as the maybe 45-second phone call came to an end, he said "I love you".  And I told him I loved him too, because deep down I really think I did.  Two months later he was gone.

On a happier note, my mom and I have a good relationship.  She is always there for me, supporting me, encouraging me, teaching me and guiding me in the right direction.  She has raised me to be an incredible young woman even though our lives weren't always easy.  She is the smartest, most educated, most dedicated, resilient, perfect mother I could ever ask for.  Mom of the millenia, without a doubt.  I don't share with her a lot of what goes through my mind because I know it will stress her out, and she has enough stressors in her life, but I do love her more than anything and would do absolutely anything in the world for her.  Except wash the dishes.  Our only point of contention! Haha. Just kidding. But not really :)

Edit: Mom just got home from Grandma's house and found all the newspaper articles about my Dad's benefit. I'll scan them. It is maddening to look back on that now and be so incredulous that I had no clue how bad things were. And then I get even more furious with some people in my "family", but I have to learn to let it go. (ha.)