Hi Dad--Donna

 

Hi. This is my story, which may not seem like a patch of thorns to some, but it is for me. If you don’t like “unnecessary ranting”, please skip :)

“HI DAD!”

The large crowds of people at the airport seemed to disappear at that very moment. My tiny feet and my short stubby legs ran towards my father’s embrace with eagerness. As a preacher in a different country, my dad never had the time to stay with me for a majority of my life. Every year from May to June, my dad would visit us, but even then, he stayed at church.

“Don’t worry Donna, maybe next year,” my mom would say on every birthday with a smile. But even as a 5-year-old, I could see the invisible tears running down her face.

My parents were old, and having a child seemed to be impossible. After I was born, the doctor said that my mom could not have any more children. They called me a miracle child.

They said I had good eyesight when I was younger because I was always the first one to spot my dad at the airport from a far distance. But as time went on, the large crowds were all I could see. My dad would slowly walk towards me and tap my shoulder. Only then would I look up from my phone and greet him.

“Hi dad.”

I can’t pinpoint the exact reason why I grew apart from my dad. I didn’t hate him, but I didn’t love him. Having a dad was not a necessity to me, but I also felt lucky enough to even have one, knowing that not every child did. All I cared about was my mom. She would work for 12-16 hours everyday just to make enough money, but my dad barely even bothered to call her. I despised the reality that my mom was living in.

If I wasn’t born, my mom would not have to overwork herself.

In the summer before my freshman year, my dad was diagnosed with stage one lung cancer. From then on, he stayed here in the U.S. to receive treatment. It was my first birthday spent with him, but he could barely mumble the words, “happy birthday.” My dad grew weaker and weaker as time went on. He had to receive surgery twice and was only able to keep his left lung and half of his right lung. He is now at stage four.

Every morning I help my dad walk down the stairs. I cook him all his meals making sure to follow his required diet. I count and organize his pills, I give him his daily shots, I drive him to his chemotherapies, and I carry his oxygen tank everywhere he goes. When he would get hungry in the middle of the night, I’d force myself out of bed to make him a small snack. If he didn’t like my food, he’d refuse to eat it.

“I’m getting weaker because you aren’t feeding me right.”
“Where is my juice. How do you expect me to eat this without juice.” “Stop being useless.”

The last one would always hit me. What once was neither love nor hate turned into something unexplainable with words.

At one point I couldn’t take it. Thoughts filled my head, like the crowds at the airport that never went away. I am not a miracle child. I wasn’t supposed to be born. My absence would actually be a good thing. Things got worse and I went into a state of emptiness. I was alive, but not living. My friends would often read my random texts that made absolutely no sense, or listen to my deep man-voice which I often used to make them laugh, or watch the dumb IG posts or memes I would send every 30 minutes, but I knew that I was unknowingly creating a facade of happiness, using it as a shield to protect myself from complete emotional detachment.

One night I was organizing my dad’s pills. I counted the usual dosage and had 12 pills in my left hand, but for some reason, I couldn’t bring myself to let go of them. My eyes focused on the pills as tears ran down my face. When my mom came into the room, I dropped the pills. I turned my head up, I met my mom’s eyes, and the invisible tears she once hid finally came down in front of me. I ran out of the room, got in my car, and drove as far as I could.

My mind was completely blank. Although my actions did not carry through, I knew that my mom saw my intentions. My thoughts did enough to defeat my superwoman and my superman; my mom. What made me feel even worse was that I felt like I didn’t have the right to have such thoughts. I wasn’t brave enough to do it, and I felt like I had disrespected the souls of those who did.

I parked at an empty parking lot and looked up at the starless sky, which made me feel even worse, knowing that there was nothing extravagant or life-changing to witness. But as I took a closer look, I noticed a tiny spec in the sky. It wasn’t a star.​ It’s probably a satellite​, I thought. It’s not supposed to be there, but yet, it still is. That tiny little spec probably isn’t appreciated as much as a real star, but I thought she was beautiful. She probably looked beautiful, but I could tell she was lonely. I could tell that she wanted to stop pretending to be a star. She probably wanted to leave the sky too, but I could tell she chose to stay.

I’m not a miracle child, please don’t call me that. I can’t reach the expectations of being a miracle child. It’s too far, and the journey to reach it is beyond what one can actually prevail through. I am too weak to be called a miracle child. Little hardships can drive me crazy. But I want to stay, just like that little spec.

I drove back home through the starless sky which saved me from being in between hope and hopeless, like a lifeguard saving a child from being in between the shore and the dark, endless ocean.

I stood in front of the door that seemed to separate me from my dad, not only physically, but emotionally. I opened it. I knew that I had yet to learn my dad’s side of the story because at the end of the day, I know he’s scared of leaving us too.

“Hi dad. Don’t forget, you need to take your shot.”