Forgive and Forget

Christina looked up at him with hope in her eyes, and said “Dad, take me home”.
Twenty-eight Years Before,
It was the summer of 1990 and I was sitting on my bed playing with my dolls, that’s when I heard the door. Mom and dad were always yelling but mom’s best friend John was always there to cheer her up after. Up to this point I learned it was better to stay in my room because when dad came home he always fought with mom, and sometimes he got angry and hit her and I don’t want to get hit. The yelling had gone on for hours so I finally went out just to catch a glance of my dad running out the door with suitcases. At this point mom was begging him to forgive her but I don’t know why because she says it’s always his fault they fight. A couple years went by and I came to learn my dad was never coming back, he only came back once but he left right away because mom told him he couldn’t see me if he was drunk. It was now 1996 and I was turning thirteen. These days mom was never home so I spent the night by myself. I told her I only wanted one thing for my birthday, to see my dad. She said that’s impossible because he left us and doesn’t ever want to see us again. I was watching tv when the phone rang and since mom wasn’t home I’d have to answer it myself. When I picked up the phone there was no one talking but I could hear a man’s breath, I asked who it was and the voice finally said it’s me honey. Before he said anything else I hung up the phone because he is the reason why I don’t have a family anymore and my mom told me he’s not the same person, that’s what alcohol does to people. He called back once and as soon as I picked up the phone I told him to never call this house again, that I hate him.
Fourteen Years Later,
Finally, it was graduation. I made it through all years of high school and eight years of medical school, and now I’m finally done. I was standing by the food when I realized there was one thing that set me aside from all the other graduates. They all had a boat load of family kissing and hugging them and giving them gifts, and I had no one. It’s amazing I made it through school; taking care of my mother with Alzheimer’s wasn’t an easy job. I had to drive forty-five minutes to class every day because someone always had to be with her and she had no one else. But her time has come to go to a nursing home where she will be cared for properly. And now it’s my time to start my life.
I moved to Seattle, WA a few months after graduation and ready to start my internship. I found a small cheap apartment right by the hospital and my life was finally starting to settle down. I became friends with Mary Suez, she’s an attending where I work. At this point in time I have set my focus on emergency medicine so I work in the ER. It was a Thursday evening probably about 7:30 when the phone rang with a male in his early fifties that had passed out in a bar on its way. We prepared the trauma team just like we would any case. The man was still unconscious so we ran a CT and MRI to see what was wrong. It came to be found the male had liver cancer that was spreading quickly. I was told to inform the male of the news when he woke up, he was still a john doe with no name. He quickly woke up and was in a panic because he didn’t know what was going on. I went to check on another patient and the nurse paged me and said I should come quickly, the man was my father.
At this point he didn’t know much of anything besides his name. The next morning I went in to check on him he still didn’t know who I was, but I knew who he was. I didn’t want him to know it was me because I was scared, but my name tag started to show and he saw.
He said, “Honey, is that really you?”
While walking out the door I quickly muttered, “It’s me”
After that I left right away and he asked me to meet him for lunch because he was being discharged but I didn’t. I looked at his records and his house is only five minutes away from where I live, way to close. I don’t want to ever see him again.
Three months had gone by and I haven’t seen him since, making sure I stay as far away as I can from where he lives. I was content with my life and job and looking forward to start my residency here at the hospital in a week. I was walking to get coffee before work and it’s quite a walk through a little neighborhood, but the coffee is worth it. I took one step off the side walk and I saw a car coming from the street ahead. They were swerving and driving fast and before I knew it they had hit me and drove away. The last thing I remember before I woke up in the hospital was the car coming at me. The police were asking me a million questions but I said I hadn’t seen the driver and I only knew the car was a white suv.
But it wasn’t till the doctor came in that my life turned upside down. I was informed that the car had run my lower back over, and I’m no paralyzed from the waist down. I thought I’m only twenty-eight how could this be happening to me? I was getting ready to start my job as a resident as an ER doctor. My dream was taken away and I had no one to blame for it. The nurse told me she called my father because he was the only family she knew I had.
“I love you,” was all he said as he walked into my room.
I said,”Sit down we need to talk.”
I couldn’t believe it. I was sitting in the same room with the man who ruined my childhood. I wanted him to suffer as much as I have because of him. For a while it was just silence.
He said, “Honey there’s a lot of things you don’t know about me what happened to me and your mom”. My face went white and all I could think was, could my mom have really lied to me about what happened?
“Tell me” that was all I could get out of my shaking lips. Finally he started talking and I all I could do was sit there in amazement. The reason he left was because my mother was having an affair with John and she then kicked my father out and never let him come back.
But then a thought came to mind, he is an alcoholic. I had just been hit by a drunk driver and it ruined my life, could I take the chance of another alcoholic ruining it more? How could I ever trust him? Would he stop drinking? With all these running through my head I said “ I cant do this dad I’m sorry. I can’t let someone who drinks into my life after all of this. It’s too much for me to handle right now, you should go.”
He said, “Christina I never drank a single drink since you were born till I moved out. But your mom ruined me and alcohol was the only thing I had in my life.” He explained to me how him and mom agreed it’d be best if she kept me, and he could visit whenever he wanted. But soon after the divorce was final she cut him off and told him he could never see me again.
“I don’t get it why didn’t you fight to see me?” I said.
He paused for a moment then said, “You know your mom, it’s her way or the highway and at that point I was drained out and had nothing left in me to fight with. That’s why I moved here.” He promised me he sent me a card every holiday and birthday but my mom must have taken them and hid them.
With the comfort of knowing it wasn’t all his fault he never saw me I knew I couldn’t deal with an alcoholic at this point in my life. If my mom was right about anything it was alcohol changes people, not for the better. But before I got the chance to say a word he broke out in tears.
He said “I haven’t had a single drink since I saw you here three months ago. I go to meetings twice a week and I take them seriously. Please forgive me Christina!”.
A had spent all my life hating someone who was really the victim just as much as I was. I felt guilty, and he knew what I was thinking and took a deep breath before he started talking.
“I’m sorry for what I did and you don’t ever have to forgive me if you don’t want to. I just want you to know that I’m starting a new chapter in my life, and if it isn’t too much to ask I want you to be a part of it.” he said with a smile on his face. A few minutes went by and he added, “This is just a bump in the rode you can do things in a wheel chair yourself, but for the things you can’t, I will be here for you. Physically and emotionally I will be the father I never was. Please forgive me Christina; I don’t want to go on with my life without you.”
There is a second when you hear big news that the world stops, for that second nothing matters. Whether its shock from what you just heard or it’s something you’ve wanted to hear, everything we hear changes us. But the truth is those moments go away, and you’re left to deal with the change. Change can be a scary thing but no matter how hard you try to avoid it’s still going to happen. You have to learn to embrace change, and embrace your mistakes because in the end you change every day. We are human beings, we make mistakes and we are oblivious from things we don’t want to hear. Sometimes you hear things and it hits you like a ton of bricks. If there is one thing life has taught me it’s; everyone makes mistakes. No one is perfect and not everyone deserves a second chance but every day is a second chance. So f you wake up and don’t like the way things look, get a new perspective because truth is, things aren’t always what they seem.