I wrote this story for a class in fall of 2007. I thought after a year of not posting, that I should finish the story. It has been 4 years since my dad's stroke so I thought now would be a good time to move forward and tell you what has been happening since this story ended.
Stay Tuned...
Now back to the story
My dad had finally progressed to a point where he could go up and down the stairs. In the beginning, he always had to have someone watching him. When he would go down the stairs, he would have to go down facing backwards. Since my dad was still paralyzed in the left arm, we had to put a railing on the right wall also, since the railing we had was on his left side.
One day my boyfriend(now my husband) and I were hanging out at my house. My dad was upstairs hanging out and my mom was cleaning. My dad decided that he wanted to go downstairs. My mom was busy and had asked us to help him down the stairs. I asked my boyfriend to watch from behind and I would watch from the front. I figured that if I were to watch from the back and he were to fall, I would go down with him. It was image that I didn’t find appealing. I watched my dad has he gripped the railing firmly with his right hand. He would slowly swing his left leg out and backward and then would lower his left leg down onto the next step. His right leg was obviously moving more smoothly than the left leg. My eyes became filled with tears. I was happy that my dad was getting his life back, but I assumed the first time I was helping someone walk up the stairs for the first time, that someone would be my child. I couldn’t get the image of my dad in his hiking boots, wearing his cowboy hat with his backpack strapped on out of my mind. This man could hike for miles, and now he is struggling to go down the stairs. It was a slap in the face. Last year my dad made a comment that he wanted to get all the backpacking in he could because he thought it might be his last year to go. I thought that he was silly for making that comment. How could someone with his determination and physical stamina not go up in the mountains for at least five more years to come? Maybe in the back of his mind he knew there would be a reason why he wouldn’t go this year.
I considered my dad’s stroke to be a cruel joke that someone was playing. He couldn’t go hiking, fishing, bowling, or even play the guitar. All of which are his favorite things. If his family were to be taken away, he would be completely stripped of the things he loved. Despite the outcome, I have yet to hear him complain or put himself down. He has never told me that he would never be able to do something. We already have plans to go camping next summer. He even speaks about when he will be able to play the guitar again.
Although his determination has been beneficial in his recovery, it has also been a hazard. One day my mom caught my dad trying to climb a ladder by himself. Another time when I was over at my parents, my dad had tried to turn on the gas fire place. My mom was cooking breakfast so we were all upstairs eating. When my dad was done eating he went downstairs. When he made it down the stairs he told us he could smell gas. Within taking two steps down the stairs, I was overwhelmed with the smell of gas. My mom ran downstairs and turned off the gas. I opened every window and door in the house to air the gas out. It was so bad they were afraid to turn on a light in fear that it would cause a spark and blow up. To make matters worse, it was cold and raining. So while we were trying to air out the house, we were freezing our asses off. Luckily since then, he has been making better decisions.
My dad’s condition is slowly improving but at least it is improving. The next obstacle we are all facing is a financial one. Since we have been home, the medical transport company has been trying to charge us sixteen-thousand dollars. That is double the amount they told us we would have to pay. If we didn’t have eight-thousand dollars then, how in the hell would we come with eight-thousand more. Then another company threatened to send us to collections because we didn’t pay the bill. My mom explained to them that we never received the bill. When she asked where they were sending the bill, it turned out they had mailed the check to our insurance company. Why the insurance company didn’t forward the bill to us, I have no idea. Since we had not paid the bill they wanted to charge us seventeen-hundred dollars. My mom was so frustrated with what she was hearing that she yelled at the company for how they were handling the situation. As a result, they arranged for her to only pay the original five-hundred dollars. With my dad out of work and my mom having retired in March, money was tight. Both my brother and I ended up having to get additional loans for school. I even had to get more financial aid from school to help out with the rest of my tuition.
Seven months have past since my dad has had his stroke. It feels like a year has gone by. Where we will be in year is unpredictable and it feels like it will be a lifetime before life is back to normal.
The truth of the matter is there are no superheroes, just people. And villains can come in any form-- even a stroke. No one lives forever and everyone can feel pain. People can sense it, people can feel it. We want to believe nothing bad will happen to our parents and that they will live forever. But even though parents aren’t superheroes, they are still heroes. They show us who we want to be and who we don’t want to be. They help us overcome our weaknesses to find our strengths. They may not live forever, but my “super” heroes will live on in me.
Beautiful tribute, Shanene.
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