Drumroll please......
At the beginning of last summer I found out that my dad had been having an affair, as simple as that. It happens (sadly) waaayy too often and affects waaayyyy too many families everywhere, and there are tons of worse things that could have happened to me, and tons of better ways I could have handled it.
My biological mom and dad were divorced when I was a baby, and both went on to marry two of the most amazing individuals I have ever known. I had always been super content with what my family was made up of. Two moms, two dads, four brothers (two on each side). I got two Christmas, Easters, and birthdays. Like most divorce kids, I lived with my mom, but I got to visit my dad's family every other weekend, holidays, and during the summer. It worked.
Fresh out of high school, I packed all my things and headed for my dad's house to live while I attended Fresno State. I was pumped. I loved my Sullivan family, and always felt a sense of guilt for never being able to live with them. I wanted so badly to see my baby brothers grow up, let my dad see big girl me, and to have feminine heart to hearts with my stepmom, Laura. Upon the big move I was rudely awakened.
I think I became almost instantly depressed. We lived out on our ranch (located about 15 minutes away from Madera, Kerman, and Riverpark). This meant I had to drive 20-25 minutes to school everyday, and about the same distance if I wanted to do anything fun for myself. That suddenly turned into me doing absolutely NOTHING fun for myself. I had no friends with me. Jake might as well have been in another town. I had nothing to do except look at the vineyards, talk to my 80-year-old grandma, and play with my dog (who ended up getting hit by car and died...fantastic). I switched to Monday, Wednesday, Friday classes, and that made the situation completely worse. I spent my two free days of the week crying, eating, and sleeping. I hated everything. I just wanted to go home. I wanted to go back to Coalinga High School, and my friends, and my house that smelled like candles.
Anyways, enough background details. I was depressed and didn't realize it. I just knew that I felt like I was losing myself. So, that May a couple friends and I decided to get an apartment for the following school year. I hadn't had a job all year, so I wasn't quite prepared financially. I did, however, have a job set up for the summer and was prepared to spend a lot of time working so I could move closer to school and spend time with people my age.
Then Memorial Day weekend came. It was my first week of summer vacation, and my happy little self was living back in Coalinga. It was everything I had been yearning for all year. That Sunday morning was pretty average. I was sitting in our usual pew at church, listening to Pastor Mike preach. All of a sudden, everything changed, and I experience something I will never forget even one detail of.
My vision started to blur. Everything was foggy, and as much as I tried, I couldn't focus my eyes on anything. It felt like what I had always pictured a newborn baby's vision looking like. Then I became slightly light headed. I was dizzy and almost delirious. Suddenly I couldn't breathe. It felt like all of the oxygen was being sucked out of the room and my body. I remember the temperature in the room rising ten degrees and feeling suffocated by the heat. Sweat seeped out of every pore. Uncontrollable shaking in my legs started, and every sound had an echo to it. I couldn't seem to focus on anything, and just remember hearing Pastor Mike saying, "A community is a common unity." I kept repeating that phrase in my head over and over. My mind began responding to my body. "You have a brain tumor," it told me, "you're going to die. This is it." All of the sensations I had being feeling within those past 30 seconds (that felt like 30 hours) magnified. I gasped for air, but received nothing. I told Jake I felt weird. After another minute without change, and hearing, "A community is a common unity," 200 more times, I got up to walk around. That didn't help. I went back to the pew, but after hearing my brain tumor diagnosis in my head again, I went back to the foyer. Jake came after me this time, and sat me down on a couch. I just remember staring at him. I knew who he was. I knew that I was supposed to have a connection to him, but I didn't feel anything. All I heard was his echoey voice trying to get answers from me. I tried my best to explain what I was feeling, but I didn't even understand what it was, so that proved to be unsuccessful. Then I threw up- in the toilet, thankfully- but I threw up. Church was over by that point, and Jake had told my mom the little details that he knew. She found me sitting on the bathroom couch looking straight ahead. She still gets emotional when she talks about the glazed over look I had on my face. I remember looking up at her and just crying.
My mom dragged me out to the busy foyer, and attempted to explain my symptoms to everyone. I remember hugs, prayers, and echoey voices saying things like, "dehydrated" and "low potassium." Next, I was being hauled home where I was forced to consume Gatorade and baked potatoes (because bananas make me vomit). Soon, I was back in the car and on the way to the doctor. That weekend was extra eery because it was overcast and rainy. This confused me even more as I stared blankly out the window.
Long story long, the doctor shined a light in my eyeballs, took my blood pressure, asked a couple questions, and diagnosed me as dehydrated. Reality slowly became to ease into me as I drove back home, but, of course, it didn't stay long.
Ok, I guess that's it for now. I don't want to torture you with ten pages of my life, so I'll break this nonsense into segments. More to come.
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