A day that changed my life

11 years ago today was probably the worst day I've ha in my entire life. It was the day when my dad died. I as only 11 at the time. So he's been gone as long as I was alive when it happened. I still think about him everyday.


That's him, my mom, me and my older sister Sam. I don't know how old I was but I was probably around Rosslyn's age. It's the only picture I have of him, and it's online. Sam has the actual picture. I think my aunts have more pictures of him.

Anyways, I want to walk you through exactly what happened that day so many years ago. It's still as vivid as when it actually happened. Things like this never go away.

Let me start with the day before, Mother's day. Just like yesterday. It was so rainy outside but my mom decided to take all us girls out to see my dad. He was a manic depressive so he would have his up days and down days but he took his medicine and was fine. But something happened and his blood pressure was really high and so he tried to go to the local mental hospital to see if they would admit him, but they said they didn't have enough beds. So he stayed home. We went to visit him and he was acting a little off. He kept telling me about wailing walls. I don't know why. He was kind of spaced out. Had a glazed look in his eyes. I knew something wasn't right.
Fast forward to the next day. After we got home from school, my mom asked me to call my dad to see if he needed to go to the store. His car was messed up because someone put sugar in his gas tank. So I called him and called him, the phone was busy. I kept trying and still, it was busy. I was starting to get worried but figured that he or his dad took it off the hook so they could take a nap.
Then the cops showed up at our house. My mom told us to go into our room. And she went outside to talk to them. Me and my little sister Talia went back into the living room and were just sitting next to each other waiting for mom to come in. My sister Sam was in teh bedroom crying because she knew something was wrong. Then my mom came in and told us the news. "Girls, your dad died." she said. I let out this agonizing sound that I never heard anyone make before. It was the sound of my heart breaking. Mom just held us close as Talia and I cried.
My dad killed himself. We really don't know why but we've fgured that because he wasn't taking his medicine and he was hearing voices, he tried to kill the voices and didn't really think that he would die too.

Fast forward again to today. I never had the things that a normal girl would have with her dad. He never walked me down the aisle (if I had a big wedding), he never got to see any of his granddaughters. It's hard but I manage. I just think of all the good memories that we did have together, like him getting us every weekend morning and taking us to Arby's for breakfast and the annual Foster family reunion. But I know I can keep him alive by his memories.