Darkest Moment In My Life

I sat there in my room with tears flowing down my blush pink cheeks. Wondering what was wrong with me, as a salty tear ran along my dried out chapped lips. I thought to myself,” Why am I so miserable? What did I do to deserve this? How am I going to escape this life?” I started to ponder that this was the end of my life, this is how I was going to be, sorrowful. At the lowest point of my life, mother came barging through the door with the look of cavernous concern on her face. She knew that it was time for something to be done, whether I agreed or not.

That day when I returned home from school, my mom’s boyfriend called me asking to speak to my grandmother. Typically, Gus would call my grandmother himself if he wanted to speak with her, which was rare. I found out about my mom going to the hospital from my grandmother after that phone call. The doctor told my family that a stroke afflicted her in the middle of the day. My mom confused the date with her birthday, had trouble getting words out and remembering our family member’s names. The nurse had to take her for walks periodically and exercise her legs and arms because they were weak. Seeing my mother in this condition made me appreciate my mother and everything she does for me tremendously. However, I was terrified for my mother’s health.

I went to my living room to ask my mom a question, to see she wasn’t there. I asked my brother “where’s mom?” and he replied with “shes at the hospital, grandpa got burnt.” I would never have expected “grandpa got burnt” to be as severe as it was. I remember my mom coming home around two in the morning. I got up and out of bed to ask some questions. She said “I don’t wanna talk about it right now. Pack some stuff up, we’re going to Waterloo tomorrow.” So I listened and packed up a bag.

I’m going through the loss of my grandpa. My mother helped my through the loss. We got through it together at my house with my mom and dad. I faced I faced this tragedy when I went to the funeral.

On May 11th 2013, my grandma passed away due to pancreatic cancer. A little later that year on September 25th, my mom received a call from my aunt in Guam that my dad had passed away in his sleep. Then on May 14th 2014, my grandpa passed from complications of an allergic reaction to a medication. So within a year, I was left to deal with three immediate family deaths, one right after another. Losing such important figures in one’s life could leave someone depressed and unmotivated to move on with their own life and to rise above those challenges is difficult, yet possible. During this time of hardship, I grew discouraged and saddened, but over time I became motivated to set aside these struggles and make a change.

There have been countless influential people in my life that I’ve come across. One who was a meticulous inspiration continues to be my grandfather. My grandmother had remarried to the one I call “grandpa” when I was at the age of five, and they both took to each other’s grandchildren as their own. With my mother and me only living a mile down the road from their farmhouse out in the country, I’d spent heaps amount of time there as a child. Indeed, I had been without a father but my grandfather stepped up to the plate and had taken me under his wing and willingly played the personification of a father figure.

Five days had passed this time since anyone had heard from my mother. I remember praying to God to protect her from harm and for me to find her. The next day she showed up, but not in the way we had hoped. One morning as I was getting ready for school my sophomore year in high school, my phone rang to the voice of my stepfather. My stepfather had told me he heard a call come over the dispatch scanner at his work and my mother’s name was mentioned. The sheriff had informed my stepfather that my mother had been involved in an accident. My stepfather asked me to go to the emergency room and see what condition my mother was in because he lived a half hour away from the hospital. When I arrived at the hospital I found my mother cut out of her clothes, covered in her own urine, massive amounts of blood all over her body, and lying lifeless on life support on the table. At this point, no one knew whether my mother would be okay. My mother had bleeding on the brain as well as a tear in her shoulder, a shattered face, and a chest tube draining fluid from her lung which had collapsed. All I could do was pray! My mother’s life was in God’s hands now. Three days later she woke

He taught me that hard work will pay off and will reward me. He always talked about how his successes in life were due to him working hard at his goal. Everyday he would talk time out of his day to make pamphlets that listed grocery stores that sold food at a cheap price. He would then hand them out to low-income families hoping that these pamphlets would save them money. My grandfather felt content knowing that he was able to help these families. Furthermore, he taught me that the only way to become better at something is through practice. During the holidays, he and I would play our clarinets together in my living room for the rest of the family. He coaxed me to continue learning about and playing the clarinet. My grandfather inspired me to challenge myself in school like making the decision to take honors classes. Even though my grandfather is not here to watch me graduate high school and grow through college, he will continue to inspire me to be the best person I can be as I move through life. I know he would be happy if I got into Stockton because he knows that Stockton has the tools for me to be

In November of 2014 my aunt tragically took her own life. That day I got a tearful phone call from my dad; I could feel his heart breaking as the words came out of his mouth. I held back tears as I drove to his office to be with him, knowing that in this moment I had to be strong for my dad. Together, heavy-hearted, we went and broke the news to my grandparents. During a time of year when most people prepare to gather together with loved ones to celebrate the holidays, my family and I were unexpectedly thrown into a period of mourning. My grandmother asked again and again why Joanie did what she did. I was at a loss for words. I had no answers. I still don’t.

Have you ever felt so broken and lost that you believed you simply couldn’t keep going on in life, as if the barriers of your life caved in and suffocated the very existence in which you lived? This pain was all that I knew in the months following my grandfather’s loss to cancer in July of 2008. Fighting until his dying breath, it was a moment in my life that rocked and shattered my heart like fragile glass. His death required me to adapt to and appreciate life and showed me that no obstacle is to big overcome if you maintain hope and a positive outlook.

When I turned 11-years-old my whole childhood began to change my life went from being perfect to everything but perfect. One day I came home to hear the news my father, my best friend; my hero was diagnosed with stage 3 colon cancer. Not knowing the struggle my family was about to take on I just began to cry. I had a million things running through my head what’s going to happen? Will everything be okay? Why him? What is going to happen? With all these things rushing through my head all I could do was cry not knowing this was least worse to come.

One evening while I was on vacation visiting my grandparents we were sitting around the dinner table eating a homemade meal made by my grandma. It was my mom, my sister, my foreign exchange student, two of my good friends, and I all eating dinner together. Dinner had come to an end and one of my friends and I were still sitting at the table with my grandpa. He has always been a very inspirational person in my life and most of the things he says mean a lot and really make me think. There was one thing my grandpa told

For many people, Grandpa is a storyteller, someone to go fishing with, and someone who has your back no matter what. The experience I had with my grandpa was a little different. I never got the opportunity to meet my great-grandfather Liston Grider, but he still somehow managed to have a huge impact on my life. Sometimes my mom would tell stories about him; happy memories from her childhood, sad ones that were painful for her to tell, and everything in between. I thought I had heard it all, but this past summer I learned something about my great grandpa that would perhaps impact my life forever. This story was not told by my mom like usual, but by someone who was a complete stranger to me. The lessons I learned would not be taught in a single day, but over the span of a month through a series of Facebook messages and letters in the mail. The words I read upon opening those messages and letters would change my life forever, permanently transform my beliefs, and show me what it truly means to be an American.

It was a bone chilling January night; my mom received a call at about 11:15 PM, a call that changed my life forever. My Aunt June was on the other line. She was crying so hard my mother could barely understand her. Through the sobbing my mom finally understood that Brian, my cousin, had been in a horrible accident and she didn’t know how bad it was. My mother jumped out of the bed after she hung up the phone. She screamed up the stairs at my sister and me; it was a nerve shrilling scream. I could hear fear in her voice. My mom was always yelling at us growing up if we forgot to do something. She would even get us out of bed to finish something that wasn’t done completely. This particular

My grandfather played a significant role in many of my family members’ lives. As mentioned before, he played the role of peacemaker in arguments or conflicts within, not only the immediate, but the extended family, as well. Being informed of his passing, family members from Nevada, California, and Washington made arrangements to fly home. My house soon filled up with my cousins and their parents, doubling the household amount from five to ten. Being that my house only had two bathrooms, during various down times, my cousins and I would play a competitive and wildly confusing game of Pictionary or watch Netflix. During the nights, we stayed up past twelve just to talk story and