Chapter 1: Red Autumn
When the red autumn leaves first began to fall, I had a healing heart that was hopeful and optimistic for the future. After all I had gone through this past year, I felt like this autumn would be different, a new beginning for me. However, walking down a path that seemed like the start of recovery, soon became a path of pain and sorrow that I have never gone down before, and it felt like I was drowning underwater, like my hands and ankles were chained with hands pulling me further down into the dark. I want to share things that I’ve only ever been able to mention and write about in my journals. The things that have haunted me. The things that tear me apart, piece by piece. The things that caused me to feel like it’s never going to get better. The things that caused me to feel relieved about ending my life. This is how I was able to keep my head above water and begin walking a path in life, where I feel Safe and Sound.
Everyone has insecurities. Whether it’s about the way they look, certain traits they have, or something they’re not proud of. Everyone has them and it’s normal. I even have a few of them, like the way I look, my humongous ugly nose, my skinny twig-like body, my overthinking brain that has trust issues, severe OCD and anxiety like you wouldn’t believe, and my huge feet that are too big to fit into the pretty pink sneakers that I wanted to wear so bad for my grad. There’s one more insecurity that I have, one that has caused me to spiral and what began a downfall 3 times. My teeth and they’re declining health. When I was growing up, brushing our teeth was never really forced upon us, not for any other reason than my parents not having a good routine of brushing as children themselves. These habits were passed down to us. This has been a generational thing, and as gross as it sounds, it just wasn’t a routine for us. My mom and aunt when they were younger, had terrible teeth problems because their mother was toxic and didn’t raise them to take care of themselves, which began a trend of bad healthcare. Both my aunt and mom have complete dentures because of this, and with my degrading teeth, I knew someday it would be my turn too.
Since the autumn of 2021, my teeth began to get worse. I broke a tooth in the back of my mouth and it was then nothing but an outer shell. Weeks later, I was in quarantine for Christmas break and received some chocolate as a gift, so I took a bite of a small piece and chipped a tooth in the front bottom row. It got worse after eating a dry rib a few months later. This has caused me so much pain and insecurities for over a year. I fought hard to forget about it and kept trying my best to do everything in my power to take care of myself.
For the last few years, I have noticed that October or more specifically autumn, for some reason, is when I get extremely depressed and every bad situation decides to occur. I began calling this my seasonal depression era. This trend of sadness began in the fall of 2020, and since then, every October something terrible has happened where I would go down a dark path. My favourite time of the year ultimately became my most dreaded time of the year. So when Autumn of 2022 was approaching, I made a promise to myself to take things slow. To remind myself that it was going to be okay. To take care of myself the best I could and write out all my thoughts and feelings. To take it one step at a time on this tightrope that I keep having to walk. To my surprise, things were actually going well that autumn. I started hanging out with my friends more and I finally got scheduled dentist appointments with a new dental clinic. Every other dental clinic has always made me feel bad and I would come out almost in tears, but this new dentist never did that. He was so sweet and kind to me, and for the first time in a long time... I finally felt hopeful and happy. My teeth were slowly but surely, getting fixed and I felt so confident. There were some not-so-good days that month, but the good days overpowered the bad. I finally saw the light in this dark pitch black room I’d been trapped in for years. It was a good October, which made me think I had finally broken this yearly tradition of having such a depressing autumn. I won this battle. A battle I had been fighting for a while and I wanted to celebrate. Party with my friends and be a reckless teenager like teenagers are in films. However, that battle was far from over. This would be the beginning of a path I’ve never gone down before.
November 1st, 2022 was the day everything came crashing down. The day that will forever bring back memories I wish couldn’t remember. Throughout the month of October, my mom had been getting chest pain out of nowhere. We thought that maybe it was just her stress as she was having to deal with a lot during that time. She had this block parent program she had joined and was a bit passionate about but pretty much ran it on her own because no one was really doing their jobs. She had to join the block parent’s bake sale in the grocery store and bake a ton of Halloween treats. There was a lot more going on but I never really checked in much because I was so focused on myself and making sure that I was okay that month. If I knew then what I know now...
The day after Halloween seemed like a regular day except I had to miss school to go to a dentist appointment in Warman. It was just her and I going because my dad was working away and Jenay had school they couldn’t miss. Jenay was also not doing the best then too. They had to miss a lot of school in October from getting covid, passing out at school from being sick, and not feeling so well. Teachers were giving them shit and constantly bugging them because they kept missing school, even though it wasn’t Jenay’s fault at all. See, this is what I hate about teachers and school. They don’t care about you. Jenay was feeling terrible from being sick with covid and then the aftermath of that, and they had slipped into a depression it seemed like. And yet, I did nothing. Was trying to be selfish and take care of myself and was so focused on my health that I didn’t really do anything else. Not to mention school was harassing them and treating them badly because of it, which wasn’t helping. Everyone’s health both mentally and physically, wasn’t exactly the greatest, including my dad who got covid because of my sibling. My mom and I began making the trip to Warman for my appointment and it just felt so normal. I blasted my favourite music and annoyed my mom about Taylor Swift because why wouldn’t I? I read her my remembrance day poem I wrote and was so proud of. She, of course, loved it ’cause it was the first remembrance project I was actually quite passionate about. We talked a lot, and both sang our songs. Completely normal. Except she was having some chest pain that would come and go throughout the trip. I didn’t really do anything because I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know how to help her. She had gone to the doctor earlier that month and he told her it wasn’t anything to worry about. Throughout the car ride, It all seemed okay. That was until we got to Warman.
My mom was driving into Warman when she suddenly felt like her chest pain get increasingly worse. She kept driving and two minutes into the city, she was hyperventilating and in excruciating pain, and we didn’t know what was wrong. We got to the Seven-Eleven convenience store when she had to pull over. Of course, we were on the other side of the highway and without looking, she immediately and quickly drove across each lane to get into the parking lot and parked beside the sign. Thankfully no one was around us on the road or at least close to us or we probably would have crashed. It was scary and yet I didn’t know how to react.
I remember tears streaming down her face on that cloudy cold day. Gripping and clenching against her chest while she painfully got into the back of our vehicle. I didn’t know what was happening, and I didn’t know what to do. I have never seen anyone cry and roll around the way my mom was, and it was terrifying. She was hysterically crying at how much pain there was in her chest. I sat still in the passenger seat, panicking. We didn’t know what to do, nor what was really going on. I could feel the tears forming in my eyes. I never cry. I wish I knew why it’s so hard for me to cry, but I can’t. The last time I remember feeling like this was when we were watching our peaceful pup passing away at the vet due to old age. I couldn’t cry at this moment, not when she was suffering and breaking down from pain. I had to be strong for my mom. I had to fight through my anxiety and tears and figure out the best way to help her. My mom insisted we call her sister, my Aunt Jessi, to have her come to Warman for us. Turns out, my aunt had just gotten home from being at the hospital for her wife. My Aunt Janine, Jessi’s wife, had injured her back badly around March 2022. We didn’t know they had just gotten home, but she didn’t care. She had started her car up again and was speeding to Warman for us. God, I have never felt so scared and vulnerable in my life.
I grabbed my mom’s phone again, opened the app and typed in the number 911. You get taught and shown all the time in school and at home about what to do in an emergency and how to call this number, but when you actually have to phone them in a true emergency, it is one of the scariest things to have to do. I get serious anxiety and phoning them was causing my anxiety to spiral, but I couldn’t think that. I needed to focus on Mom. She needs me right now, and I can’t leave her to do this all alone. The 911 operator answered immediately with the whole “What’s your emergency” response. I could feel my hands trembling, sweating, and holding onto the phone. I could feel the tears forming in my eyes, and the lump in my throat, while I’m trying to speak to her and tell her what was happening. Luckily the phone was connected to our stereo and was coming out through the car. The operator was very calm and smart, and I had finally gotten the courage to say, my mom is crying in extreme pain, we think she’s having a heart attack and I don’t know what to do. She was so calm through this as my mom was still crying and hyperventilating intensely, and I was having trouble speaking. She was asking me where our location was and where we were to send out an ambulance, which was coming from the Royal University Hospital in Saskatoon. It was going to be a little bit of a wait for them to get here, so the first responders, who were in Warmen, would come first to our location. They were the firefighters. When she asked for our location, I was still panicking and was just so overstimulated, I had trouble trying to get the right words out as fast as I could. I was trying to tell her we were in a white SUV parked in front of the Seven-Eleven a few minutes into the city of Warman. She was asking for a bit more specifics like the street address and whatnot, but I’m not very good at being able to read addresses nor could I even tell her ’cause I don’t really know the place well and have only been in the city a few times to go to the same clinic every time. My mom after a few minutes jumped in to help me by telling her where we were. I felt so bad because she was in such excruciating pain and had to tell the operator where we were because I was unable to. I felt like I failed her in a way. Everyone was finally on their way, and the operator was asking my mom what she was feeling, what was wrong, etc, and my mom was trying to explain it the best she could. She was explaining how she felt like her center chest pain was getting worse, her jaw had slight pain but felt like she was sucking a sour candy. Her left arm had tingling pain that ultimately felt really heavy. The operator assured us that help was on the way, and we ended the call with her. It felt like an eternity, waiting for someone to show up. I remember what was around 5 minutes, felt like forever.
After a few minutes of me looking out every window, searching for someone, anyone to come to our rescue. Sure enough, the firefighters with their big loud truck, were driving towards us and turned the corner into the parking lot. I have never felt so relieved in my life than when I saw someone finally come. We weren’t alone anymore. I wasn’t alone anymore.
I quickly jumped out of the vehicle just as the firefighters were opening their doors. I rushed to the back of our vehicle and opened the trunk so my mom could talk to them. She was still crying and in pain. I can’t remember what I said to the men there, but they helped my mom out of the vehicle and walked her into the back of their firetruck. I followed them, shaking and cold, to the back. She got in and the guys were asking her questions and trying to see if they could help her. I stayed standing with one of the firemen on the ground when he began taking information and asking what happened. I gave him our names, phone numbers, and such. I was watching as they tried to help her, but it was like they weren’t listening and doing anything. She was trying to say it was her heart, but the officers were just saying it was probably an anxiety attack about her MS, which it wasn’t. I remember at one point my mom couldn’t sit up anymore and was lying down on the hard floor of their truck, crying and pressing against her chest as the other firemen were standing around her. The ambulance was still on its way.
While I was outside watching my mom suffer through the pain. It began to rain. Water drops slowly spitting from the sky. The officer beside me told me if I wanted to wait inside our vehicle to get out of the rain, I could. With hesitation, I began making my way to the vehicle. I didn’t want to leave, but I felt like they would at least keep her safe and stay with her until the paramedics came. When I got back into our vehicle, I had gathered all our things and slipped on my thick red jacket. It was cold and cloudy, as well as raining. Which are typically my most favourite days. It’s comforting to hear the rain, and yet there was nothing comforting about that day. I sat there waiting and waiting. It felt like an eternity waiting for my aunt and the paramedics to show up. I hated every second of it.
The first to show up after was my aunt. She parked beside our vehicle. She immediately got out, to which I also got out. We met and spoke for a brief second before she walked over to the back of the truck to where Mom was. I went back into our vehicle and waited. I wanted to be there but felt like I wouldn’t have been any use to them, I’d just be in the way. A few moments later, the ambulance came and they placed my mom onto the bed and wheeled her into the back of the ambulance. Apparently, no one believed she was having a heart attack because she was too young to have one. She was 38, which I suppose is quite young. The paramedics got her hooked up in the back and did an ECG test and they still didn’t believe she was having an active heart attack, so they did an ECG a second time, and sure enough, she was. They told my mum that there was something happening with her heart, and then the man closed the back doors and got into the driver’s seat. They rushed off to the hospital, leaving my aunt and me there. Thank god she came, because everyone would have left me alone there. They asked if I could drive or something, but I only had my learners still, nor was I in the best shape to drive at that point. When I got all our stuff from the vehicle, my aunt and I got into her vehicle to meet Mom at RUH.
We began to drive out of Warman to head to the hospital, with my mom in the hands of the paramedics. This was when I finally took a deep breath. Things were going to be okay. At least I hoped they would be. My aunt began phoning everyone to let them know what sort of happened. We phoned my father who was working out of town. He dropped absolutely everything he was doing and left for the hospital. He left all his tools and didn’t even tell his work he was going until after he had arrived at the hospital. Then she phoned my papa to let him know we were on the way to the hospital. He had a heart attack years ago, and he was out working as well, in fact, farther than where my dad was, and lastly, we phoned our family friend to ask if she would be able to pick up Jenay after school and drop them off home. We planned for my papa to pick Jenay up after he got off work and was on his way to Saskatoon.
Aunt Jessi and I finally got to the hospital and it was pouring rain. We began making our way through the huge hospital and got to the other side. It was the older parts of the hospital that we were walking through. Mom was going into surgery. So we sat down and took a break in a waiting room. My mom was in the Cath lab where they did an angiogram through her wrist before being transported to the CCU (Cardiac Intensive Care).
There were so many thoughts going in and out of my head. What just happened? I honestly couldn’t even process what we just went through, it all just felt so slow yet so freaking fast. I didn’t even know what time it was, I didn’t know what exactly was wrong, I didn’t know where she was, I didn’t know when my dad and sibling were gonna get here. How long was it gonna take? But the question and thoughts that never left and stayed with me that whole time, the one that had me stressing and panicking the entire time we were waiting; Was she going to make it? I just kept thinking whether or not I was going to still have a mother. How would life be? Why did she have to be the one who suffered? Just thinking about losing my mom, had me holding back tears and screams. Waiting to hear anything about her surgery, and how she was, felt like forever. Time went by slowly, and my own heart was beating faster than usual. I couldn’t take it. This patience I had to have was killing me with each second I had to spend waiting.
I was not okay. Waiting in a waiting room for your mother to come out of surgery after having a heart attack. Having to call the 911 number, having to wait a ton and having to watch your mom break down, were things I will never ever forget. Things I wish I could forget, but I know I won’t be able to. I have never been in such a terrible mind space before that day.
Later that day, my family was finally showing up at the hospital. My grandma showed up and waited with us. She comforted me as we sat in the dark and quiet waiting room. People were coming in and waiting, and leaving throughout that whole time my family was waiting. Reflecting back on everything that happened, Words just can’t explain how we all felt.
It was quite later in the day, when my father finally showed up, still in his blue overalls with his work logo on it. I still remember seeing him walk around the corner into the waiting room. I could feel my hands pushing my trembling body out of the chair and my legs finding the strength to run to him. I slammed into him and wrapped my arms tightly around him. He did the same for me. I remember almost tearing up. The lump in my throat returned, and my eyes closed. I didn’t ever want to leave his grasp, Being in my father’s arms after what we had to endure. I never wanted to leave his side again. My father and I have had a rocky relationship for a few years. I’m not too sure exactly why or what to even do, and I don’t think even he knows what to do sometimes, but that day... that moment... will forever be a moment I remember. I felt so safe and like things were finally going to be okay. I couldn’t even remember the last time I had hugged my mother before she had a heart attack and the fear I was going to lose her. I couldn’t let my dad go. I didn’t ever want to let him go. We hugged for a bit and as tight as we could.
My mom came out of surgery and was okay. We learnt that she was having a SCAD heart attack. Something we have never heard about. SCAD is short for Spontaneous Coronary Artery Dissection. It’s a condition that occurs when a tear forms in a blood vessel in the heart. It can slow or block blood flow to the heart, causing a heart attack. It could be more fatal, but thankfully it wasn’t for my mom.
We stayed there until almost midnight. It was probably one of the longest days I’ve ever experienced. It didn’t feel real.
The whole family practically stayed for that whole week, with some of us at my Aunt Jessi’s place, and my dad’s parents. We were all scattered and were complete messes.
When Jenay and I got back with my aunt to her house, it was so late. We all made a plan to go see her in the morning. We would get up and we would head over to the hospital at 10 am. Not too early, but not too late where we wouldn’t have the whole day with her. I was getting ready to go to bed and was relaxing before I went to sleep. It was such a long and scary day. I went to bed, impatiently waiting to see Mom again. I didn’t want to leave her side and leave her alone. I was glad that she was okay though, and that all the stress and traumatizing events were over. Of course, I jinxed it, and it wasn’t actually the end.
I woke up the next morning from my Aunt Jessi. She was speaking to me in a soft quiet voice as she tried to wake me up. It felt so early as it was quite dark outside. Of course, it was the beginning of November, so it was going to be darker in the morning. I looked at the clock beside me and it was around 7 AM. Why was she waking us up this early? Then she continued to talk to me. She told me that she has to phone for an ambulance to come because my Aunt Janine, Jessi’s wife, was currently laying on the couch unable to move. This was due to her back injuries earlier that year. She was unable to even sit up and was in extreme pain. Jenay and I had to get up and get ready to head to the hospital earlier than when we were originally planning due to another emergency, this time with Janine. After a few minutes, the paramedics arrived at my aunt’s house and came inside to carry Janine into the ambulance to take her. She was in pain and couldn’t really move much. I felt so bad and so worried for her. I just wanted all this pain and suffering to be over and for my family to be okay.
I have had the ambulance come to my location twice in less than 24 hours. For two different people with different reasons. I don’t know how I got through that week, as it was the most draining, traumatizing, sad, and painful week my family has ever had to go through.
That whole week I was struggling mentally. The longest week to live through, even though both my mom and aunt were okay in the end. I went to bed exhausted, and sad. Grateful, but sad. My family didn’t deserve any of this. We had to stay the rest of the week until my mom was released on Friday. Jenay and I were stressed about missing that whole week of school. Jenay had already missed so much school and was getting in a ton of trouble for no reason and the teachers were harassing them about it. Making comments and such. So for Jenay to miss yet another week of school, They weren’t exactly okay in my eyes.
Thankfully, My dad had phoned the vice principal and he made sure that neither Jenay nor I would be in any trouble and that our school work would all be gathered, and that we were to focus on our family, and when we were alright and had free time, to resume back to school. One of the few times, Jenay and I felt supported and cared for by our teachers. Especially in such a depressing and eventful time, like that week. Mom spent the remaining week in that hospital and was okay to head home on Friday. She had new medication prescribed and rules she had to follow in order to heal, like not being able to carry a specific amount of weight. The aftermath of her heart attack was definitely a struggle. It felt like no one was doing exactly well both mentally and physically after then. Even though we all tried to create a better space for us to heal, it still felt like a depressing place to be in. I love my family and our home, but it got to the point where school, the place that I hate the most, became a vacation from being at home. I began drinking alcohol more often with friends than I did during the summer.
Life got even worse in January when my mom was constantly getting sick with her medication. I just can’t go into detail about that month, except that none of us were okay. When thoughts of ending things and my intrusive thoughts came back for that month, it was just so bad. Like a depression that no one could get out of. Since the beginning of 2023, it’s been filled with ups and downs. Filled with so much sadness and depression, and filled with so much healing and growth. This is my story and everything that I’ve had to experience.
