A Mother's Horror Story

It was a summer like no other, but of course, I didn't know that at the time. How could I? Fall came and went as usual, and the classes I helped teach proceeded as normally as possible. But what does "normal" really mean? That year, I had a coworker who persistently harassed me, and I should have recognized that as a warning sign. Like everyone else, I was hoping that was the worst thing that would happen to me that year. I was wrong!

When school let out for the day, I thought of the hard time I had helping to teach, and I was looking forward to spending time with family and friends, but shortly before school let out, my son became sick and was hospitalized. I received a call from a friend, and my son was talking on the phone with her, and he was asking me to come see him. Just as they got off the phone with him, asking me to come see him, I came walking around the corner and through the door. My son smiled at me, and I gave him a hug. I asked him what was wrong and my friend, Sam short for Samantha, said his ammonia levels were going up again. I did not think much of it. We had been there before, and he had always healed up and was able to go home within a few days. Not this time, though! My son has a rare medical condition that prohibits him from eating foods high in protein. It makes his ammonia levels rise in his body.

It was dinner time, and the nurse brought a dinner plate in for him, loaded with protein-rich foods. I told her that when he experiences high ammonia levels, the protocol is to avoid all protein, all protein! Not until his ammonia goes down!

The next day, when I came to see him, the nurse came in to ask if I had sent in this powder for my son to take. I looked at the package and said, "No, this would kill my son!" The nurse looked at me and said, "No one here will give this to him. The person who delivered it was a man who said he worked at the group home where your son lived." I shrugged it off at the time, since no one would give that protein powder to him. However, looking back, I wonder if that powder was given to him by mistake at the group home.

The next few days definitely proved that I was right, as every time they would get my son's ammonia level down, it would rise again. The only way they can get the ammonia level down was to use a kidney dialysis machine on him. It is not a cure, but it works by reducing ammonia levels in the bloodstream. After my son battled with his ammonia levels going down and up, it eventually affected his brain, and he was declared brain dead.

Those blood sucking leeches at the hospital kept my son alive, not to say goodbye to the family, but to convince me to donate his organs. WHAT? You put my son through hell by keeping him alive, and you want his organs! NO!

After trying to convince me and bringing my friend in on it, what seemed like hours but more like minutes, and trying to get me to donate my son's organs, I still said a firm NO to them. My daughter and I said no at the same time. I was proud of her, and I haven't been proud of her in a very long time! This is something the people in the hospitals and organ donation organizations don't want people to know: They rush your family member into surgery to remove all of their organs; however, they are still alive when this happens! When a person is brain dead, that does not mean they are brain dead. What it means is the part of the brain that controls the heart, lungs, and thought processing is damaged beyond keeping them alive. You don't know if they can feel pain when they do the surgery! I also know the person on the receiving end of the organs is not as thankful as people want you to believe, even though their families may be.

MONEY! The root of every evil in today's society! It seems as if no one matters anymore, and the only thing people see is dollar signs when you walk through the door! My son became a grand dollar sign and was probably thought about in the hospital's meetings concerning him. "He is nothing to us, alive but dead! We could make millions!" The conversation must have gone like that! My son is only one fish in the sea. They will find someone who is weaker in the mind than I am, and they will convince them to donate their loved one's organs, causing their death to be more traumatic than needed.

The day my son died, I went home shattered, as I pray you never have to know the feeling of bringing a child into this world and then watching helplessly while they leave it again! Just making it back home from taking my second daughter home, my first daughter had the funeral home on the phone. She started to hand me the phone, and I said, "Why do I want to deal with that right now! I have a headache and don't feel like talking to anyone!" She had him on the phone and gave me his number so I could call him back. I contacted them the next day and made an appointment to arrange a funeral for my son. Then I went to clean out his house. I took all of his belongings and placed them in my apartment. Barly enough space for my stuff, I now had to figure out how to store his belongings, which I found space.

The next part of the harassment continues with the apartment I live in; people from another apartment brought roaches into the apartment complex. They lived upstairs, and when they left, the roaches began to invade my apartment. Slowly at first, then it seems like a one-way street. They check in and never check out unless it is belly up! The apartment management, which forgets everything you tell them because they never write anything down, decided to harass me about the roaches because they had taken refuge in my home. I'm sure my place is not the only one that has them, but because they can be seen from outside and I have a lazy daughter who never cleans up after herself, the roaches love her. I don't understand how she can allow them to crawl all over her! She does not care and blames laziness on feeling bad! Well, we all feel bad, don't we! I now pack my belongings, and I'd like to know if I should leave her in this now roach-infested place. I've lived here for eight years, and the bugs have been here for the last three. She has been here for two. So, where did the bugs come from? It seems convenient that when the people who moved out upstairs, the bugs were not far behind. I think the bugs chose this apartment because it is next to the swimming pool and on the ground floor. My dispute with management at the apartment complex continues, and they have given me time to find another place; otherwise, I will see them in court. They are slum lords at best!

To top it all, I have a new school to work at, as the harassment from the last school year was a significant factor in my decision to transfer to another school. I hope to find new friends and colleagues who will help me on my knowledge journey and not judge or label me.

Having to deal with all of this trauma is very disturbing, and no one should have to deal with this much stress in a short amount of time, but here I am trying to get through it as best as I can. My Christian Faith and my belief system are the only things seeing me through any of this. I know my journey is not over yet, with all the challenges I'm facing this summer, but hopefully, with Gods' help, it will end well for me and my family because sometimes I feel as if I walk alone! I know this is not true, but it feels like it.