Waking up and realizing the person you have always had by your side is not there anymore. Wouldn’t that scare you? No one ever wants to see the ones they love in pain no matter if it’s emotional or physical. Although, we do not always want to listen to them, they still mean everything to us no matter how they are, or how they act in different situations. There is always this fear inside you that you won’t know what to do if you were all alone, but can we really change someone’s faith? Can we really change what’s written in their life? We can only pray for their safety and well-being because nothing is in our hands when it comes to life. So is it worth the risk to trust someone with your eyes closed, not knowing what is actually going on in their mind? They say you never know what you have until it’s gone, but the truth is we know what we have, we just don’t think we are going to lose it .

A cold winter night, my mom was fast asleep in her room, everyone besides my father- he was at work. On the night of January 23rd, my cousins and I were all underneath our blankets trying to warm up our toes, the cool of our room was nothing compared to the cutting, cold wind blowing outside. It was probably the coldest night in Calgary, a killing cold wind that pierced the skin. Our laughs echoed in the room, but something was wrong. I didn’t know what was going on because I was having an excellent time with my cousins, but this unusual feeling was eating me up from the inside, yet I ignored it and carried on with the night. A few hours into the movie us kids were watching, the same feeling started reoccurring and now I got really worried because I feared something wrong was happening, somewhere, to someone I loved.

The cold sun rays beamed into the cracks of the blinds, awakening me in the early morning. As I was getting up to close them, my eyes, half open caught sight of the yellow tape, it was not an ordinary tape, it was the “police line do not cross” sign. Although, nothing was of my concern, I caught sight of my mom and older cousin standing by the cop, which was unusual because they were last asleep when I woke up earlier.

I could feel my chest tighten. My breathing became faster.  I ran down the stairs. Before I could even utter a word from my frozen mouth, my cousin told me to keep quiet and to go back to sleep. I was really restless, I was worried, I didn’t want to sleep, so I just lay there thinking of what was happening outside. It hadn’t even been an hour when the house phone rang.

Silence. This was the first time my house was so quiet. You could hear a pin drop if it was to fall on the ground. All of a sudden I heard this loud cry, the phone fell from my mom’s hand and she was crying. As I took in and realized what was happening, I felt the walls closing in on me. I felt shaken up, afraid. Was this true? Was I dreaming? I was standing there absolutely frozen. Everything was starting to turn black and within a matter of seconds, I was smack down on the ground unconscious.

The last thing I remembered was cramping into one vehicle and being rushed to the hospital. Few hours later … My dad, he was critical.  The weird feeling I had last night, the sirens were for my dad. Last night, after work, my dad went out with his friends and during those hours he was with them, they drugged his drink. Footage was taken from the surveillance cameras from the work and my neighbor’s house, showing that when they dropped him home around 5:00am one of them struck the back of his neck, fracturing it. My dad, who considered the his best friends, was the victim of their devious plans.

He was in the ICU, in a coma, fighting for his life. Doctors had refused for any further treatment because he had his body frozen so badly from the frost bite that made the doctors came to a conclusion, they wanted to amputate my dad, from knees down and his right hand. We fought, we stuck together and my father, after three days started to improve his condition. From 5% survival chance he moved up to 10%, slowly recovering. From one unit to another we kept shifting, but later, doctors and nurses did whatever they could to naturally recover the frost bites and to not amputate my father’s body.

Even though, this occurred over a year ago I still remember every detail clearly. Something this big, as almost losing my father, I can never forget. My family has been through such tough times, and people say such negative remarks about issues, but people judge with blind eyes they really do not even know the true story. Something this big can change a person forever, even the people you trust can backstab you to a point that you lay in a hospital bed fighting to live.