Nothing can replace the emotional crutch that is a mother. It’s a shameful fact that too many younger people don’t appreciate the people they love and care about to the full extent until it is too late. My mother of 18 years, who I’ve never appreciated as I do today has suffered from various health issues throughout the past couple years and it wasn’t until 2 weeks ago that the situation’s seriousness came into light. Throughout my mothers family: high blood pressure, high cholestrol, and strokes ran through the family tree, and my mother herself has suffered from these health conditions. My grandfather passed away due to a stroke, and my grandmother has already suffered from 6 heart attacks due to her blood pressure and cholestrol problems. Thankfully due to improvements in the medical field my mother could take medicine to regulate her blood pressure, but all that changed sometime in the last 2 weeks.
It was a typical Sunday morning, though this particular Sunday it was hotter than any day I could remember during summer. And oddly, at the breakfast table I noticed my Mom more tired than she usually were on these mornings. I didn’t think too much of it thinking her extra fatigue came from staying up during the previous night. Later on in the day she became extremely fatigued, she couldn’t even stand up or walk without falling to the side, minutes later she had a stroke. I was as scared as I had ever been in my life, thousands of thoughts going through my mind of that would happen to me if I lost her. We rushed her to the hospital where we were told her blood pressure was extremely high. They ran some more tests on her, took blood samples, and did some more tests. All the while they were checking out my Mother to see if she was fine, I was sitting in the small waiting room area not noticing anything else around me entranced in the thought of what my life would be like if I lost anyone close to me. After checking to see if she was fine, they gave her some stronger medicine to stabilize her blood pressure and lectured her on how she must change her lifestyle to keep her blood pressure low. All seemed to go back to normal, though nowadays I am much more protective of her, questioning what type of oil she uses to cook, making sure she eats healthy, and encouraging her to exercise and life a healthy lifestyle.
This was a major event during the high school that influenced me because it reminded me how most people don’t truly appreciate the people and things around them before it’s gone. These days I try to enjoy life with my family by spending as much time as I can with them, knowing one day they will have passed away I don’t want to look back and regret not spending some more quality time with my parents. That is life: we are born, we live, and we die. But it is the people around me that care about that makes me the person I am, and the reason why life is worth cherishing.