When I was a child, about five years old, when I lived in California, I lived with my mother, and my father, who frequently abused us due to his PTSD from fighting in Iraq. My mother was about four months pregnant when we ran away to live with my grandparents in Missouri. While living there, my mother was having a lot of strain on her from the pregnancy while dealing with stress from leaving my father. She would cry often, and very much. I was young and didn’t know why, but I do now. While my mum was giving birth, me and a friend were watching Cinderella and colouring some pages in a book. I went in there very many times, but i had to leave because of all the blood, and my mum’s screams. Something went wrong during the birth, and my mum was hospitalised. One night, I remember visiting her in the hospital. I talked eith her for about an hour, before the doctor came in and told us that visiting hours were over. All I remember afterwards was being dragged out of the room, while kicking and crying and screaming, and my mother was crying too, and then we had to wait in the lobby. I remember sitting out there, and the doctor came up to my grandmother and said, “If she dies, would you or another grandparent be willing to take care of the kids?” And then it hit me; my mother was dying. And then I was angry, because at that point, the only thing I could think about was that it was my brother’s fault. If my mum had never been pregnant with him, then she wouldn’t be dying right now. My mother did not die, but to this day, 9 years later, I still hate him for it, even though I know it’s not his fault, and I feel incredibly guilty about it.
