One weekend I took my daughter out to my dad’s to visit family. It was mid-summer. When we got there, my dad, stepmom, brother, and granddad were there sitting outside. We joined them.

My family is pretty decent if you ask me, though not without our faults for sure. I was raised by my father along with my twin brothers who are only 15 months younger. My older brother has a different father and, thus, had the unfortunate luck of being raised by our mother. My mom, at the time, was a very sick and absent woman in every way…mentally, emotionally, spiritually, physically. She was an alcoholic and a drug addict. My dad was on his own pretty early on. He said he came home from work one day and we were all alone, crying in our cribs. He had no idea how long we were there for, but could tell from our diapers that it was a while.

He doesn’t like to accept any credit for being a single father…always says what choice did he have? Well…I get it and greatly appreciate his humility, but we always have choices. Just like my mother walking away from her children (though I now know that she simply wasn’t capable of staying and that that, in itself, was a gift). It’s choices like these that illustrate parts of a person’s true character, isn’t it? Maybe it’s not all of it, but I think it’s part of it.

When we were young, I was maybe 7, we moved a couple hours away from my mom to be closer to my dad’s family. We stayed with my uncle, his wife, and their two children.

When I think about this time, I can still feel the music. There was always music…live music, folk festivals, music in the car, music in the house, music everywhere…soulful oldie’s, classic rock. My dad and uncle and their friends, were mostly hippies at heart (a lifestyle that often goes hand in hand with drugs and alcohol). They would sit around for hours and hours playing music…my dad with the guitar or the bass or the dulcimer or whatever else he picked up, my uncle attached to his drum set.

I remember one day at my new school, another little girl had her hair braided. I really, really liked it. When my dad got home from work, I asked him if he would braid my hair for me. We sat down. He brushed my long, wavy blond hair out and started trying to braid it. I realized right away that he didn’t know how to make one. I didn’t say anything. We sat there for what felt like hours…him trying and trying to braid my hair. He didn’t get frustrated, he just kept trying. Eventually, I ended up with a haphazard braid of sorts, but I was so glad because I understood.

Here’s a man…carpenter by trade, a guy’s guy (but loved by the ladies too), a biker, extremely hard-working, tough, busy single dad…taking the time to braid his little girl’s hair when he didn’t even know how to braid hair. You think you understand love until you recall memories like that…patience, unselfishness, perseverance…that’s love.

So, my daughter and I joined my family on their patio. My daughter started playing with the hose and the rest of us were just talking, watching her. Someone said something and it was just too funny. It’s always funny there and there are always laughs and I adore the presence of each of those people, but this was too much. It felt like a little guy with a giant machete was inside my body hacking away at my insides. I had to leave. I went inside.

My dad came in and asked me what was going on. We were on our first trip to the hospital within minutes.

This started a several week long process of going in and out of emergency rooms. We started near my dad’s house where the doctor told me that it was my gallbladder and that I should change my diet. I went home still in dire pain and, to no avail, changed my diet.

My dad and stepmom called to check on me every day. We went to a few different hospitals in my area, who referred me to my primary physician, who referred me to a gastroenterologist. Then always back to the hospital. I had an endoscopy, blood tests, CAT scans, PET scans, MRI’s…nothing came up. It was a mystery. They couldn’t figure out what was wrong with me.

We eventually ended up at the same hospital that Betsy had died in. It was just me and my dad. It was a horribly awful time. I was forced to be away from my daughter. I was still freshly devastated from losing Betsy. I was in the worst physical pain I had ever experienced. I laid in a bed in the emergency room wondering if it was the same bed Betsy had passed in. Wondering if the man who was my doctor was the same doctor she had…my head in complete morbid, shock mode.

They ran a number of tests. After a while, the doctor came in the room and told me that he thought I had a Pulmonary Embolism, the same thing that took Betsy’s last breath. Ugh…my heart…an elevator whose cables were severed…it was a nightmare.

There was a distinct moment that I looked over and saw my dad. I saw in his eyes that he was scared for me and that he was sad, but I also realized that he was a rock…a pillar of comfort. It would normally be like me to soldier up and try to tough it out so that he wouldn’t need to be worried. I briefly gave it my all, but I was shook to the core of my being. He didn’t say much and I needed that so badly. I simply needed him there and he was…as he always, always was. See…sometimes angels live on earth too.

The doctor gave me blood thinners and sent me home.

Tensions were running high. It was starting to get scary. The pain increased exponentially every day and nobody could help me. The next night we went back to the same hospital.

There was a different doctor that night. It was a younger, attractive woman with dark hair who was way more caring and attentive. She looked over some test results that I had gotten previously. She noticed that something was off with one of the numbers. I told her how the doctor from the day before said that he thought I had a blood clot in my lung. She looked slightly bothered, but assured me that that wasn’t the case. She said she wasn’t sure yet what was going on. She sat across the room from my dad and I. With a soft face and a voice so kind that I instantly felt the warmth, she told me that she believed me. That she was admitting me to the hospital so we could figure out what was going on.

It was a relief for me, for all of us. Thanks to this woman, there was a sense that it was going to be ok. They moved me to another room. I told my dad that he could go home and get some rest if he wanted to. He promptly dismissed that suggestion with a wave of his hand and settled in for the night.

The next morning I saw a surgeon…a very, very young Doogie Houser’s long lost twin looking surgeon. He came in my room, felt around my stomach, asked a few questions. He explained that it seemed to him that my gallbladder was the reason for all the trouble. That it would be risky to do surgery without test results pointing towards it. By this time, my dad was not messing around anymore. He demanded that the doctor do the surgery and that he do it quick. The surgeon reluctantly considered it and eventually agreed. As if just noticing the age of the doctor, my dad asked, “How many of these surgeries have you done anyway?”

The next thing I knew, I was prepping for surgery (thanks dad).

The surgery lasted way longer than expected. The doctor said that I was within a day or two of death. I had a massive infection inside my abdomen. All the subsequent fluid was pushing my organs against my body cavity. My liver had gotten stuck under my rib cage.

I was released within a couple days and went to stay with my family for a few weeks to recover. They helped me take care of my daughter. While I was there, I received a phone call from Betsy’s husband.

He had called to tell me that Betsy’s brother had committed suicide. He had been sober on his own for a long time and eventually succumbed to the drugs and alcohol again. It was only a matter of time really. We can’t do it by ourselves. Betsy knew this of course, but she fought for him. Promised their mother she would always look out for him. I remember feeling sorrow on her behalf, which struck me as odd as she was gone. Her husband said he felt the same.

He also told me that he had a meeting with the doctor who was working in the ER on the day of Betsy’s death. The doctor on duty wasn’t made aware of her state. She laid in the ER for hours with a blood clot in her lungs. By the time the doctor saw her, there was nothing that could be done. Her husband told me that he had no intention of suing, but that he just wanted to talk to the doctor to be sure that this incident hadn’t happened in vain. That it wouldn’t happen to anyone else.

He said that the doctor was very receptive and tremendously remorseful. He said he asked the doctor if they believed in God, and they said yes. He told them the story of his last moments with Betsy and what he experienced in that room when her soul crossed to the other side. He told me that they were both crying.

I asked him what the doctor’s name was and to describe them to me…younger, attractive, dark haired woman…same doctor that believed me. The same one that saved my life…