Time Heals All Wounds
by Sarah Forster
The phone rang at 10:30 on a Wednesday morning. It was my sister. She could not speak; Dad had been rushed to the hospital at 5:30 in the morning.
I had to go home. Now.
But I was in St. Cloud, Minn., more than 2,500 miles from my hometown of Anchorage, Alaska. I paced up and down my hallway like a chicken with its head cut off. My sister had called me from my Aunt Patty and Uncle Ray’s house after my dad was brought to the emergency room. They bought me an emergency ticket to Alaska and I was at the airport within two hours. I was headed home to say goodbye.
I had known Kevin Forster 21 years. He was tall and thin (he hated the word skinny). He had glasses. I inherited his eyes. His humor was smart and always funny, at least when I understood it. He knew more than I had given him credit for.
My sister and I were his chipmunks. When he first gave us the nickname it really bugged us, but later it turned into a term of endearment. The truth is, we were his little chipmunks. We were his world.
I had grown up with this man, Kevin Forster. He was my father. And time had been his worst enemy the two and a half years he was sick.
The nightmare started as a mole on Dad’s back. It had been there since he was a little kid, and when the mole was removed in 2003 he was considered to have a clean bill of health. But the clean bill was soon blemished. The melanoma in the mole had spread.
In May 2005, Dad was in Iraq with the National Guard when the nightmare continued. The melanoma was found during a routine medical exam by the military doctors. Multiple lumps in my dad’s lymph nodes were reason for huge concern. From that point on, he was finished with the Operation Iraqi Freedom war and had to start fighting his own war.
The first time it really hit me that I was losing my dad was when the doctors found that the cancer had spread from his lymph nodes to his brain in 2006. He had two golf-ball sized tumors. They were inoperable.
My dad broke the news to me on a day I was home from work. My stomach was a mess from bad eggs and too much coffee, so my boss let me take the rest of the day off. I was watching TV on the couch, about to take a nap, when my mom and dad came home. I still remember his face, almost frozen, just eyes wide open staring off into the distance.
The doctor had said, “You only have four months to live…”
I could not believe what my parents were telling me. Thoughts and questions filled my head like a tornado. How do I live with this? What will time bring? What about my family? Will my friends support me?
Then I felt selfish. What about my dad? How will he live with this? Four months… what is that? How do you measure that? What can you do in four months?
I had never cried so much in my life. My eyes hurt, as if someone had sewn them shut after filling both with sand. My world was crashing down around me.
Family from all around came to show their love, even some people who had not spoken to our family in years. Friends from all stages of my parent’s life flew to Alaska to say they loved my dad. We didn’t want to say they were coming to say goodbye. It hurt so badly; it was so final. Dad was dying.
The long sun-filled days were coming to an end. The cool wind signaled the end of summer and the unstopping progression into fall. It was time for me to head back to school. Returning to school was what my parents wanted me to do. I needed to be at school. I didn’t want to stay home and wait for the end.
The semester went smoothly for the most part. My dad’s cancer had not dramatically changed. The radiation had been working, and the golf-ball-sized tumors had decreased to the size of peas. By the time December rolled around, I was very hopeful. Finals were over, and I got on a plane to Anchorage to spend my three-week break with my family and friends.
Eight-thirty a.m. on a cold December morning. Dad and I were the only ones at home. I was eating my cereal, sitting with him in silence. Outside, the sun was still tucked under the dark blanket of the horizon. Suddenly, without looking up or shifting, he said, “I don’t want to go anywhere.” I knew exactly what he was talking about. He did not want to die; he didn’t want to leave Mom, Katy and me.
My heart twisted inside, the heaviness on my shoulders pushing me into a dark hole. Dad had made a conscious choice to live until he died. He did not let the prospect of death stop him from enjoying life, but the fear of dying seeped through his gentle eyes. I had never felt so helpless in my life. There was absolutely nothing I could do but be there with him as much as I could.
That was the only time I ever heard him say anything like that… and he never said it again.
No one, including Dad, thought he would die only weeks after that single comment.
I spent that whole Christmas break with Mom and Dad, doing whatever they wanted. Dad’s favorite pastime was just being with us. He would marvel at the life that was swirling around him. The morning talks we would have over our coffees and newspapers gave a great base for the day. He loved hearing about what I was doing in school, homework, classes, friends, boys and my choir music. It was a great pleasure watching his face light up as the conversations moved and swayed gently. Mom and I didn’t have any trouble making all conversations smoothly connected, and Dad would wait patiently to find a space to insert his thoughts. Our living room was literally the room we lived in. We never moved from there until the sun crept over the mountains, usually around noon.
After Christmas break was over, I headed back to St. Cloud to go back to school. I was back for only days when I received the shocking call from my sister. I had to turn right back around to Alaska to be with my family.
It was such a weird plane ride home. I wanted to scream to everyone on the plane, “Why am I here?!” But my better judgment took over and I kept the screaming on the inside. The lump in my throat throbbed as tears tried to escape. I had a layover in Seattle where I was able to talk to Dad. He was excited to hear my voice. Again I had to hold back a wave of tears from escaping; his soothing voice almost convinced me he could live for years. Later I found out that the nurses had given Dad blood to keep him alive long enough so I could see him. Dad had signed a “do not resuscitate” document and should not have been given any blood.
Two a.m. Alaska time, 5:00 a.m. Minnesota time. It was dark. Aunt Patty and I were the only two people in the room; the rest of the family had taken over a waiting room. I was waiting for Dad to realize I had made it home to see him. The hours that passed seemed like an eternity, but then time stopped as he started to recognize I was there.
He was so sick. He couldn’t even open his eyes or lift himself out of bed. All he could do was put his large hands on top of mine. He was so gentle. His hands were so soft, which was strange, since he was a mechanic and his hands were usually coarse and cut up from working on the car or on his helicopters at work. There were always black stains underneath his nails from the oil and grease. He just patted my hands purposefully and said, “Oh good, Sarah’s here.”
“Yes, Dad, I made it home.”
That was it. He fell asleep for the last time. He died just hours later at 11 a.m. It was still dark.
It has been two and a half years since the last time I saw my dad. The time passing has been a bumpy road. I read many different books on grieving to see if they held the key to feeling better. They all said the same thing: “Everyone grieves differently.”
I thought there was a correct way to grieve. I felt guilty for living my life or even having a smile on my face. I didn’t think it was appropriate to be happy when Dad was gone. The books helped me realize everyone does grieve differently. For me it came in waves, some big and some small.
At times it would sneak up on me. I would be watching a movie and see an old man, and a tear would form as my eyes explored his time-beaten wrinkles. I will never see my dad as an old man. A smile would form as I thought about how much Dad wanted to see his grandbabies grow up while enjoying his old age with my mom. He’d never spoken of the future or how much he wanted to be around longer.
The years without him have been extremely difficult, but as time goes on, the gray haze that has shadowed me is getting brighter. I still miss him just as much, but the waves of grief have subsided to just small splashes. My tears are turning into laughter and smiles when I think of the silly things he used to do. It’s getting easier to go on with my life. I have learned a lot from my dad, and I remember it so much more now that he is physically gone.
Dad is still with me and will always be with me. My choices in life are very much dependent on what I think he would say. Time is no longer an enemy but rather a gentle reminder that life is short and must be used wisely. It allows me to feel the weight of Dad’s death lift from my shoulders. Time is healing my wounds and I am feeling happy again.
Published 20 July 2009. All Rights Reserved.