It was a typical Sunday afternoon at my house. The kids were running about the house playing, my husband was working from home, and I was trying to keep on top of the messes my kids kept making. That all changed after one phone call. My aunt called me and told me that my parents had been drinking and were arguing. She said that she had spoken briefly to my mother on the phone and my aunt was worried about her. My aunt told me that my father had put my mother's head in the toilet!
I could not believe what she was saying to me. She thought that I might want to check in on my parents and make sure everything was okay. After I hung up with my aunt, I explained the situation to my husband and decided I would drive over to my parent's home. My parents have a long history of alcoholism and abusive behavior towards one another. The entire drive there I was really sick to my stomach and was becoming angrier by the minute that my father would do such a demeaning act!
When I arrived, my mother came outside to meet me, I could tell she had been crying. I asked her what was going on and asked her if my dad had indeed put her head in the toilet. She told me he had. I became infuriated. My mom and I went inside and I told her to pack her things and that she was going to stay with me. My father became belligerent and told me this was none of my business and that I should leave. I stood my ground, even though I was shaking from the inside out. I was nervous, scared, mad, but I had a job to do and that was to protect my mother and get her out of that house. To my surprise, my dad got right up in my face and we began screaming at each other and then he did it. He put his hands on me! Never in all my life had he done that. He tried to shove me and I landed on the chair. I quickly dialed 911 and begged for help. About that time my father went into the other room and got a gun. I remember screaming to the dispatcher, "He has a gun!" I ran out of the house and hid behind my minivan and waited.
Waited for sounds, for movement, for anything. In my mind I kept picturing hearing the shot of the gun going off. I could see my mom and dad, both dead. Everything had happened so fast, I couldn't process what was going on. The police showed up not long after my call. I drove down the street, crying hysterically, watching the scene through my rear view mirror. My dad was on his knees in the driveway of the home that I grew up in, being arrested. My relationship with my parents changed right then. I had had my father arrested. My emotions surrounding this event are very conflicted. I wanted him to pay for what he had done but in the very same breath I felt awful about him being arrested. I knew that he would hate me and that my mother would probably too. I wondered if I had made the right decision, should I have gone over there, should I have called 911, should I have got involved? I still ponder these questions but I have grown to accept the decision I made and I feel I did what I thought was right. I was still trying to be the girl who protected her mommy.
That day I lost a parent and became no man's daughter.
