It was a Saturday afternoon and some family friends of ours invited us over for dinner. My brother, Sergio, and I were playing board games with some of our friends that we’ve known our entire lives. By this time we had spent the whole afternoon together and somehow we all had way too much energy. They took us out to their backyard so we could ride around and play with their horses. We were all running around playing tag when my parents told us they’re tired and they were ready to go home.

A few days after the dinner, my dad started to get very sick. He couldn’t keep anything down and everything that he would eat would come right back out. We didn’t know what to do, but we all kept trying to tell my dad that he needed to go to the hospital because he hadn’t eaten in days. Being stubborn as always, my dad kept telling us that everything would be fine and we just needed to give it some time. 

Two weeks passed with my dad eating  barely anything, and my dad’s friends were at our house to make sure he’s doing okay. They were trying to convince my dad that he needed to go to the hospital and if he didn’t it would only get worse. Somehow, they managed to get him to the hospital and by the time my brother, my mom, and I got home they texted us telling us to meet us at the hospital. We drove to the hospital in kind of a rush but we also didn’t know what to expect. At the hospital, we got very lost since we’d never been in that part of the hospital before. I kept looking around for any kind of map, but at that point we were just wandering around aimlessly. After some very confused strolling, we found the room with my dad, his friends, and a nurse. My parents's friends said their goodbyes and left. We waited and talked with my dad about how this was crazy but everything was going to be okay. A few hours passed, when a few doctors came in and told us that my dad would need an MRI. 

The next day, I was dreading going back to school from what felt like the longest weekend ever. At school, I saw all my friends waiting in the cafeteria and I realized how lucky I was to be able to get away from all the stress at home and the hospital. Just like every other day, one of my best friends, Rylie, and I messed around and got nothing done in our language art class. We made too many jokes and ate a few too many Jolly Ranchers while trying to act like we were doing our classwork. When we got back from school, my mom told my brother and I that she had to tell us something very important. Sergio and I were thinking the same thing but we kept quiet and listened anyway. She told us that my dad was very sick and the doctors had found a tumor the size of a golf ball in his pancreas. Our jaws dropped. For the first time in my life, I was completely speechless. I was a little confused though because I wasn’t completely sure what a tumor was, I just knew it wasn’t a good thing. My mom went on to explain that the doctors don’t know how dangerous the tumor was yet, but he would have to get a biopsy. We drove to the hospital to see my dad again, and I noticed that this started to become part of our daily routine. Somehow I got used to doing something that I thought I would never have to do in a million years. 

My dad got the biopsy done which was probably the scariest thing we have all been through. There was a lot of anxious waiting because this would determine how dangerous the cancer really was. The results came in and that was one of the most shocking moments of my life. The oncologist told us that he had stage 3 pancreatic cancer. He then told us that we had a few options, he could have surgery to remove the cancerous part, start chemotherapy, or start radiation. 

A full year has passed since my dad was first diagnosed with cancer and a few things have happened. My dad ended up getting the surgery to remove the cancerous part of his pancreas, he started chemotherapy, and had to start radiation as well. At first it looked like the surgery worked, but then the cancer spread so my dad had to start chemo to try and kill the cancerous cells. That seemed to work so my dad got to spend the entire summer at home, even if it meant he had to lay down almost the whole day because he had no energy. My grandparents came with us on our most memorable vacation to Canún, Mexico one week before school started. As school started, my dad had to go back to the Baylor hospital for another big surgery coming up. 

He got the surgery done and was in the recovery wing for a week or so. Doctors told us that he would be able to come back on a Wednesday and they even came and set up a hospital bed at our house. It ended up not working out because my dad wasn’t healthy enough to stay at home. He fell into a coma for four days and every time we visited, we said goodbye like it was our last. On Thursday, October 18, 2018, my grandparents took me home from a volleyball game. When I got home, my mom pulled me in her room and told me she had to tell me something very important. She went on to tell me that this morning when she was visiting my dad before work, she heard his heart stop beating. She called  nurses in as soon as possible but they told her that there was nothing they could do. I was in complete shock, I didn’t know what to do. Even though this was expected and I tried to mentally prepare myself for this for months, I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I couldn’t stop crying that whole night. I tried my best to remember what my dad always told me, “It is a blessing in disguise.” I tried my best to focus on the “blessing” in what just happened. I emailed my teachers explaining everything that just happened, and I’m so thankful they were so understanding by telling me I could take off as much time as I needed. The volleyball coach ended up telling the team what had happened which I didn’t like at first, but I was glad because I don’t think I could have done it without breaking down. I never wanted to seem like a different person after my dad passed, so I hid all my feelings and didn’t let anyone see what was actually going on. I tried my best not to change and always be positive, but that really took a toll on my mental health. 

Then the pandemic started and everyone had to quarantine. At first everyone was really happy, but then it started getting really hard since I was so used to seeing people other than my family almost every day. I ended up falling into a really dark depression where I didn’t see myself wanting to keep going. I opened up to my friends about what was happening and I was so relieved that they were so supportive. We started going on bike rides pretty often and talking almost every day. Being able to hang out with my friends or just seeing people really helped me when I was going through that rough patch. They all helped me in their own ways whether it was, playing Roblox, joining Zoom calls, or even just going to get snow cones. 

One week before school started my family invited some of our friends to go down to Port Aransas with us. It was so fun and I really needed a break from being stuck at home for five months. We got to swimming, parasailing, and drove around in golf carts. Coming back to school also really helped because I got to see some people that I haven’t seen in six months. Now I would say I’m probably the happiest I’ve ever been other than when I was so small that my only problem was trying to walk.