Daughters Gone Wild, Dads Gone Crazy by Charles Stone

Author:Charles Stone
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: ebook, book
Publisher: Thomas Nelson
Published: 2010-11-06T00:00:00+00:00

For Daughters

Once again, my life returned to the way it was. It seemed to be one big trap, a great string of events that followed no rhyme or reason. Often my life was like getting caught in a riptide: I struggled without footing to keep my head above water. I felt I had no control. Things just happened.

As I stared at the blindingly white walls in Boston, I wasn’t surprised that I’d ended up there. I remember my room seemed like a large white coffin. The small window on the north wall was barred and locked shut. As the leaves of the dying tree outside rattled against the window, the cold, gloomy winter perfectly reflected what was happening to me inside. The room was bare, sparse. Its furnishings included a single bed and a nightstand, which were bolted to the pale gray linoleum floor. The stark white bathroom had the same stale, cold feeling of the room. The unbreakable mirror bolted to the wall prevented its use in a suicide attempt.

When I looked down the hall, I saw only an antiseptic whiteness made a glowing gray by the buzzing fluorescent lights. Sadness and anger lived in this place. Desperation was king.

I remember hearing a steady thud! thud! I got up from my bed and crept down the hall, carefully following the noise. It came from one of the rooms. I gently knocked and opened the door. Blood smears stained the wall. Her knuckles bled. She had punched the wall so hard that her blood and bits of skin remained plastered to those stark white walls. Red smeared on white.

Perhaps her bloody knuckles were her way of reminding herself that she was alive. Perhaps it wasn’t about anger, or rebellion, or acting out. Maybe it was about seeing the lifeblood leave her body—at least she knew there was something in her that was still living.

I went back to my room.

I’d been admitted to the hospital in Boston for “psychiatric evaluation,” meaning my parents wanted an explanation for the reason I was so bent on defying their wishes. I had been at the hospital for one night, and I expected a visit from my dad soon. I will never forget that visit.

I’d become so accustomed to strange noises that when he knocked, I didn’t respond, so he opened the door. I looked up, and there stood my dad. His red-rimmed blue eyes looked distant, and at the same time, fearful. He managed a weak smile.

“Hi, Dad,” I mumbled.

“Hi, Heather.”

We didn’t say much to each other. We were at odds, to say the least. We both felt angry, hurt, and confused. Our relationship had all but ceased to be. Our eyes met. I looked away.

“I brought something for you,” he said.

It caught me off guard. I didn’t expect anything, and I surely didn’t deserve anything.

He stepped out of the room and returned with a huge card. In black and white, the card showed a smiling Chihuahua standing in a pair of oversized Converses. On the front it read,“Hurry and get well” .

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