Narritive

I knew things were going to be changing, my whole family dynamic would be different the day I found out my 15 year old sister was pregnant. My sister is 16 months older than me so with our ages being so close my mom knew she was in for trouble. She was right; we pretty much fought our entire lives together and caused a lot of trouble. Everything changed that night though, you could feel the tension in the house lighten and bonds start to form as our love for one another came out in care and compassion. I am a strong believer in everything happens for a reason after all that has happened in the past three years from my family’s little miracle.

            Let me start off with the background of me and Ashley’s relationship together. We were the typical little girls, always stealing each other’s things and tattling on each other. Don’t get me wrong we had our good times when we were growing up together but once middle school came, everything seemed to hit the fan. I remember one particular summer where Ashley and I would get into physical fights with each other, left countless holes in the walls from throwing things and some doors were broken. We weren’t even allowed to be home alone together at this point in our lives, someone had to be there with us or we had to go to a day camp to be watched. That was the worst we had ever gotten, but once that was over the emotional fighting never stopped. After all we went through even I think it is nuts that we can be so close now, but it was almost like none of that had ever mattered or even happened the night she told me.

            Everything was a normal day as far as I was concerned I came home from school and was watching some TV with one of my friends. The only thing that was sort of out of the ordinary was that my mom and Ashley were having a huge fight over the phone and were screaming at each other. All I had to do was wait for my mom to get home to find out what that was all about. As soon as my mom walked in the door she came up to me and asked “Did she tell you?” I replied, “No” and immediately got that sick feeling you get when you know something super bad is about to happen. We all sat down in the living room and my sister turned to me and said, “Angie, I am pregnant.” I just started to laugh because I thought it was a joke, it only took a couple seconds for me to realize she was serious when she started to tear up. In that moment my heart dropped and I was scared of what was going to happen. It was really weird what happened next. We didn’t even talk about it, like everyone knew everything there was to know so we didn’t need to speak about it. That night the past was the past to both me and my sister and we put aside everything that happened in our childhood and started to act like real sisters. I helped Ashley with everything she needed, we went shopping together and I would talk to her about all of her concerns with the baby. We would hang out and talk about everything, we became best friends. Never fighting or even really disagreeing, we worked together to do everything for the first time ever. It went by really fast but finally the day came we all were preparing for, the day I got to meet my baby nephew. 

            You know how most people will tell you that women almost always go into labor at night? Well now I am a believer in that, Ashley had come home on December 1^st complaining of stomach pains that wouldn’t go away. Around ten thirty at night my mom decided that she was going to take Ashley to the hospital. Ashley was 16 at the time and she was very scared of what was going to happen. Since she was so young and so scared the hospital admitted her a little earlier than they would have any other pregnant women. Once I found out they were going to stay it was my job to drive Ashley’s car to the hospital to be there for support. I was 15 and only had my learners permit so I was nervous to drive at night in the snow illegally. When I arrived at the hospital my sister was walking around trying to speed up her labor, she looked like she was in a lot of pain. So I walked with her for about a hour while my mom called the rest of the family. Even though it was around eleven thirty my entire family showed up and had pretty much a pizza party in the waiting room. I thought having a baby was supposed to be a happy and enjoying experience but I was very wrong. I couldn’t be in the room with Ashley, as if I really wanted to anyways. But I was outside of the room the entire time. It was literally the worst night ever. I had to sit outside that room and listen to my sister scream and cry for hours! It sounded like she was being murdered very slowly and painfully. After getting so close to someone it sucked having to hear them be in so much pain. I pretty much cried the whole time, I’m not afraid to admit that. Carter was born on December 2^nd at around 6 in the morning. My family only got to see him for around fifteen minutes before the doctor and nurses started noticing discoloring of the skin and strange movements of his legs. The doctor decided it was best to send him to the cities to United Hospital for more in depth observation. Ashley couldn’t go with since she just had him, so my mom and I followed the ambulance to the cities to see how everything was and if he would be okay. Carter ended up staying at United for two weeks, we went every day to see him, talk to him, and hold him. They ran tons of tests on the kid and they couldn’t find anything wrong with him. Carter is now almost three and he is one of the smartest little kids I’ve ever met.

            If I have learned anything from this experience I’ve learned that miracles sometimes come in the worst times and in the strangest ways, but they are always worth it in the end. You can’t always prepare for the future so when unexpected things pop up you just have to take them in the best ways. The birth of my nephew Carter was probably the best thing that had ever happened to my family and to me personally in my life. He made our family come together and really start acting like a real family. Everyone got so much closer and we forgot about the past, not only did I gain a new member of my family but I got a sister and best friend as well.