Call your mentor

Leaving my mother in the ER hospital bed, it feels like I am walking away from her. It feels so selfish, breaking down.

I know this is the point at which I can now get some relief. I have the opportunity, once I am broken again to look outside myself for strength. So, I have hope. I do talk to God at this point, but I am also hoping that I can count on my flesh and blood best friend waiting outside the metal doors.

I am practically running by the time I hit those doors. Told that only immediate family is allowed inside the doors of the ER, I am torn. I know that I need to be there for my mother and that I need to be with her for myself, but I cannot go back in there alone and I tell my best friend so. He replies, “You don’t have to; call your mentor.”

My mentor is a woman who has lovingly and selflessly agreed to help me with the effects of alcoholism. In one way my best friend is right. My mentor is the perfect person for me to lean on. In another respect, he has just taught me that I cannot count on him. Some part of me knows this, even then, but all of this is too much to fully process in that moment.

I dial my mentor’s number, and cry to her about the difficulty of this time. She gently offers that I do not have to do this and can choose to leave. When we both decide this is not an option for me because it is simply too important to me to stay with her – even more important than how hard it is to stay - she prays with me and reminds me where all Strength and Love comes from.

I am able to push through the doors once more to stand by Mom’s sleeping side. Now there isn’t much to do but be there. The severity of her situation begins to dawn on me. They will need to examine her. Even without the assault, she is near death. God knows what they will find.

The need for nicotine is suddenly more than I can stand. I whirl around and throw back the white curtain. I spy a nurse – looks like a nice guy – and ask him if there is a smoking area.

“Ha!” His wry smile perplexes me. “Honey, everybody in this place is here because someone was driking, drugging, or smoking. So, no, there is no smoking area.”

Incredulous, I dare him, “Everyone? What about the families and children?” He pops back, “Why do you think they’re here? Either their Daddy was doing those things or someone who was doing them hurt him. And that’s why they’re here, too.”

His words wash that indelible truth over me and just like that, the desire for a cigarrette leaves me like so much smoke drifitng away. I know it sounds like a Hollywood moment, but it is nothing but the truth.

I decide I still need a break and walk outside, tossing what’s left of my pack of cigs in a trash can. My friend joins me here. It’s weird. I don’t turn to him or to the cigarrettes. I truly am being granted with more strength than I alone have. Thank God.

Although I cannot fully handle it at the moment, I will get it in the coming months that if you can’t count on someone in your darkest hour, you don’t need them. No matter how much you think you do, you don’t. It was a gift, what my friend did, letting me down. I could make more room for the people who could support me with him out of my life. I could also be a better friend to others. I somehow had more to give, wanting to be the kind of friend that would be there in someone’s darkest hour.