My Story

I couldn’t have thought of a better way of spending my birthday than with three of my best friends, bowling and dinner at pizza hut in Stockport. At the time I thought that some one must have loved me because I thought it was the best birthday I had, had in a long time and I did feel like I was on top of the world and nothing was going to spoil this day. I thought I was all grown being fourteen. Wish I hadn’t now because I had to grow up from a gullible and immature fourteen very quickly. It’s amazing how much fifteen minutes can change your life.



“Who is it?” I was so happy I was off in my own little world, thinking about how great life was. I couldn’t stop smiling because I was walking home with my friends, Josh and Kim, after dropping a video off at the video shop, and they kept on making me giggle.

“Mel, are you listening to me?”

“Did you say something?”

“You’re phones ringing, I was wondering who it was.” That was Kim, good job she had noticed otherwise things could have been worse. I don’t know how I hadn’t noticed, that night was really peaceful and quiet except our voices because on the main road only a few cars were going past and there were no people around except for me, Kim and Josh; but I was miles away. I looked at my phone screen to see was calling the name “Chris” (my older brother) flashed on the screen. I wondered why he was ringing; I thought he was at the house. It must have been important because he hadn’t given up trying to reach me after two attempts.

“Hello”

“Hiya Mel, I’ve just rang the house asking for you”

I heard Kim in the background doing the rhyme she always does when she sees an ambulance - ‘touch my nose, touch my toes, hope I don’t end up in back of one of those.’ Not that a rhyme would help her but she thought it would.

“I thought you were at the house?”

“Nope I never came down, so decided to ring you to wish you happy birthday instead,”

“Oh, why didn’t you ring the house later?”

“That’s the thing, I rang home asking for you and Dad said this isn’t the time Chris and slammed the phone down and he sounded really angry, do you know what’s going on?”

“No idea. I’ll run home now and see.”

“Okay, hope you’re not in trouble. Bye.”

“Me too. See you”



The voices behind me of became distant whispers. I said a quick goodbye and then I started running for home. My mind started to fill with all the things I could be in trouble for, but why would Dad have been so angry about something I have done. I’m petrified and worried sick at the same time, what could have happened that was so terrible that he slammed the phone down on my brother. Five minutes passed and I thought I was going to have a panic attack in the middle of the pavement. I was out of breath and everything except for what was straight in front of me was out of focus. I kept thinking that maybe Gareth had fallen down the stairs and had badly injured himself.



As I got nearer to the house I began to slow down and everything came back into focus. What happened after that I hadn’t expected. I guess I should have known something like this was going to happen though. I knew she had depression, plus all the signs were there, her feeling anxious, bursting into tears all the time, always feeling sad more than usual, and it wasn’t like it was the first time she had tried to escape from it all, but nothing as bad as this.



As everything around me came back into focus again, I noticed that there was a group of people outside my house, which looked like my neighbours from no. 80 and my dad. Also there was an ambulance. My mind wandered back to Kim’s superstition and her rhyme and the fact that I had thought nothing of it. I got closer to the ambulance and I could hear now everyone mumbling about what was going on. I could make a few words like ‘Jane’ and ‘It’s a shame’, but still I didn’t know what was going on. Then it clicked. It was my mum that was in the ambulance and I knew what she had done. Sam, my neighbour, started to walk towards me and looked at me in sympathy. I didn’t know what to do, but my body decided what it wanted to do. I ended up collapsing into Sam’s arms as soon as she got close enough, everything went black apart from the ambulance and I just cried and I couldn’t stop. I was so scared. I eventually calmed down and Sam took me to her house, and sat me on her sofa where I saw Gareth also sat on the sofa. As I sat there in a trance, Sam was telling me what had happened, but I couldn’t listen, I already knew. I couldn’t look at anyone in fear that I may start crying again, but I had to be brave for my little brother.



As time went by, all I could think about was how are my friends going to get their stuff from my house from last night, it was something to keep my mind off what had happened. After a while my dad came to pick us up and take us home. We were told she was all right but she had to stay in hospital for a little while, on the mental health ward, so they could watch her for a while.



A while; was six months. Hardest six months of my family’s life, and mine, I had to mature very quickly and look out for my younger brother a lot more, but I’m glad they happened. Otherwise my mum wouldn’t have made a full recovery and be the amazing person she is today.