Final Draft - Personal Experience

Personal Experience
By Melanie Dionisio
Due June 2nd, 2008

Melandro Gonzales Dionisio was born on September 25, 1950, in Manila, Philippines. He has four children, two born in the Philippines and the other two he currently takes care of, born in America, my sister, Esther and me, Melanie. Ironically I was named after my dad, having the same initials and similar first name. He and my mom had me at a fair age of 37 while my dad was 41. My sister was born eleventh months after me. My sister and I are the first generation Filipinos, in our family, born in America. Unfortunately, we do not speak Tagalog, the main language of the Filipinos, but we do understand it.
Like other immigrants who come to America, Filipinos usually look for a better opportunity to have a happier life. The currency in America is different in the Philippines, so sending money and clothes to the Philippines was nothing new to those who have done it since they have moved here like my grandfather. He provided a lot for my family in the Philippines. We they all moved here, we all had so many family gatherings of my dad’s side; the Dionisios’. My grandfather was a funny man who always teased his grandchildren for fun. He always made each and everyone of us smile. Sadly, he died on March 3, 2000 when I was in third grade. I remember during this one week in April going into March, my parents would bring my sister and I to New Jersey where my grand parents lived. My whole family was there; my cousins and I were in the living room while all the adults were in the bedroom. I asked my cousin David what was going on, he told me that our grandpa, Tatay, was dying. I didn’t believe him until it actually hit me the next day when we were in my aunt’s house again. My mom came to me with tears coming down her face, telling me that tatay had passed away. She told me to see him, in his death bed, to pay our respects. As Filipinos, it was tradition to bless the elderly by putting the back of their hand to our forehead. At the time I was scared because my grandfather was dead, I too afraid to touch him.
The day of the awake, I remember all of my aunts and uncles crying and my sister crying too, while I did not shed one tear. That was the first funeral I attended to and till this day I still feel guilty that I did not cry for my Grandfather. I remember a couple of days after, I returned to school like nothing had happened. I missed my grandfather and realized that people do die in real life. I just never thought it would have been my grandfather. At the time kids my age did not really think about death as a everyday thing. It was just so sudden when he died that day.
Years after his death, my family went through some complications with my dad. He had experienced several chest pains in the past years of 2002 and 2003, which then lead to his first heart attack. Doctors found out that his arteries were clogged which made him at risk of having another heart attack. Of August 2003, my dad was told to go the hospital for an operation to unclog his arteries. During his operation, my mom, my sister and I were in the waiting room, quietly waiting for his operation to come an end. One hour already passed into his five hour operation, and then lights around the building were starting to shut off. We were not sure what was going on. I assumed some little kid was playing around with the lights so I did not pay any mind to the malfunction. A couple of minutes later, a few nurses came into the waiting room, announcing that there has been a black out, but the generators were on so everything was going to be fine. Well at a young age of 12, I did not believe ‘things’ were going to be fine. All three of us soon left the waiting room to talk to doctors and ask when the electricity would turn back on. One person told us that there has been a black out through out the whole east coast and there is no sign to when the electricity will be turning back on. My mom contacted family members, cousins, aunts from New Jersey, My older sister, Emie, and her husband in the Bronx. Two of my aunts came that day, to support my dad, while still in the black out. My mom, sisters, aunts and my uncle and I ended up sleeping in the hospital for the night because there was too much traffic in the city to get home.
Two days after my dad’s operation, he was able to leave the hospital, but in order to recover he was not able to drive or work for a couple of weeks. I was glad that my dad was able to receive help from doctors, though a couple of years later he had two heart attacks, both of which he survived, but was still difficult to cut down on his food habits which gave him those heart attacks.
Three years later after 2003, there was another person in the family who was undergoing some health problems. After Christmas in 2005, my grandma was diagnosed with cancer. A tumor found in her right leg was spreading to different parts of her body after refusing to take treatment. She said she could not stand the pain, so she allowed her body to weaken, knowing her time was about to be over. In 2006, I was in 9th grade and I have to say that would had to be one of my toughest years out of all the years I’ve been in SOF. I was going through some problems in school, with friends and enemies, and having to watch my grandma get weaker by the day made things harder. I did not know how to handle the issues in school; I tried to deal with it by shrugging off my problems and trying to continue my 9th grade year strong. However, in March of 2006, my grandma had the toughest month of her life.
In the last week of March, the Dionisio family got together to support my grandma as she was ready to pass away. The first few days of our gathering, my aunts, my uncles, mom, dad, me, and five of my other cousins came to visit her. Everybody else was either in school or at work and was not able to see her. Each day my family tried to nurture her, make her feel comfortable for the time being. My aunts tried to talk and sing to her as my grandma was lying in her bed. Each day of that one week, I walked in her room to look over her. I remember looking into her eyes, and seeing the pain she had felt when lying in her bed. She looked so weak, and as people tried to talk to her, she would close her eyes.
It was March 31st, 2006 when everything changed. It was about 3:50 in the afternoon, my aunts and my mom were in the Kitchen, My uncles and my dad were in the dinning room and my cousins and I were in the living room. We were all hanging around until me aunts and uncles rushed into my grandma’s bedroom. My cousins and I were confused, so we followed them into the bedroom and found everybody surrounding my grandma. It was about twenty people in one small room, crying, knowing that that moment was going to be her last. Everybody was either to the left or right of her, while my cousin and I were by the end of the bed, standing directly in front of her. Phone calls were made; relatives trying to talk to her for the last time. My grandma couldn’t speak, but she still wanted a call and let him/her know that she loves them.
For the time being, my grandma had her eyes closed. Around four o’clock my grandma started looking up at everybody around her, and then up at the ceiling. Everybody knew she was going to pass at any moment. She took a deep breath in, and let it all out and slowly closed her eyes. Her jaw started dropping, as a sign that she was gone. Everybody was crying all over again after seeing her pass away. My Aunts made phone calls to those in California and in the Philippines. Others made phone calls to those who were not able to come. My cousins and I Just sat back down in the living room, shaken of what we had just experienced; death happening right before our eyes.
The funeral took place a couple of days after. It was tough on the family, but we continued to move on strong, knowing she is still watching over us with our grandpa.
Lastly; my dad suffered his fourth heart attack in the summer of 2007. My god-father, my aunt and my god-sister from Las Vegas came to visit my family and I in the Poconos. It was like any other day; we went shopping, went out for dinner, came home to stay in the house in Pennsylvania, and slept over. At the time my god-father and his family was staying in a hotel, but we allowed them to sleep over our house for the night, only for the simple fact we haven’t seen them in about seven years.
In the evening, my god sister and I stayed up late watching T.V. My sister was in Binghamton visiting my cousins, while we were all in Pennsylvania. My god-sister and I woke up the next morning finding that nobody was in the house. I looked in my parents’ bedroom first, finding that the covers of their bed were not made and my dad’s glasses were on the floor. I was suspicious that something went wrong because my mom would never leave the house without making the bed. I looked outside my window and the car was not outside in the drive way nor was it in the garage. I didn’t bother calling my mom because I thought my mom, dad, god-father and aunt went to get breakfast.
An hour after my god-sister and I woke up, everybody came home except for my dad. My mom broke down the news to my god-sister and me that my dad had a heart attack in the middle of the night and was rushed to the closest hospital which was thirty minutes away. I was so speechless that I did not know how to react. I quickly called my sister, in Binghamton about the news, where she later was drove to PA to reunite with us. Family from New York and New Jersey came to the Poconos all for my dad while he was in the hospital which was unbelievable.
After my past experiences with death between my grandma and grandpa, and death almost taking away my dad’s life, four times, made me realize to not take my life for granted. Even though I am only sixteen, sitting in that waiting room in the hospital in the Poconos made me realize there is more to life & my family than there is with all these issues I’ve gone through with friends and close friends. I mean, if friendship means that much to me than of course I would take care of it, but with all the gossip in school and what people say about me or any other person should not matter to me at all. What matters the most is what my family thinks of me, and how I carry myself as a person. Who knows when I am going to die; maybe at a young age or at an old age. Just thinking about how a long my grandparents had lived showed me how grateful I am to be a part of a family that is not broken. My dad is only 57 and is living a long life so far and I’m thankful that he is still alive after 4 heart attacks. Just the thought of my grandparents and my dad makes me think about cherishing the time I have left with my family and friends.
Everybody has a personal revelation in some point of their life, maybe everyday, just by realizing something that one had not known before. Because that one revelation I learned about ‘cherishing life’ and ‘not taking life for granted’ which branched out to individual revelations about discovering myself and who I am as a person. That I don’t have to be this ‘bitch’ that everybody views me as, because I am not always mean. I am only mean because I am concerned with those who think about me. And now? I could careless of what anybody has to say about me, only to those who I can trust matter, and nothing else. It is just a matter of time to know what else is there to learn when another revelation is taught or recognized when a situation is experienced. I have a whole life ahead of me and I am not one of those girls who go on and start looking for ‘an answer’- aka a revelation. I want to just sit back, relax and enjoy the ride, awaiting any revelation that passes me by.