The way I see it family should always have each other’s back, right? Well so I thought. When I was younger I had always been close to my cousin Cody. Then the day come when he hurt me like nobody else could. He shattered my world and threw the family into a crazy war. I made it through all of the hurtfulness and pain by diving head first into my Sunday school teachings. Growing up in my crazy family I felt out of place a lot of the time. The only time I felt right was when I was with my cousin Cody. He was like my twin brother, we were same age and had the same crazy ways of entertaining ourselves.
We would run around pulling pranks on many of our family member’s, hiding things and the, Oh so funny “rubber band around the kitchen sink hose” trick. Let’s face it, we were little shits. Last summer our family was in town from Yakima, Washington. My cousin Sara has Autism and she takes medicine to help control her behavior. The only people that new where her medicine was Cody’s mom and Kristie, Sara’s mom. Somehow some of Sara’s medicine disappeared. At first my aunt accused Cody and me of taking it, but we denied the accusations.
The family argued over who took it and in the end everyone left that night still angry and confused on who stole the medicine. I later had found out that Cody had told his grandma that I was the one who took the medicine because I wanted to sell it. I couldn’t believe that Cody had told her that. I didn’t want to believe it. I was angry, confused, and hurt all at the same time and for a teenage girl that was a lot to handle. My aunt went around telling everyone that I was a drug dealer and a pill head. Not many people believed her but some did.
My family looked at me in discussed as I pleaded and denied what she had said. Being angry and confused, I started spending a lot of my time at the youth Methodist church I attended. I spent many Wednesday nights and Sunday mornings there teaching and leading the youth service groups. After those many days I had come to realize that the words that my pastor had once told me were true. “You should always forgive someone but never forget the pain they have caused you. ” She had opened my eyes to see that no matter what my aunt may have said about me, I know that the people who really love me know the truth.
I had later come to find out that Cody’s mother was the one who had taken Sara’s medicine. Family might not always have each other’s back when they need each other the most. Cody has since apologized to me and we have returned to speaking terms, but things will never be the same between us. I find irony in the fact that my aunt was the one who accused me of taking the medicine when in turn she was the one who had taken them. I hope that one day she will learn from her mistakes the way I have learned from mine with the help of Pastor Dawn.
