I have a friend named Ginny.

Ginny is one of the nicest, sweetest people I've ever met. You know the type of girl who refuses to stop smiling and exaggerates all of her emotions to the extreme? Similar to the stereotypical anime main character, except less helpless? I suppose that you could say, out of everyone in the school, I would least expect her to be the least sad.

But, I was wrong.

Because we live at a boarding school in the US, Ginny had no way to communicate with her family (who all live in China) other than through the internet or phone. About three weeks ago, her father and grandparents had stopped answering her calls. At first, her mother told her "your father is too busy" or "his phone is off." And because the means of communication at our school are rather limited (particularly with time differences), it made sense at first. But, as fourteen days passed and excuses began to pile up on top of each other, it became more obvious that something was off. She forced her mother to tell her what was wrong.

Ginny held in the burden for three days, because she didn't know how to express it. But then, one night after study hall, when she was practicing piano, she just burst out into tears.

Ginny's father, an overweight yet still healthy and happy man, had a heart attack.

He's been in a coma for over three weeks, and has yet to wake up. Her mother, whom I commend for being so strong, had been carrying the weight all alone for obvious reasons (she didn't want her daughter to be upset by the news).

"A coma rarely lasts more than 2 to 4 weeks. But a persistent vegetative state may last for years. Some people may never wake up from a coma."

Some people never wake up from a coma. The uncertainty associated with waiting is the worst part.

How could this happen to such a nice girl? Especially right before Christmas?

Seeing Ginny - the girl who's always so energetic - crying, just broke my heart. And just thinking about it makes my heart start to break all over again.

I have an extremely difficult time dealing with emotions, whether they belong to me or other people. Whenever someone breaks down in front of me, I have to narrate in my head exactly what to do and how to present myself ("Okay, Christine, frown now. Not too much. Furrow your eyebrows.") I never really noticed that I did this until that moment, and it made me think about how terrible I am when it comes to comforting others. When I feel sad, I tend to close myself in rather than expressing it (if that makes any sense). Which leades me to the next current tragedy.

Sorry this blog post is a bit all over the place, but it's something that I need to write off the top of my head. I don't even know if I'll be able to read over for spelling mistakes.

My aunt has cancer; it started off as stage three lung cancer, and then spread to her brain.

"Christine, I wanted to live longer than this. I want to see you get married, you know? I want to live and see those kids Brianna and Aja get married too."

"I'm just so mad at myself. I can't believe I kept destroying my health, even when everyone was telling me to stop."

While she said these things, she was holding onto my hand with all of her strength. And I didn't react. I couldn't react. All I could do was narrate in my head and remind myself to look half as upset as I felt.

I don't know if writing this made me feel better or worse, but here we go