Huyen Huynh
English 1009 K 02
Professor Sublette
October 31, 2012
1170 Words

Keep Moving Forward

My father always told me to keep moving forward whenever I made bad grades at school. I never took my father’s words to heart or paid attention when he tried to lecture me. In elementary school, I would stop working on my homework when a problem looked hard. In fact, I would ask my friend to show me the answer. At the time I did not understand the real meaning behind his words, but I was finally able to better understand through my uncle’s life threatening struggle. It began when my uncle, Huy, found out that he had a brain tumor. His doctor predicted he only had three months to live. It made my grandparents cry every night. All they could do was support him in every way possible. While they went to the temple to pray for him to get better soon, my father spent several sleepless nights worrying. My father and my uncle were like two peas in a pod ever since they were little. All my father did at home was research treatment for brain cancer. Then he called many places to find the best hospital in Vietnam to find a cure for my uncle. He booked many appointments for my uncle, even at the hospital in Ho Chi Minh, a city in Vietnam. He even took off from work to care for my uncle. Uncle Huy just wanted to give up and live at home instead of going to the hospital for medical treatment, yet his symptoms got worse day-by-day. Uncle Huy vomited at least ten times a day. Also, he had a difficult time moving his arms and legs. Uncle Huy received treatment, but his results would be the same. He figured what was the point of going again. My father told him to go to the hospital again for another treatment. It took the whole family to convince my uncle to agree to my father’s proposal. The next day, my father and uncle Huy went to the hospital in Ho Chi Minh for testing. My uncle Huy had more frequent headaches and began to lose his vision. The doctor told him that the tumors were getting bigger and there was no use for any medicine. So my father took my uncle to another hospital for radiation therapy for his brain tumor but it did not help much. All of the doctors would get my father’s hopes up and disappoint him later. Finally, the third hospital said that it was possible to treat uncle Huy, but it would be a fifty-fifty chance. My father had to use all of his savings to pay for the surgery, the hospital bill, and the medicine. The hospital bill alone was really expensive, but my father just kept thinking about success in this surgery instead of the other way around. My father looked at uncle Huy’s eyes and he asked, “Do you want to stop or keep moving forward?” Uncle Huy said, “Do I look like a quitter to you? You are the one to tell me to never give up in life. Now you asked me this nonsense.” At that moment my dad knew that uncle Huy understood what he was trying to say since the beginning of day one. Before the surgery my father told my grandparents to have faith in him. The surgery took five hours to finish. The doctor walked out with a smile on his face. He said the surgery went well, but they were not sure when my uncle would wake up. My father had to take care of my uncle alone because my grandparents were too weak. My mom could not help either because she needed to stay home to take care of my brother and me. My father stayed at the hospital for one week, but my uncle still had not woken up. The doctor said it might take months for my uncle to regain his consciousness, but my father told him that he would not give up on his brother. At that time my uncle opened his eyes and tried to move his body. Then uncle Huy whispered, “Keep moving forward.” The doctor said that, during the surgery, part of his brain got damaged, which caused a loss of memory. My father was just happy that my uncle was healthy again. After my father came back home from the city, he told me everything that happened during his