Memories I don't want to last

The guilt I live with

My father had been smoking for 45 years in November of 2015. In that point in his life he'd had 2 strokes caused by smoking. I'd decided enough was enough and I cared about my father too much to let him slowly kill himself. Around the beginning of November in 2015, my dad claimed he had stopped smoking. My whole family knew this was a lie. He just wouldn't smoke indoors. Everyday he would go for at least 3 "walks" in which he went to the other side of the neighborhood out of our sight and smoked. One day I decided to follow him, this was around mid November, and I found him on the corner of the street begging for cigarettes and smoking them. How pathetic. He couldn't even have the decency to buy his fucking own. Immediately I went up to him and took the cigarette out of his mouth and called him a liar. Not soon after that, we were fighting. Things escalated quickly. He told me he wished he had never had me, and I told him I'd hope he'd go to the hospital and suffer and not be able to move or eat or breathe on his own, because of him smoking. At the time I didn't actually mean what I said, I didn't believe what I said. I was angry, he was angry, he would forgive me, right? I still don't know if he forgave me, or if he even remembers the incident at all. But two weeks after our fight, he had a stroke. Cigarettes raised his blood pressure, again. At first we thought it wasn't a serious stroke. He could still talk and walk, barely. His speech was slurred and he could barely move his legs, but that's normal with a stroke, he'll get better soon! Right? Not right. He got progressively worse, until the point where he was suffering and he couldn't move or eat or breathe on his own. I spent my Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, and multiple other holidays in a hospital. And I still hate myself every day because of it. I live with this guilt, this weight on my shoulders, and I'm sure he does too. I know that it is IMPOSSIBLE that I cause his strokes. Scientifically it's impossible, unless I put him under enough stress, which I'm sure I didn't, not two weeks later. But somehow, someway I still believe it was partially my fault. Karma is a bitch. Karma is a real fucking bitch. I still think everyday of the "what if's." Like, what if I hadn't said what I said? What if he'd actually made an effort to stop smoking? What if we didn't fight? What if he was still at home with me? What if I didn't have to make hospital visits every week? The list goes on and on. This, ladies and gentlemen, is the guilt I live with.