12 Days: Family copes after cancer takes father

ALAMO — The doting father didn’t recognize his kids when they crawled into bed to tell him, “Happy Father’s Day.”

A physician had diagnosed Herminio Garza’s recent splitting headaches as bad migraines only two weeks before. But with his headaches now coinciding with memory loss, Garza spent his holiday at the hospital.

He would undergo surgery the next day to remove a tumor from the left side of his brain. Then there were two more surgeries, each briefly followed by a period where Garza was his old self before the aggressive cancer kicked back harder than before.

On July 26, his wife of 20 years, Elvia Garza, and his oldest daughter, 19-year-old Anahid, cried by his bed when doctors told them there was nothing more they could do.

His family pulled Herminio’s life support. The 42-year-old died about 30 minutes later, a month after Father’s Day.

In the time since the death of the family’s patriarch, the devastated mother has pulled her family together.

Her husband brought in the family’s income cutting lawns, so Elvia took up work cleaning houses to make ends meet. When the house the family rented for three years was sold this fall, Elvia found a smaller one for her family on the other side of town.

And when Thanksgiving arrived without her husband’s presence, she said, she tried to be strong for her four children even though she was just as devastated by the loss of a father who was always there until he couldn’t be.

“I miss him because we would never be alone” on holidays, she said as her eyes welled up with tears. “We’re in a house without a man.”

BALLGAMES

The family portraits that decorate nearly every inch of the living room wall each have their own story to tell.

Here’s an older photograph of Herminio with his two youngest daughters, Nohely and Aneth, who both wear white dresses to their first communion ceremony. There’s a photograph from May where Herminio has his arm around Anahid in her green high school graduation gown.

In another, Herminio and Elvia celebrate an anniversary together with the broad smiles of a happy couple.

Elvia met Herminio through his sister and quickly married him at 21. Anahid was born a year later, the child he grew the closest to despite initially wanting his first to be a boy.

Three more children followed with Herminio devoting himself to his fatherly duties when he wasn’t working to provide for his family.

His children remember him as the popular dad at school, easily joking with the security guards and showing up to all their sporting events. He regularly bought Gatorade for the entire team before Anahid’s softball and basketball games.

When Herminio Jr. hit an inside-the-park-home run in little league, his father took him to Mr. Gatti’s to celebrate.

Anahid said her father always told them to never give up and that he would always support them.

“He was always there whenever we needed him,” Anahid said. “He never missed a game.”

QUIET HOLIDAY

Outside the screen door at the Garza house, expressway traffic speeds toward points unknown.

Inside the house, life is slow-paced this night. Elvia, 42, rests on the couch after a long day at work. Her children sit nearby in the tiny living room with a small Christmas tree tucked in the corner.

Herminio Jr., 15, who is working on a mustache like his father used to have, drives his mother to work on his way to school at PSJA Memorial, where he is a sophomore. Her youngest daughters, Nohely, 11, and Aneth, 9, return home from Bowie Elementary in the afternoons, where an aunt watches them until Elvia returns from work.

The small house is new to the Garzas. They moved there a month ago when the house they shared with their father was sold by a landlord.

Elvia takes her family by the old neighborhood to visit the friends she misses. She doesn’t miss the old house, which reminds her of Herminio.

She doesn’t know what she and her children will do for Christmas. Herminio used to plan the holiday, where they would pop fireworks and sing together.

For Christmas, Elvia wants whatever her kids want. She won’t be able to afford gifts this year.

Her two youngest both say they want a Nintendo DSi. Pressed, Herminio Jr. says he could use a computer to complete schoolwork.

And Anahid just wants a present for her mother. She’s talked with her brother about buying a heart-shaped necklace, where they’ll put a picture of her children on one side a photograph of her late husband on the other.

“We’ll find a way to get her one,” Herminio Jr. said.

THINGS TOGETHER

Some memories are stronger than others.

The one Elvia remembers most is when she was pregnant with her first child. When Herminio returned from work each day, he always placed his head next to her pregnant belly to listen for the baby.

His daughter kicked the most when he was around.

She’s not sure what the first Christmas will be like without her husband. But she’s thankful for the 20 years they had together and the four kids he left her.

“Todo,” she said tearfully when asked what she misses most about Herminio. Everything.

---

Jared Janes covers Hidalgo County government, Edinburg and general assignments for The Monitor. He can be reached at (956) 683-4424.