Walgreens Manager Says 'Go Take Care of Your Son' When Crying Mother Can't Pay for Prescriptions
In the midst of great emotional trauma, even though we often want things to pause just for a moment so we can process or grieve, life demands that we press on. Bills need to be paid, children need to be fed and prescriptions need to be filled.
Although those tasks can be difficult to do while carrying around so much emotional weight, it sometimes provides the opportunity for people around us to bless us in small but meaningful ways. It’s something that a North Carolina mother experienced this week after her 19-year-old son was shot and rushed to the hospital.
Emoni Hardy’s teenage son drove to Raleigh after he finished work to visit his older sister. According to reports, he saw an argument that ultimately ended with him being shot in the shoulder.
When Hardy found out, her heart immediately dropped as she faced a reality that no parent ever wants to face.
She told WTVD, “I’m just like hysterical, don’t know what to do, didn’t know what to grab, and I just ran out the door.”
Hardy frantically made her way to the emergency room where her son was being treated. She wasn’t able to see him right away, but once she was able to see him some of her worries were eased.
“He was laying the bed with the thing on his neck but he was talking,” she recalled. “He was moving, so I was kind of at ease a little but still was scared. Didn’t know if he was going to be paralyzed or anything.”
Later, after the medical staff at the hospital cleared Hardy’s son to go home, Hardy made sure that he was settled before driving to the nearby Walgreens to pick up his prescriptions.
After giving the pharmacy tech her name, she sat down to wait for the prescriptions to be filled.
It was in this moment, when her momentum finally slowed, that the heavy emotions of the day hit her all at once. It was a visibly emotional moment for her, which prompted some employees to console her.
Once the prescriptions had been filled, however, she realized that the $60 she had pulled out of the ATM on the way to drugstore was missing. Not being able to pay for the medicine only added to the weight of the day.
“When I got ready to pay the money was gone. I don’t know if I dropped it in the process of leaving out of here, going to the Walgreens. I don’t know what happened,” she said.
She called her brother and asked if he would come and pay for the medicine, but before he arrived one empathic manager approached her.
“She said, ‘It doesn’t matter. Go take care of your son.'” Hardy said. “You know she was like, ‘We have kids. I have a son and I understand. I feel your pain.'”
The kind act came at the perfect time for Hardy as she exhausted from the events of the day. She cried again and said she was overwhelmed by thankfulness.
The manager’s actions show how much we are able to positively impact someone’s life by showing compassion.
Hardy added, “God placed those people at that moment, at that time.”
Liftable, a brand of The Western Journal, has reached out to Hardy for comment but has not yet received a response. We will update this article if and when we do.
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