Ellies story (Part 1)

I have thought about writing this post many times, most people know the story so it is more for record keeping than anything else.

It's funny to me how life changing, sad stories start with "It was just a normal Wednesday" or " On _________ day our lives were changed forever" I always thought these beginnings were added in movies to  get your attention, honestly I was always flippant about them I would joke about them. When something life changing does happen you tend to think about what you did that day, how normal everything was, you went on with your daily routine, chores, and errands, there was never a moment in your day that you even had an inkling that something would go terribly wrong, that the next day wouldn't be a normal day, that you would be fighting for someone's life.

December 19th, 2012 was our day. Dana had taken a couple of days off of work so we could get all the Christmas shopping done together before the kids were out of school for break. We took the kids to school and planned the rest of our day. We picked Ellie up from pre-school and ran our errands, we got everything done early and had enough time to treat Ellie to lunch. After lunch we got the kids from school and headed home, just like we normally would. Once home I got the baby down for a nap and set to work on the cinnamon rolls we were taking to a potluck  for Kaleb's scout troupe. Everything was fine, my rolls were rising, Dana was on the phone and all the kids were cutting out snowflakes at the table. Maeley woke up I sat down to feed her and a few minutes later we heard a loud noise, it wasn't a loud crash like you would think, honestly I wasn't really alarmed at first, but like most parents do I paused and waited for the dreaded scream of pain or the "I'm ok" moment. Ellie did cry but it sounded weird and muffled, I asked Dane to go check on her something didn't sound right, before he could get up Kaleb jumped up from the table quickly said "it's ok, I'll check on her" he ran to the room and came out in a panic, that's when we new without a doubt the situation was serious.

Dana rushed into the room and got the t.v. off of her. I got into the room just a minute or so later, Ellie had clothes in her hand so we figured she was climbing the dresser to get some clothes and the dresser and t.v. fell, the dresser was stopped by a plastic tote but the t.v. kept going. Immediately I tried to get Ellie to respond but she didn't she just kept crying with her eyes closed, then she started going in and out of consciousness. In this moment I knew something was wrong, but I just didn't know what to do my first thought was to call my mom, once I told her what was going on she calmly told me to call 911 that she had a bad head injury, I relayed the message to Dane as I was talking to my mom, within seconds he was on the phone and just minutes later there was a policeman at the door. I want to mention that while I was talking with my mom Dane ran and got his oil and gave Ellie a blessing. Just minutes after the police officer arrived the fire-department showed up they took over and honestly I don't remember much after that.

 I talked with the officer and a fireman about what happened, they asked me how long it had been when I looked at the clock it had only been about 10 mins since the accident happened and within that time they had her ready to be transported, it happened at 4:30 they had her in the ambulance by 4:45. A helicopter had been called but couldn't find a safe place to land,  they put her in an ambulance and got her to the nearest hospital with a helipad the helicopter was waiting. At first we were told she was being taken to Phoenix Children's Hospital but for some reason in mid flight that changed and she was taken to Maricopa Medical Center. We made arrangements for the older kids once they were dropped off we headed for the hospital, it was about 2 hrs after the accident that we finally arrived.

Once we found our way to the PICU we were met by the neurologist, he explained that Ellie looked better than he had expected upon arrival but she was in a partial coma and CT scans showed her to have left frontal lobe subarachnoid hemorrhage with compression of the cisternal spaces, in short she had a bleed on her brain and she had a lot of swelling which was putting a lot of pressure on her brain. We were then told the best (and really only) option was to have the Dr.  place and EVD in her head to drain the fluid and watch her ICP's, we were told the first 3 days were going to be "touch and go", if the pressures got high enough they would have to remove part of her skull (which they would be able to put back later) to allow the swelling a place to go.

 I can't really express through words how heavy our hearts were after the Dr. left us alone with our thoughts.Dana and I knelt, prayed, and cried together while waiting for Ellie to be out of surgery. The accident happened at 4:30 p.m. we finally got to see Ellie around 11 p.m., since we had the baby with us we weren't able to go see her together, they took me back first I kept trying to prepare myself for what I was going to see, I knew it was going to be bad, but I kept telling myself I needed to be strong for her. I held my breath as they pulled back the curtain, she looked so tiny, she was very pale and her head was 3 times as big as it should be, her little face was so bruised. I had a hard time believing this was my baby girl, that just a few hours before she was a happy go lucky 3 yr old. I was barely aware of the nurse telling me what all the monitors were and what her levels were, the thing I remember most was just thinking that I just wanted to climb into the bed and hold her and make everything better, but that wasn't possible. I held her hand for and bit and talked to her, I told her about all those that were praying for her and that we knew she was was a fighter, I begged her to keep fighting, I told her how much I loved her, how much her family loved her and how much we wanted her to stay with us.

Dana had a few minutes with her before they had to take her for another CT scan. Once Dane and I were back together we cried and prayed some more. The baby wasn't doing well so I decided to take her home around midnight, I didn't know how to feel when I drove the hr home. I had to pull over a couple of times because I couldn't see the road through the tears, once the tears stopped the numbness set in. I went through the motions of getting the baby to bed, I just laid on the bed and starred into space not knowing what to think or feel. I was grateful when my sis Chrissy called, I don't remember much of the conversation, but the encouragement and support I felt helped me to be able to get some sleep.

Ok I think I will stop here, and continue the rest in the other post along with pictures, most of the pictures I already shared on FB but this is just a warning for those faint of heart, who haven't seen them.