My Seventh ER Visit This Year

“Let’s go girls.” I said as I ushered my tiny humans out the door, tears streaming down my face, with their father on the phone in my hand and my husband holding the keys to the car in his.

My husband helped my eldest daughter, who had just face planted into the sidewalk, falling off her bike, buckle her seat belt and apply ice to her face.

While I buckled my not even 40lb 7 year old into her 5 point harness, hands trembling, sweat dripping from my forehead as I reassured her for the 10th time her sister was not going to die.

“It’s mostly her teeth. She was wearing a helmet, so her head was protected. She is going to be okay, my love, I promise.”

The four of us rode in our little Mazda the eight minute drive to our local ER which ended up taking longer as my husband instinctively drove to our clinic instead.

He had been consoling three sobbing tiny tornadoes of emotion, switching between whom he extended his hand to for comfort frequently.

I was in the front seat, replaying the scene over and over in my head, which was making me nauseous.

My youngest, who was seated behind me, was trying to hold in her tears to stay strong for her sister while facing her fear of blood.

My eldest was seated behind my husband with a bag of ice on her mouth as blood dripped down her knee, while her left pinky was swollen, red, and bloody.

She was letting out a cry that, as a mother, I hope to never hear again, while her entire body shivered from adrenaline.

Once we arrived, I ran inside ahead of my family to check in.

I was trembling as I tried to explain why we were there, then my family walked in and I was able to relax slightly knowing she was in good hands.

The day had started off with a weird energy when my alarm went off at 8:30am, starting my morning far earlier than usual.

We had to meet my ex husband, an hour and half away, to do our weekly kid drop off/pick up.

I had slept badly the night before, sweating from stress and perimenopause, so I was nauseous and exhausted.

We arrived at the park 15 minutes later than our usual time as the local kids were starting to arrive, waiting for the splash pad to open.

15 minutes later, my ex-husband and our children arrived.

While they put their things in the car, my 7 year old and I went to stretch our legs.

She clung to my arm as she told me she had really missed seeing my face.

I reminded her she could call and look at my face anytime while she is gone.

“I know. But I’m usually busy. I’m either working on my game or we are going out somewhere fun. I just don’t have time,” she said matter-of-factly.

“Fair. Well, my face is here for ya anytime you miss it.” I responded.

As we walked back to our car to start the drive back to my house, I looked over at the two men standing with my other daughter.

“Their dads,” I thought to myself with a feeling of peace coming over me as I approached them.

The memory of my youngest telling a random boy at the playground, “I have two dads!” making me smile.

Our blended family of four got into our car, turned on one of our playlists, and started the long drive home.

Upon arriving home, my husband and I took a collective sigh of relief, as we are homebodies to our core, and then we saw the notice on our front door.

The dreaded letter we thought we had avoided this month, as our rent had been paid 2 days prior, was staring us in the face compounding our off kilter morning.

We were able to confirm it was an error from a delay in the system, relieved that at least our shelter was secure for one more month.

Then lunches were made, served, and consumed, while everyone settled into their own chosen activity for the afternoon.

I decided to take the quiet time to do some writing while my kids bopped around the house doing their own thing and my husband went to get some groceries.

A couple of hours later, he was home, and I had finished the project I was working on.

So I asked my daughter if she would like to go on our walk.

She said yes, put her shoes on while I grabbed a few things we wanted to put into the free library by our house and went to get her bike and helmet from the garage.

It only took me a second to remember that she took it to her dads recently and it was still there.

For maybe 30 more seconds, I contemplated the thoughts of “Eh, just one time without a helmet won’t hurt.

She hasn’t had a bad fall before and has gotten really good at riding, so I think she’ll be fine”.

As my husband was unloading groceries, I interrupted his workflow by asking about the dilemma at hand.

He mentioned that the helmet he uses for skateboarding may fit her.

So we put it on, tightened the straps, checked it over, and both felt comfortable enough to let her proceed.

He went back inside to put away our ice cream as our daughter got on her bike, kicked the kick stand back and started to ride down our driveway as usual.

I followed right behind, only a few feet away as she turned the corner onto the sidewalk riding partially on to our neighbors yard.

I remember noticing the dent her tire left in the tall grass as I rounded the corner to my left and looked up.

The moment my eyes were on my child, she was swerving, trying to realign her bike and she lost balance.

Seconds later she fell face-first into the sidewalk.

It was like I was seeing it in slow motion, yet I could not do anything to stop it.

Gravity took over her body as she fell to the ground, head first, like her hands were pinned to her handlebars.

I saw her face hit the ground as her long blonde hair splayed around the gray helmet.

I felt like time was standing still as I saw her lift her head, and I heard the scream that echoed through our neighborhood.

My body instinctively filled with adrenaline, and I sprinted from a dead stop as fast as my legs would take me.

It felt like a lifetime to get to my baby when, realistically, she was only fifteen feet ahead of me.

The sheer panic of how badly injured she could possibly be overtook my body and brain as I started to scream and cry.

I helped lift her from the ground, then brushed the hair from her face to assess the damage quickly.

I immediately noticed blood around her mouth, and as she lifted her lips, I could see there had been extensive damage to her teeth.

I finished helping her stand as I looked up to see my husband sprinting down the sidewalk towards us.

He had just opened the garage to put the ice cream away when he heard a scream, which he recognized as our daughters.

I yelled to him to help her inside and that she “busted her head wide open,” as my youngest recalls me saying.

Once I was able to hand her over to him, I ran back to grab her bike and the items I threw as I looked down at the cement to see her blood.

There is something so profoundly traumatizing about seeing your child’s blood on pavement.

But I was also able to also feel relief that it wasn't from an injury that could have taken her from me.

And that is because of a split-second decision my husband and I made together.

Once inside, my husband was able to assess the damage further as I called her father, panicked.

He got a bag of ice for her mouth as he told me it is what his mom, a retired nurse of forty years, had told him to do if anything like this were to happen.

The irony of it all is, he had an almost identical accident at the same age, breaking off more than ¾ of his two front teeth, also requiring extensive repair.

I relayed over the phone what happened as calmly as I could to their father, while he tried to snap me back into reality to get our kid to the hospital.

Once we arrived and were able to get checked in, we were called back right away.

We were all huddled in the small triage room as the nurses took over care while my youngest was still asking if her sister was going to die.

A decision was made for them to go back to the waiting room while my oldest and I were led back to a room where the doctors and nurses swarmed.

They were all asking if she was wearing her helmet while checking her toe to head and if she had lost consciousness or exhibited signs of a concussion.

Overall, her injuries were superficial scrapes, but her adult front teeth had bilateral chips, one being very close to the root, which will require repair.

I will gladly take broken teeth over bones or worse, a broken skull though.

That night, after the kids had settled in bed and we were able to process the day's events, we looked at the helmet she had worn.

We could see where it had made an impact on the pavement.

That sight shook me to my core as I let the weight of that day consume me, sobbing in my husband's arms.

All of the what-ifs were running through my head like ticker tape.

We then took a moment to acknowledge how well we managed the 7th ER crisis in the first year we’ve been together.

While again, proving teamwork really does make the dreamwork.

Written by: Ashley Ylvisaker