In just moments

Sometimes it take time to process tragedies & major upheavals of your life. I am finally at a place where I can talk & share publicly what happened to Samuel &, as an extension, our family. These posts will reflect the date around when the information & procedures took place.

Samuel is our 2 year old. He’s funny, quirky, full of life & quite spoiled by his siblings. It’s amazing how your world can change in just moments.

It was Wednesday, September 23, 2015. It began as any normal day, with the children doing school at the table & I was nursing Elisha in the living room on the couch. The FedEx delivery truck pulled into the driveway, as it often does, & the older children unlocked the screen door as they rushed out to see, as they often do too. I thought nothing of it, for I could see them out the window.

All of a sudden, I heard Samuel screaming. It was one of those pain screams, so I quickly looked out the window. As I did, my hear stopped. I saw Malachi pulling Samuel out from under the front of the delivery truck, trying to get him to stand. I quickly gave Elisha to Grace as I hurried out the door. Maacah got to him first & carried him to the porch, where she handed him to me. Once I was inside, I looked at his back & I saw the tire tracks across the small of his back as well has scrapped skin down his left thigh. I carried him to Adam’s kitchen & I said “The Fedex truck just backed over Samuel”. I then had the idea to look in his diaper. I laid him down & he began to scream louder, so I picked him back up. But I knew I had to see what was there, so I laid him back down anyway, pulled his diaper away & saw lots of blood. I knew at that moment that this is bad.

We have a volunteer EMT service here in Crandon, so I made the decision to call my mother to take us to the hospital. Adam had a function for lunch that day, so he had to stay. My sister in law came to stay with the children while Adam has to be gone & she got to our house just a few minutes before my mother came. Grace came with us, for I was still nursing Elisha & I needed someone else to help with him. I was doing okay until we got in the car & I looked at his face. I didn’t know what was wrong. I didn’t know if he was going to survive. I pleaded & cried with Jesus on that journey. I begged Him to allow me to keep Samuel.

We got to the hospital in about 15 minutes (it’s a 40 minute drive…ahem). Thankfully, we had the clarity of mind to call ahead, so they were expecting us. All hell seemed to break loose once we got there! I laid him on the gurney & was quickly escorted to a chair, where I helplessly watched as they “worked” on him. I felt fairly calm, but perhaps there was an expression on my face that prompted the hospital Chaplin to escort me to a private waiting room.  Either that, or they knew it was about to get even crazier & it was best all around for me to not be there, just in case I freaked out on them or something (freaking out is not in my nature, but they didn’t know this & it was for the better anyway).

It’s a bit of a blur, all the things that happened & what was said. I remember being grateful that I was still nursing Elisha, for that at least was a constant & familiar thing. We waited in that room, talking about what had happened, trying to make sense of it all. Or maybe we didn’t really talk much at all, keeping our thoughts to ourselves, letting silence dominant the atmosphere. I remember both, so both must have occurred.

After what seemed like ages, the dr.’s came in and told us that they thought his lung had been punctured (it hadn’t), which is why his blood pressure kept falling, that perhaps his left leg was broken, maybe his ribs, and a slew of other things that they just didn’t know about. They were at first going to send him to Marshfield, but his trauma was too high, so to Milwaukee he went. It was a big, blue helicopter that came for him. By that time, he was fully sedated & not aware of anything, including his pain & fear. We followed him out to the helicopter pad & watched as they loaded him up, with the nurses & pilots. The weight of helplessness was unreal, as those big blades started rotating, going faster & faster, pulling at that giant machine. The roar of the blades getting louder with each second, whipping up the dust around us, blowing everything not tied down around to it’s own fancy.

I felt so small, as my son flew away without me. As we watched that helicopter get smaller & smaller, until it could be seen no more. It was there that I knew what I had to do. I had to let him go. I couldn’t keep him. As I have done with all his siblings, I gave him to God before he was born, knowing that each of my children was “on loan” to me & that I was not their true owner.

I gave Samuel to God.