Tuesday February 12th started off like any other Tuesday. Plyometrics workout in the morning, Boss wakes up and says he doesn't feel good so I keep him home but send Buster off to school and the little baby I babysit (Jackson) comes. Crate the Great and Lumber Jack eat breakfast, I shower, start laundry, and other household chores and before I know it, it's 11:30am and we head off to Heidi's house for a lunch get together with friends.
We are all hanging out at Heidi's house and 1:30pm comes around and it's time for me to leave. Jackson's mom was coming at 1:50pm to my house to pick Jackson up. I walk outside with Lumber Jack, Crate and baby Jackson along with Stacy and Caleb and I think a few of the other kids followed us out the door. The gates to the property had been shut so the kids could play in the front or backyard without worry of them going into the street.
I happend to be parked outside of the gates and across the oneway street on the dirt. As shown in the picture below.
Stacy pushed the one gate opened so I could get out to my car and so when she was ready to leave she would be able to pull her car out as it was parked inside the gate on the driveway. I put Lumber Jack down next to the car and then placed baby Jackson in the car. Then I walked around to the side of the car that has Lumber Jacks carseat and as I was buckling him up I could see out of the corner of my eye Crate and Caleb touching the gate but at that point it was still pushed back into this decorative brick post thing. I finish buckling Lumber Jack and I look down on to the floor of the van where the diaper bag was sitting and I as I'm checking to make sure my wallet and phone and everything I need are in there I have a feeling to turn around.
Let me stop here and mention a few things. First off I had just seen Crate out of the corner of my eye about 20-30 seconds prior. Second, I did not hear anything such as a scream, crash of an iron gate, NOTHING. I simply had a feeling that said turn around. This is where the miracles begin. The first miracle being that of my feeling. Back to the story...
I turn around and see Crate lying on the ground with the very top of the gate resting on the right side of his head, his head is turned to the side so that the left side of his head is on the concrete. The entire rest of the gate was lying on top of his body. The gate never hit the ground, his head only hit the ground with the gate on top of it. I think that is why I never heard a crash.
I run the 10 feet over from the car to the gate and Stacy is right there and together we lift the gate off of him.
Another pause in the story. The gate was not heavy for Stacy and I, not heavy at all. Although after talking with the fireman two week after the accident they said they went back and tried to lift it themselves and could not pick it up. Stacy and I had it standing straight up. I know we weren't the only ones holding it up, we just couldn't see with our mortal eyes who else was there. But I know there were others there.
We lift the gate up and since it didn't feel heavy at all I look down to Crate and say to him "Crate, get up." In that moment it didn't dawn on me what had just happened. I thought to myself, "this gate isn't heavy, he should jump right up." But he didn't jump right up.
As I glance down at him I see blood running down the concrete. Stacy says "pick him up I got the gate." I scoop his lifeless body up in my arms, and run with him in my arms to the car to grab my cell phone to call Pops. But I see the amount of blood and realize it's coming out of his ear, nose and mouth. This is when I realize I don't have time to look for my phone in the diaper bag so I yell out "Call 911" to which Stacy starts yelling "Call 911!" As far as I know this is about the time Aika came out and she grabbed her phone and called 911. I just went to the ground in the middle of the street on my knees held Crate in my arms and just kept saying over and over "Heavenly Father, please bless him, please bless Crate, please bless him." I must have said it 50 times or more.
Back to Stacy and the gate...she laid the gate down by herself without dropping it. Logically that would be impossible. From the moment of the accident I am sure legions of angels were at our side. She ran over to me and asked "what should I do?" to which I replied "just say a prayer." I remember her offering a prayer of protection out loud, right there.
Aika is now on the phone with 911 giving them the address of the house. Heidi hears the yelling and commotion from her backyard and comes running out. She runs back into the house and grabs a bunch of towels and brings them out to me to help catch the blood. There was a lot of blood.
The moment I picked up Crate off the ground he was unconscious. Once I'm kneeling on the ground I start calling his name and I see his eyes rolling back in his head and he starts moaning. His breathing seemed calm but really slow. Aika tells me that 911 says not to move him. I yell back "it's too late, I'm going to hold him." At this point because of all the blood I see and the way Crate was acting I think to myself "if he's going to bleed to death it's going to be in my arms not lying on the street by himself." 911 tells Aika again to tell me not to move him. I remember yelling back "I'm going to hold him."
While we are waiting for the fire truck I tell Stacy to get my phone and call Pops and tell him to come now! I remember hearing her on the phone address him as President Meryhew and I remember thinking... don't call him that, there's no time for that! She tells him Crates been in an accident and to come right away.
Another miracle is that Pops is home, with Boston, so he leaves right away. A few moments later I tell Heidi to grab my phone and call baby Jacksons mom and tell her that she needs to come to Heidi's house to pick him up right away. I then remember loosing Crates eyes and I yell to Aika "where are they?" meaning the firetruck. Aika asks the operator where they are and Aika just keeps telling me they're on their way. The wait seemed like forever.
Another miracle is that the fire station is only two miles from Heidi's house. The wait wasn't more than 4 or 5 minutes or so but it seemed like forever.
Stacy runs to the end of the street to flag them down, I hear the sirens and just keep praying out loud. I remember glancing over at Lumber Jack who is sitting in his car seat sucking his thumb with the van door open just watching it all unfold. I'm only about 5 feet from him but I felt like a world away.
The firetruck pulls up and as they get out of the truck and start coming over Crate starts shaking in my arms. I remember thinking "he's having a seizure." Then I thought no, no please, please let him be ok. They fireman immediately take him from me and place him on this little blow up stretcher, put a brace around his neck. Just then the ambulance pulls up, as well as Pops. Pops runs over to us just as they begin putting Crate in the ambulance. I say to Pops "Give him a blessing." The fireman says "we have to go now, get in the front of the ambulance we are going to Phoenix Childrens." I tell my friends to help Lumber Jack and the baby and to call Kim to go pick up Buster from school. I grab my wallet and cell phone and hop in the front of the ambulance. I tell Pops to follow us in his car and to say a prayer. Since Boss is with him he gets in the car also and we take off. We pull onto Dobbins and the sirens go on. At this point I can hear Crate still moaning for about the first two miles then he's silent.
I was so grateful to all the cars for pulling over so we could pass. I started praying for green lights and we got them. I think we only hit two red lights the entire 20-25 minute drive to the hospital.
As soon as we start going and I realize what just took place I call my moms cell phone but no one answers. I call my sister, Jennifers cell phone and she answers which is another miracle! :) I tell her I am in the ambulance and that Crate has been in a horrible accident. I tell her we're on our way to Phoenix Childrens and then I give her the names and numbers of everyone I was with so she could call them and figure out where the other kids were. Another miracle is that I rattled off all the cell phone numbers of my friends to her without even looking at my phone. I knew the Lord had blessed me with a clear mind in order to calmly give that information to her.
About 5-7 minutes into the drive I hear through the radio the fireman in the back of the ambulance talking to the hospital. I remember hearing terms like "head trauma" "trauma team is assembling" "level one trauma" I say to the the ambulance driver, are they talking about that trauma stuff for us? His reply was in the affermative. I don't know a lot of medical terminology but I knew that words like head trauma and level one were not good terms. I started praying harder. The drive yells to the fireman in the back of the ambulance to take care of the communication and he shuts off the radio up front so I couldn't hear anymore.
My mind began to race in the ambulance and I remember breathing really deep, like really really deep like I did when I was in labor so that I could remain calm.
I looked in the side mirror and I could see Pops right on the tail of the ambulance. I prayed for his safety in driving.
Let me back up a moment. From the time I initially picked up Crate in my arms off the driveway I was calm. I knew everything was going to be ok. I really did.
It wasn't until I sat in the ambulance and realized I didn't know what "ok" meant. I still knew in the end it would all be "ok." I realized "ok" at this point could mean saying goodbye to Crate in this mortal life. But I was completely comforted in the fact that I would know that, that is what "ok" meant and we would get through it. My prayers turned from asking the Lord to bless him to be ok to asking the Lord that if it was His will to take Crate home with Him, that we would let me say goodbye. I remember pleading to allow Crate to live long enough to make it to the hospital so that I could hold him in my arms one more time. I begged the Lord to let me kiss his warm body and tell him I loved him, and let his brothers and Pops see him and touch him one last time. I told the Lord I didn't want him to pass in the back of the ambulance while I sat in the front not knowing. I needed to hold him once more. I remember ending my prayer saying "not my will but thine be done." I knew at this point is was in God's hands.
Crate was silent, the radio was silent, I just sat there watching car after car pull over as we raced by. I remember saying silently to each car "thank you, thank you."
As I watched the buildings go by and the cars move to the side I thought "their lives are going on just like normal, do they know what's happening? Do they know about Crate? Do they know who is in this ambulance?" I prayed again that the Lord would keep him alive until I could hold him one more time.
The fireman pokes his head through this little window that separates the back of the ambulance to the front of the ambulance and asks me if Crate is allergic to anything. I relied no. I then ask him if he's ok? His reply was "he's the same." I didn't exactly know what that meant. I asked again if he was ok. He said "he's breathing." I then asked if he was going to be ok and the fireman's reply was "pray."
Still not a sound from Crate.
