The Accident

Have you ever been close to losing the person that you love most? It’s a heart wrenching feeling when you don’t know if that person will be okay, it is especially difficult as a child. I was seven years old when my mom was in a terrible accident that put her in the hospital for weeks and physical therapy for months. I will never forget the day that it happened, it’s clearer than any memory from my childhood and I know it will stick with me forever.

It was a beautiful Wednesday afternoon, the sky was clear and the grass was green. The air seemed unusually fresh because it had rained the night before; I decided that it was too nice of a day to stay inside. So I called my friends from down the street, Kelsie and Paige and told them that we needed to get off our lazy butts and go swimming. After begging my Mom to take us; bribing her with trash duty for a week and an alternate ride home, she gave in. She mentioned that she needed gas anyway and instead of waiting like she was going to, she would grab gas while she was out.

My mom dropped me and my friends off first because the pool was on the way to the gas station. I was so excited to swim that I never even said goodbye or I love you to her before we ran inside. By mid-day the sun was beating down on our backs and the pool was so full that it was hard to walk around let alone swim. Thankfully, Kelsie and Paige’s mom had showed up just in time to save us from the crowd, we were ready to leave. When we got back to their house, the message machine was beaming. “We have to get you home immediately,” Leslie said. I knew then in the pit of my stomach that something was wrong.

I opened the car door and was running inside before Leslie had even parked the car. When I walked inside my house, it smelled like homemade banana bread like it was fresh out of the oven, little did I know that it was the last time my house smelled like that for a while. My older brother Tom was waiting for me in the living room. He looked so different, I had never seen him like this, distraught and worried. All he told me was that Mom was hurt and we needed to get in the car and go see her. Not knowing what was going on, I hopped into his beat up old Ranger and we drove off. He didn’t say a word on the way there. I remember looking over at him and seeing tears roll down his sun burned face, I had never seen my brother cry before. He became a real person to me that day, with real emotions.

The car ride on the way to the hospital was the longest in my life, waiting in anticipation of what happened. Walking into the lobby of the hospital was so surreal that it almost felt like a dream, I was so anxious that I was shaking. After checking to see which room she was in we went into the elevator and rode it up. I remember thinking that the music in the elevator was horrible, and unnecessary. The closer that I got to her room the more I started to shake. The last hallway was pure white, not a painting on the wall and smelled like hospital food. It seemed so long but after turning the last corner I saw my entire family. Aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents were lined up staring at my reaction.

When I walked into my mom’s room for the first time, I felt as if a train had just hit me. Tubes were in and out of her arms, chest and nose. Her right leg was posted up and in a huge cast, and she was being held together by rods. She was black and blue; my first reaction was that she was dead. I couldn’t breathe and began crying uncontrollably. Immediately I ran into my brother’s arms and didn’t let go. My dad decided that it wasn’t good for me to stay at the hospital for too long, so my brothers and I went home with my Aunt and her family, and my dad stayed with my mom. I remember kicking and screaming all the way out down to the garage. I wanted so badly to stay with my parents, and more than ever to hug my mom and smell her favorite perfume, Lilac. Aunt Candy decided that it would be better to grab our own things from the house to make us feel more at home at her place. I stuffed my clothes together; a pillow and sleeping bag, then I snuck into my mom’s room, took her perfume and sprayed it on my pillow. It was all that I knew to do to give me a piece of her.

That night I pleaded with my Aunt Candy to tell me what happened, I didn’t want her to sugar coat it for me all I wanted was the truth. She told me that my mom went to the corner gas station to fill up her tank, after doing so she decided to get a car wash. When she pulled up to put her code in, she thought she had put it in park but instead she put it in reverse. She took her foot off the brake and put one foot out of the van, and before she could pull herself back in the van she was dragged twenty feet backwards and she finally let go. The paramedics said that if she didn’t let go of the van door when she did, the door would have snapped off and crushed her. She had forty stitches in her right shin, broke her pelvis in three places, and had horrible road rash and bruising all over her body. She was lucky to be alive. I had a new appreciation for my Aunt that night because she was honest with me like I was an adult and could handle it.

However, over the week that I stayed there I thought a lot about that day. I began to replay every event in my mind, like if I had never pushed her to take me swimming then she wouldn’t have gone to get gas. Or if I would have gone with her, nothing would’ve happened; I would have noticed that it wasn’t in park. I was only able to see my mom twice that week. It was hard to look at her, she looked broken to me. It was hard for her to move and talk because she was still pretty swollen. But every time before I left her bed I was sure to say I love you.

I went home the week after, I couldn’t keep missing school so my Grandma Mary decided that we needed her help and she would stay with us until Mom got better. She was released from the hospital almost a month after the accident. I realized after she moved in that my Grandma had a coldness about her that made life at home hard to live with. My brothers were always gone at their friend’s, Mom couldn’t leave her room and my dad had to take on extra hours to keep up with the bills. I remember feeling really empty and alone, I would just sit in my room and watch TV waiting for time to pass.

One night I really wanted to eat dinner with my mom; I always had to be so proper with my grandma at the table, and she always made me eat my vegetables. All I needed was a little laughter and comfort with my mom. But it was against the rules, when my Grandma caught me sneaking upstairs, she took me downstairs and yelled at me. She told me that if I wanted to see her better then I had to let her rest and leave her alone. It broke my heart, and I resented Grandma Mary for years after.

My Mom began to get better after a few months of physical therapy. She had to walk with either crutches, a four wheeled walker or be pushed in a wheelchair. She usually chose the walker, unless it was a rainy day and her pelvis hurt. Her shin was almost healed completely after a few months, I used to trace her scar with my fingers, and always joke that it looks like an upside down “Y.”

Even though my mom was finally better, I still had serious problems leaving her. I dreaded school everyday and would cry to stay home with her. I didn’t want to let her out of my sight, and made everyone’s life miserable fighting for it. For a while after, I couldn’t stay at my friend’s house overnight because of the fear that something was going to happen. Not only did this hurt my friendships, it was also detrimental to my emotional well-being. The memory of this accident haunted me for years. At this point in my life I have gotten over the fear of leaving my mom, but the reality of almost losing the person that I love most will stay with me forever.