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Hello all. I wanted to thank everyone again for all their wishes and prayers. I truly feel much better now. My muscles and bones still ache but, I am able to move around more and I am heading back to school later today!
I just wanted to write a little about my experience. It will take me quite a few posts to get it all down because it is tiresome typing with my left hand (I am a righty but that wrist is broken) and it isn't very comfortable sitting in the computer chair. However, I would still like to share my memories and feelings about that day. I do plan on going into detail so if you are faint of heart you may not want to read further. So here it goes:
My dad, my sister (Laura), and I were headed to my littl sister's (Julie) state playoff game at Shippensburg University. My mom had, last minute, left the day before as a chaperone on the girl's bus. My dad and I left for Penn State to pick up Laura because she really wanted to see Julie play. It was actually a gorgeous day out side-sun shining, beautiful blue sky, and nice country road. I had the directions that said we were going on 74S.
We came up over a little hill and came down into the intersection which was slightly hidden by the hills on either side of our road. I generally pay attention to road signs when I am in the passenger seat and I can honestly say I never saw a stop sign. It was at that moment my dad and I saw the white van coming in from our left in the middle of the intersection. In just one second our lives changed forever. That is all it took. One second we are having a wonderful ride and the next we are jolted by the impact of two cars travleling at least 45mph.
I have heard countless people in accidents account their experience and one thing I remember hearing is everyone saying how all they can remember are the sounds of tires screeching, cars hitting, air bags deploying and people screaming. For me, that never happened. The last thing I remember hearing is my dad exclaiming "Oh God" and the next thing I heard was my sister screaming after our car had already stopped moving. Everything had just gone silent. It was like everything was in slow motion, yet incredibly fast. It is hard to explain, but I remember practically everything since I was concious the whole time.
Posts: 306 | Registered: Jun 2003
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Hey RackhamsRazor, glad you are feeling well enough to type. So sorry you are having to go through all this, but relieved you are still here to tell the tale. Best wishes for a speedy recovery for all of you. Don't push yourself too hard!
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Glad you're on the mend, RackhamsRazor, and that the rest of your family is okay. Were the people in the other vehicle okay also?
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((Annie)) -- I think it's good that you want to type it all out -- might kinda help in some way. I understand if you have to do it in installments.
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Good for you for getting it out. Glad you're feeling well enough to type, if only for a little while.
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I remember seeing the white van. It seemed like we were both just going so fast. I know I closed my eyes at the moment of impact and I guess that is why I can't remember what I did with my hands. Whether I pulled my hands in front of my face or my right arm slipped past the airbag and hit the dashboard, I have no clue. I felt the hit, but it is less memorable than one might think. While the car was still spinning, I opened my eyes and saw a lot of white that faded into a white smog with a background of blue sky. Then I closed them again.
The next thing that came was my sister's screams. Laura later relayed to me that she never knew it was coming and I think she was better off that way because she didn't tense up.
I opened my eyes-a little dazed by what had just happened. I turned my head towards my left shoulder and spit out a little blood onto my sweatshirt. I could feel that my face was messed up and that my lip was swollen pretty bad, but I forgot all of that when I saw my dad.
He was slumped. His head was down and he didn't respond to me when I called him. I shook his shoulder and lightly tapped his face while begging him to respond, but he made no movement. I was scared. I think that moment was probably the worst moment of my life. I started crying as I reached for his neck to feel for a pulse, and he opened his eyes and jerked his head back. I can't tell you the relief that flooded over me.
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It wasn't until my dad woke up that I noticed my own injuries. My wrist sorta hurt. I picked it up in front of me and I could tell something wasn't right. I pulled back my sweatshirt sleeve just a little and saw an uncharacteristice dip in my wrist. I knew it was broken and now it started to hurt.
I'd have to say that I was glad my sister was there because she turned into a little mother. I remember her leaning over my seat and holding/hugging my head, stroking my hair and telling me that everything was going to be ok. She was so comforting even though I knew she was scared to death.
Dad was still worrying us because he could seem to remember what happened or where we were going. He kept asking us and telling us he was sorry. My sister and I didn't really care at that moment because we were just glad we were all alive.
It was around then that I was able to turn my head a little and I saw the bottom of a van. The van had flipped on its side. I quickly asked some men who were at the scene if they were ok in the other car. He assured me they were. I then caught sight of a young mother, father and a child of no more than two standing outside the car. The baby had two red marks on its head. I jerked my eyes back to the man I questioned and he then replied "Don't worry, the baby is ok...just a few scratches on its head."
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Scary stuff - but I hope it helps writing it out.
We had a car accident in which our car got totalled about a month ago - we were absolutely fine, and it was a pretty minor accident for one that caused so much damage. But that was scary enough.
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I'm so glad everyone is okay! Cars are just dangerous! It's enough to make you decide to stick to horses and buggies. But they're just dangerous too! We should all walk from now on, you know?
I'm finding this fascinating. Please continue, as your strength and healing permit.
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There are a few things I still can't remember. I can't remember where my sunglasses were when we hit. Whether they were on my face, on my head or in the little car dish, I have no clue. I also can't remember how my seatbelt came off. I don't remember undoing it, but it is possible that is the first thing I did so I could lean over to my dad. I just remember the paramedics getting me all situated and me looking over my shoulder seeing the belt buckle next to me and wondering how it got there.
As soon as the ambulances arrived, they rushed Laura on because she had been complaining about chest pains. Before she left, I squeezed her hand to let her know I would be alright and asked her to hand me my cell phone. I knew my mom would need to know and would be worried if we hadn't called and I wasn't sure if my dad was coherent enough to remember to grab his phone.
Finally, the paramedics came over to help get me out. By now, my wrist was really hurting. It wasn't until the guy came around in the back seat to put the neck brace on that I really started to feel the pain in my shoulder area.
Unfortunately, the paramedics could not really get to me because my door wouldn't open all the way. One guy was considering jaws of life out loud when this other guy grabbed the partially open door and jammed it open. Once openned, the paramedics began cutting my sweatshirt off to get a better look at my obviously broken wrist and my painful shoulder area. He began to stabilize it while I tried getting a look at everthing around me.
The glass in front of me was the most spider-webbed. Luckily, it never broke completely. I glanced up to see the condition of the sunvisor to see if the mirror could give me an idea of how bad my face looked but it was utterly destroyed-almost like it had exploded. I remember at some point earlier seeing some firemen cut the wires to our battery because someone has said it was smoking a little, but nothing was smoking now.
One of the more mysterious observations I made was this one man standing around outside our car. I want to say he was Amish or at least Amish looking because of the dark black vest thing he was wearing. He caught my eye because, one, he was different looking and ,two, he was one of the few people that was actually looking me in the eye. He seemed genuinely concerned, but he never said a word. I remember he was also one of the people that held the board while others lifted me out of the car. Still, he was one of the only people at that time that was looking me in the eye. It was just one of the most truly mysterious things that I have ever experienced.
It was another half hour from when Laura had left before I finally got on an ambulance. From what I could gather, my dad was in the ambulance right behind me.
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ok-first I would like to say that yesterday I attempted to wean myslef off of advil and that was a bad idea. Now my shoulder/collarbone really hurts and it is really inflammed
ok..anyways:
Once on the ambulance, a cop came by to ask me a few questions before leaving. I was able to answer everthing except how fast we were going. All I could remember was the speed limit and said that we were almost surely going about that. The cop left and then my EMT, Jeremy, told me we were going to start moving and that he needed to ask me a few questions. Oddly enough, he told me that our birthdays were exactly 1 year apart...he was going to be 22 and I was going to ne 21 on March 25th.
Then it was my turn to ask a question. All I wanted to know was the time. Apparently it was 1230...just about 45 min after we crashed and I told Jeremy that it was just about the time we were supposed to be at Shippensburg. I said, "My mom is going to be really worried." Not even 2 minutes later, my phone started ringing. I knew it was my mom and I knew she would need to know. I also had no clue if anyone else remembered their cell phones so I had to be the one to tell her.
I told Jeremy that my mom needed to know and that I wanted to talk to her, but he told me to relax and that he would talk to her if I would like. He called the number back and I heard my mom answer. That is when I really started crying.
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The EMT was not very good about telling my mom what had happened. I kept trying to tell him to tell my mom that dad and Laura were ok, but he just kept telling my mom that he wasn't sure...he only knew about me and that my dad was in an ambulance behind me.
At one point I could tell my mom either dropped the phone or handed it over to someone else. Turns out it was the latter. Jeremy, the EMT, told whoever where we were headed and how to get there and that was it-my mom was coming and she at least knew what had happened.
The ride to the hospital was 20 minutes long. They wheeled me out and told me my dad was directly behind me. They put me in a room and put my dad right next to me. He told me he was ok and I told him that my wrist was broken and my shoulder hurt.
A nurse came into the room and I asked her where Laura was and if she was ok. She told me that Laura had been there for a half hour and that she was ok, but just really worried about us. She promised me that Laura would be wheeled in soon.
Meanwhile, they placed a catheter in my arm. I told the lady that I had really small and crappy veins. I will never understand why no nurse ever believes me. Every time I have ever had blood drawn or IVs placed, the nurse, no matter how good, always has a hard time. It doesn't make it any easier that I hate needles poking me. I can draw blood from animals and see catheters placed...that doesn't bother me one bit.I just don't like needles in me. Well, as you can guess, she had a difficult time getting it in my arm. They always act surprised too. It never fails that they say, "Wow, you weren't kidding."
Finally, they wheeled my sister in to our room. They put here right between my dad and I and she immediately asked how we were. Then at the same time, Laura reached her hand out and I reached out my good hand. We grabbed each other's hand and squeezed to assure each other we were ok and to let each other know it was going to be alright.
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quote: The EMT was not very good about telling my mom what had happened. I kept trying to tell him to tell my mom that dad and Laura were ok, but he just kept telling my mom that he wasn't sure...he only knew about me and that my dad was in an ambulance behind me.
I have worked on an ambulance (and my birthday is also March 25th!) -- and just let me say that even if Jeremy didn't say it the way you wanted it to be told to your mom -- he was really going above and beyond and risking some things himself because protocols don't ALLOW us to do things like this (talk to family members about condition of family members). He realized you were really upset and worried and tried to get your mom to the right place (hospital) so she could get the information from the people who had the authority to give it.
There is all kinds of liability at stake. If I tell a mom "he's going to be just fine" and then suddenly on the way to the hospital they go unexpectedly into cardiac arrest -- then there is hell to pay. You can't predict these things, so you keep the comment neutral.
I'm glad you are feeling well enough to write occassionally, and are getting these thoughts down while you still remember them all. I hope there are more segments coming.
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FG-really the only thing I wished he hadn't told my mom was that our car was totaled. I don't think that helped. However, I didn't realize that protocols didn't allow stuff like that. I guess I was just so concerned that my mom knew what had happened so she could come see us at the hospital that I never even thought about how that would affect the EMT.
Anyways, the hospital experience was not that much fun either. It seemed like it took forever for anyone to come look at me. My mom actually arrived not too long after we all got there. I don't know how she did it so fast, but the other parents from Julie's bball team were truly helpful.
I was still in my neckbrace and flat out on my back. I remember at one point the doctor came in to inspect my back. She just wanted to make sure nothing was wrong and even though I could pretty much tell nothing was wrong, they had to roll me on my left side anyways. I can tell you that this made me cry out and was very painful with the broken wrist and painful shoulder area. I yelled "ow ow ow ow ow" and answered "no no no no no no" when the doctor asked me if any of the places she was touchign on my back hurt. She even said "you wouldn't lie to me right?" to which I replied "no no no no no." Thankfully, they put me down on my back again.
The xray technicians came in to me and slipped the xray under my shoulder/neck to make sure everything was ok to take the neck brace off. This didn't feel so great either.
One of the things that was bothering me was that I had a hair-tie around my hair and it was stuck under my head in the neck brace. It was just in the wrong spot because it was pushing into my head. I tried to get my mom to see if she could see it and pull it out without moving my head but it was no use. It wasn't until much later that a nurse finally came in and helped pull it out so it wouldn't hurt anymore.
I think they must have full xrayed my dad and sister first because it seemed like hours before they finally went to really xray me.
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At this point, I had only recived some mild pain medication. I really couldn't tell, but the nurses told me that is what it was. They finally wheeled me out into the hall down to the x-ray room.
If it didn't hurt bad enough rolling me on my side to check my back, the x-rays hurt the most. I was hard to miss that my wrist was broken, but they had to twist and turn it to get the right shot. I yelled out and started crying. They continually moved my arm and lifted me up to get all their x-rays.
I remember being somewhat surprised that they had taken me off the oxygen before being x-rayed because throughout the process, I started hyperventilating. I was having a hard time breathing (gasping for breath) because I was crying so hard from all the movement and twisting. I tried to calm myslef down, but it is kinda hard when the pain you had been trying to ignore was all of a sudden brought to the surface.
The technicians were unfeeling until the end. I guess I understand because I am sure they have to put people and their broken bones in the worst possible position all the time. It didn't make it any easier though. Finally, at the end when they let my body rest, I thanked the tech and apologized for crying. She laughed and told me that it was ok and then asked if there was anything I needed. All I asked for was something to cover my freezing feet. The tech got me a pair of hospital booties, covered up my feet and then wheeled me back into the room with my family.
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Wow! I don't understand why they have to do it like that, to hurt you so much! Couldn't they give you something for the pain first? That's just wrong!
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It's important in some cases not to dull the sensation, even if the pain is really bad. Once the area is well-numbed, it becomes impossible to doublecheck that sensation from the nerves remains intact as you move it around and stuff. And if she had just been in an accident, they would worry about giving general pain medication that might make her drowsy and thus obscure a mental status exam (which, e.g., they might be checking frequently as they figured out what was going on -- so, for example, increased drowsiness might make you think of impending brainstem herniation, which is an immediately life-threatening complication).
It is horrible -- absolutely, positively horrible -- but sometimes it is necessary not to treat pain until the situation is adequately assessed. That's no excuse for either not treating it immediately as soon as you possibly can or for taking longer to get the assessment done than is absolutely necessary. But man, it is excruciating to have someone begging you for relief you cannot ethically give yet.
(*cue small violin)
I know that's nothing compared to what it's like being on the other side.
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CT, I understand. In that case, could they then show deep concern, and explain the reasons why they can't make it stop hurting, and why they must hurt her so badly? To ignore the person's anguish seems especially cruel.
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It would be much better to do so from the patient's perspective, that is for sure. It may be that some people don't bother, or perhaps that some people cannot hold that empathy day in and day out and manage to do the job. Maybe everyone has their own level of -- empathy tolerance? empathy reserves? -- and everyone would be overloaded at some point, but it just takes longer for some than others (that famed "professional distance"). I really don't know.
I do remember that at the end of residency, I found myself snapping at a medical student for asking a question while I was juggling thirty things in my head, all of which had deadlines within the next hour. (Lab values to check and deal with immediately in the ICU, phone calls to make before consulting physicians got away from the building, and so on.) I don't think I ever snapped at a patient, but there were two times when I know I responded more callously than I would have at the start of my training. And this was very out of character for me -- I would've sworn in the beginning that even if I was stretched enough to make mistakes, I would never deliberately be an ass. But I was.
I really wish that was different. It seems to happen to everyone I've met at some point, though. I hope there are people who find a way to never slip in that way, just so the rest of us can see that it can be done.
[Edited to add: I mean that sincerely. I hope that all in these professions strive to do better with this, and that we each push ourselves as much as we can to give the best care possible.]
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CT, I know that I'm asking a lot. I thought about that again early this morning, and realized that it takes a lot of spiritual fuel to be able to maintain that level of empathy all day every day. Perhaps not noticing or feeling the pain of the patients is sort of a protective mechanism for the health care workers.
My feeling / thinking about this subject is steeped very much in my own worry and guilt over what I'm doing to Drive By right now, both in terms of too much and too little intervention, as well as my experience with my Dad's long hospitalization and death a few years ago, and the episodes of callousness blended seamlessly with ignorance and misjudgment that bubbled throughout that year-long process.
I just don't know the best answer. I know it's very hard to always do the right thing, with deftness and sensitivity. Perhaps it's nearly impossible. And yet, for them to hurt her so cruelly and ignore her suffering, it just seems so wrong.
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I think in some ways it can be helpful to be thoroughly angry while in heavy pain. If nothing else, it's distracting. If you're so mad at the doctors/nurses/etc that you're fuming about that, it means you're not concentrating primarily on the pain. And since there isn't any choice about being in pain....
I think I'd rather be angry than be empathized with in those moments of weakness.
Posts: 5948 | Registered: Jun 2001
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I just wanted to tell everyone that I got my cast off today! It will be another week-10 days before I can drive again and start getting mobility in my wrist, but the doctor said it looked like I was healing nicely. So YAY for me!
Just a funny side note: Afer asking my doctor if I could drive yet he made me do a few things with my hand. I thought I was doing ok, but then he told me "well as soon as you stop making that face when you do this, then you can drive." Apparently I was wincing the whole time and I guess he caught me.
Then he asked how long it had been since the accident. He laughed and told me that it was a good Fruedian slip when I told him it was almost 4 MONTHS exactly when it had really only been 4 weeks.
Anyways..I'll get back to finishing the story soon...just trying to get caught up on all my school work.
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Awesome! Congratulations on getting your cast off. I can't wait to hear the rest of the story!
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When I got back in the room, they finally gave me some morphine. It burned a little but there was really nothing one could do about that. I wasn't really sure it was doing that much until later when the x-ray tech came back in to get one more shot of my wrist. When she picked it up that time, I was a lot more calm and it didn't hurt quite as painfully as it did before. The tech even maed a joke saying, "I see they gave you the happy drugs."
It was nice to hear from one of the nurses that their good orthopedic surgeon was going to be in the building shortly and that they were going to have him look at my wrist. It seemed likely that he was going to have to put it back together and who better to do it than an orthopedic surgeon.
The one thing that started bothering me that I hadn't really cared about before was that my face felt tight. I knew it was swollen because I could feel that. I also knew my nose was damaged up because I could sorta see the blood on the tip. My face, more or less, felt like a bad sunburn. All I really wanted was for someone to clean off my face a little. No one had even bothered to wipe the now dried blood off my face. It had been a couple hours as far as I knew. Since my mom was ok, I asked her if she could find someone for me to get the blood off. I knew it was probably hard for her to see me somewhat disfigured and I thought that maybe if the blood was wiped off, it would make everyone feel better.
Finally, the head nurse came in and told me that if she couldn't find anyne else to do it she would come in and do it herself. Shortly, she returned with a sponge and some water and began to wipe my face off. She told me to warn her if anything really hurt because she wasn't sure how deep some of the cuts were and she didn't want to make them bleed more. I told her she was just fine because the cool water felt nice and even though it wasn't great, the burning of my face wasn't anything I couldn't handle.
I would have to say that the only thing that worried me about my face in the hospital was when a doctor came in to talk about the cuts/abbrasions. She told me that there were a few places they were concerned about, mainly the bridge of my nose. There was apparently a cut that seemed like it might make a nice scar and they told me that after it healed, I could always get some plastic surgery to fix it up. Hearing the word "plastic surgery" made me wonder how bad my face really did look. I never asked for a mirror though because I was kinda glad I didn't have to look at it.
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I guess one has to give up on all privacy and humility when they are in a hospital (this is the embarrassing part of my story). I know they are used to that sort of thing, but I sure was not used to it. See, I had a little problem...I had to pee. I had been holding it for hours at the hospital because I was waiting until I could get up and walk to a bathroom. I had been hoping that it wouldn't be long before I could do that, but I was still flat on my back and my wrist was not even fixed yet.
I told the nurses and they tried to sit me up slowly by raising the gurney. Unfortunately, I got lightheaded and I could not slide my back up to match the movement of my bed. I could not pick up my shoulder to raise myself to a sitting position. I knew then that this was all going to be a lot harder than I had hoped. It wasn't that I hadn't worked hard enough because I wanted nothing more than to just sit up and move a few feet over to the toilet. I just couldn't do it.
I will tell you this...it took me a while to convince myself that I had to pee in that pan. As much as I had to go, when they told me to pee in a pan my body did not want me to do that. I soon relented and gained a little more relief.
By the way: sorry it is taking me so long to get all this out
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Wow, that sounds like the hardest part so far.
I'm glad you're telling the story. It's very interesting to me. Pray continue, at whatever pace works best for you.
Posts: 6246 | Registered: Aug 2004
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Uggg that's so horrible. Car crashes are the kind of thing that can haunt you for a long time, even small ones. I've been in two minor ones in the past four or so years, and it's the sound of them that I hate the most. The BOOM. It's so scary.
Anyways, best of luck in the healing process... Though you and your family have already been very lucky. Posts: 464 | Registered: Jul 2004
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It was sometime after that incident that I became sleepy. All I remember is my mom coming over to tell me that someone was here to see me. I opened up my eyes and my little sister was there. I had heard she won her state playoff game, but I had figured she wouldn't be able to come to the hospital because she would have to go back with the bus. Nevertheless, there she was to come see all of us.
Someone was nice enough to drive her up to the hospital so she could see how we all were. My mom had previously instructed everyone not to tell her what had happened before her game. The only thing she knew was that we were in a minor fender bender and that mom was coming to see us. I was glad she and all the other girls were not told what had happened to us because I would have been crushed if I had known that they were all too upset to play the game well.
Julie came over and squeezed my hand and said how glad she was that we were ok. She stayed for a little, but had to head out because the bus was supposed to stop somewhere and wait for her to meet them. One of her best friend's mom was going to go home with her to stay with her if she needed anything.
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It was getting late before the orthopedic sugeon showed up to fix my wrist. At first, he told me there were two ways heould put my wrist back together. One way was to numb my whole arm and set my wrist back in place and the other was to knock me out and set it back in place. I had no desire to hear my wrist bones being pushed back together and I told him that I would much rather not be awake for the process. After taking a look at my xrays, he decided the best plan of action was to knock me out.
He told me that he was going to insert novacaine (sp?) into my broken wrist and the other doctor was going to give me the sedative. He told me I would only be out for about 15 min so I wouldn't need tubes or anything and that I would definately want to be knocked out for this.
I knew having small veins would always be a problem with me. I asked the other doctor if the anethetic was going to burn. She informed me that it would burn a little, but that I would be out so fast I would hardly even notice. As soon as she started giving me the anesthetic the orthopedic surgeon grabbed my broken wrist and started putting in the novacaine.
All of a sudden my left arm bicep started burning. I yelled out "it hurts...that really burns" and the orthopedic surgeon replied with "I know your wrist hurts, but you will be out in a second." I then replied "no, my left arm...it hurts and burns." He stopped working on my wrist and said "what?" The other doctor walked over to my left arm and chekced the IV that had been placed. She told the orthopedic surgeon "I don't think she is out yet." I sorta laughed because I knew that I wasn't even feeling sleepy. She then said that the anesthetic must have leaked out of my vein and into my arm so they would have to place a new IV in my left wrist.
Of course. The person who is afraid of needles inside her just so happens to have the smallest veins ever and has to be poked more often because of it. It doesn't make my fear of needles inside me get any better.
In a short time, she finally got the new IV in and gave me the anesthetic. This time, I was out in a flash. Posts: 306 | Registered: Jun 2003
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Wow, that sounds like a nasty experience. I've been in the hospital and in surgery a couple of times, and it's never been pleasant. I guess it's kind of funny, but I always try to empathize with the hospital staff. I figure that it must be difficult for them, having to deal with hurt people all the time, having to cause people pain and discomfort sometimes in an effort to heal them. My mom still laughs at me because whenever I wake up after anesthetic, the first thing I always do is thank the doctors and nurses for taking such good care of me. I doubt I'd be able to do what they do.
Glad to hear you're doing well RackhamsRazor. Broken bones are both painful and frustrating. Keep getting better Posts: 3950 | Registered: Mar 2006
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When I woke up, my family was just walking in the door. I was a little dazed. For some reason I felt compelled to tell the doctor that I had a biochemistry test next week and I really needed to take it because I had an A in the class and I wanted to keep it. She laughed and told me that I told her all about it before my wrist was put back together and that we would just have to wait and see how I felt later. There are some strange things you do when you are being knocked out.
Finally, it was about time for me to go home. The nurses told me that they would help me to stand up and then I could leave. As the one nurse started to lift me up, pain just lept up from my shoulder. She had to resituate and try again. This time my sister, Laura, helped the nurse out by placing her hand on my back/neck and lifting me up. Amazingly, it didn't hurt as much as the first time I tried to get up. I asked my sister how she knew just where to put her hands and she told me that the nurses didn't know for her either and that the place she helped to lift me was the place she wanted the nurses to lift her earlier.
As I started to stand next to the edge of my little bed, I started to feel dizzy. I believe I just gave a running commentary on how I was feeling. I told the nurse that I felt a little dizzy. Then I told her my eyesight was dimming and fading into black. Next, I mentioned that now I couldn't see anything. At that point, they had me sit down again for a moment and brought a wheelchair in for me. They loaded me in the wheelchair and took me down the hall to the exit with my family.
Loading me in the van was horribly uncomfortable, but I managed to find a spot and I stuck to it. Luckily, our hotel was not very far away.
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![[Smile]](smile.gif)
![[Frown]](frown.gif)
![[Cry]](graemlins/cry.gif)
And yet, for them to hurt her so cruelly and ignore her suffering, it just seems so wrong.
![[The Wave]](graemlins/thewave.gif)
![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
![[Embarrassed]](redface.gif)
I soon relented and gained a little more relief.![[Sleep]](graemlins/sleep.gif)
