A Tale Of Transformation

  THE REST OF the day, for Ann, was like walking in the fog at night. She knew doctors and nurses were talking to her. She made decisions, but what were they?

  The emergency room was filled with people of all ages, in various stages of need. Illnesses with fevers, runny noses, coughing, and chests filled with congestion waited for help and medication. Accident victims with broken bones, cuts, abrasion, trauma and pulled muscles, from crushed cars, sport injuries or activities gone wrong, lined the walls. Even an attempted suicide by a 16 year old, whose boyfriend had left her, lay in an emergency room next door. She had taken all the pills she could find in her mother’s medication cabinet, trying to end her life.

  Voices surrounded Ann, hemming her in and yet she felt isolated, alone as she stood uncertainly in the crowded room.

  An emergency room nurse handed her forms to sign for admitting Matthew into emergency surgery. Handing the forms back to the nurse, she looked up to see them working on her son in a small room across the hall.

  Oh, how she wanted to be there to hold his hand. Through tear-filled eyes she saw them wheel Matthew away in a cluster of nurses, doctors, and equipment heading swiftly through double doors into the bowels of the building.

  A nurse’s aide approached her.

  “Mrs. Henderson?” he asked.

  “Yes,” Ann heard her voice answer him from somewhere far away.

  “I’m going to take you to the waiting area near the surgery,” he said. “Please follow me.”

  Ann nodded in agreement, following the man down the clean, polished floors, through several doors, and into the elevator that took her to the fifth floor.

  Dazed and in some shock, she entered a small waiting room filled with a few couches, chairs, tables, magazines, and nondescript art on the walls. Windows lined the south side, overlooking the city below. Snow-crested mountains loomed in the distance. A few people sat in small clusters, waiting to hear news about someone they cared for, about someone they loved.

  Before he left, the nurse’s aide informed her that Dr. Mead would speak to her in this room, as soon as he got out of surgery. Ann couldn’t remember if he said anything else. She sank into the couch, numbness encasing her body as she closed her eyes for a second.

  The image of the accident came sharply into focus. She shook her head to dispel it, trying not to remember. Not yet, not now. She wasn’t ready.

  Oh, Matthew, my baby boy, my son! She cried out in her soul, as tears filled her eyes. She tried to think of something else, just for a second, just for a brief pause in the chaos that engulfed her. Trembling she thought, Where is my faith, my hope, my trust in God?

  Abruptly she thought… Marty! Oh, Marty… I’ve forgotten all about you! Someone has to pick you up from school today! With tears in her eyes, an ache in her heart, she got her cell phone out and dialed her best friend.

  “Hi Ann. What’s up? Aren’t you coming to work today?” asked Shelly in a joyful voice.

  “Oh, Shelly…,” sobbed Ann, “Matthew has been in an accident!”

  Silence emanated from the phone for a breath or two. “What happened?” she asked with dread in her voice.

  “Sean kidnapped Matthew right in front of the daycare center. I couldn’t believe my eyes.” Ann choked it out in between the sobs. “I just stood there, doing nothing while he grabbed my son and ran to his car. He sped out of the parking lot like a madman, weaving in and out of traffic. I called the police right away and they were able to catch up to him very quickly, but… ” Ann’s voice broke off in heartbroken sobs as she remembered the crumpled car and her little boy inside. Finally she got hold of herself when she heard Shelly softly calling her name.

  “Ann?” Shelly’s voice sounded frightened and broken too.

  “Sean crashed into a utility pole!” she exclaimed, “They had to cut Matthew out of the car with the ‘Jaws of Life’! And I could do nothing but sit there and watch,” she sobbed again.

  “Is Matthew badly hurt?” Shelly asked with dismay in her voice.

  “I’m so scared that he is, Shell. They wouldn’t let me ride with him in the ambulance and the police officer told me that he wasn’t wearing a seat belt. Oh, why didn’t Sean make sure he was safe?” she cried with hysteria bubbling in her voice.

  “Didn’t they let you see him in the emergency room?” Shelly sounded shattered.

  “No, he was rushed into emergency surgery as soon as he got here!” she exclaimed, “He’s in the operating room now. And, Shell… Sean’s dead.” Ann’s voice trailed off as she thought again how unreal it all seemed.

  “Oh, Ann…,” said Shelly painfully, with a small sob in her voice.

  “Shell, can you pick up Marty for me from school this afternoon?”

  “Of course. Don’t worry about her. She can stay with us until you figure out what needs to be done,” Shelly offered with an emotional tremor in her voice.

  “What am I going to tell Marty?” she asked her friend in anguish and the tears.

  Shelly suggested, “When I pick her up, I’ll tell her that Matthew got hurt today. That he needed to see a doctor to help make him well, and that you’re with him to make sure he’s okay. Is that what you want me to tell her?”

  “I guess so. She has to know that he’s been hurt, but don’t tell her too much, will you? I don’t know myself his condition and I don’t want to scare her. And don’t tell her about her daddy. I need to find a way to tell her.”

  “Ann, don’t worry. We’ll take care of Marty on this end. I’ll work it out, don’t worry. Call me later, when you have more news, okay? I’m so, so sorry about Matthew. You know how much we both love him,” she added tearfully.

  They said their good-byes. Ann pressed the “End” button on her cell phone and flipped it closed with a soft snap.

  Closing her eyes, the thought to call Pastor Henry came to her. I need to put this on the prayer chain! Why didn’t I think of this before! Oh, Lord, please forgive me. This is all so overwhelming… her thoughts trailed off as she dialed his number.

  Pastor Henry answered and soon he and Tiffany were by her side. Ann knew things were talked about and comfort was offered, but it didn’t make much difference to her at the time.

  Sometime after noon, a doctor came into the waiting room.

  “Mrs. Henderson?” he asked, looking around for Matthew’s mother.

  “I’m here,” Ann answered jumping to her feet. “How is he?” she asked trying to keep her emotions in check.

  “Mrs. Henderson, I’m Dr. Mead, the head emergency room surgeon,” he informed her. “Matthew is still with us, but he’s in critical condition, I’m sorry to say,” he said firmly but with compassion in his eyes.

  “Oh, no,” Ann sobbed, her hands flying to her face, tears forming.

  “He was admitted into the emergency room surgery with severe head trauma, a broken right arm and leg, and internal bleeding. We have been able to stop the bleeding and have stabilized his arm and leg, but the head trauma is very serious. We’re doing everything we can for him. He will be watched around the clock. He’s on his way now to the Intensive Care Unit. His vital signs are stable for the moment, but head trauma is very hard to predict or control. Swelling on the brain is the most dangerous thing to deal with in these situations,” he told her in his professional voice.

  Ann stood silently, tears falling to the floor as she listened to the painful words.

  “We’ll know more in the next couple of hours,” he told her gently. “I’m sorry. I wish I had better news for you.”

  With an ashen face she asked in a husky voice, “Can I see him?” her eyes begging, tears still falling.

  “We’ll let you see him as soon as we can, but not for a while yet,” he answered. “He’s heavily sedated and needs constant observation for now. We’ll contact you here, with any updates on his condition. I’m truly sorry, Mrs. Henderson. We’re doing our best to help him survive,” he said heavily, and then he turned and left the room.


  Ann numbly sat down with a heavy thud, tears gently rolling down her face. “Please, Lord, oh please save my little boy,” she begged softly to herself.

  Her friends prayed with her and tried to comfort her, but she was lost in such a dark hole.

  A few hours later, Pastor Henry and Tiffany had to leave. They gave her a big hug and prayed before they left.

  Pastor Henry told her, “Don’t give up hope, Ann. You know God loves you and Matthew. We all want him to survive and get well. There is always hope that God will grant our petition as long as little Matt is here with us. We must never lose hope in a God that loves us,” he offered.

  “I know,” she said, but her heart wasn’t in her words. She wanted her little boy back to the way he was just a few hours ago!

  “Someone from church will be here if we can’t come,” Pastor Henry promised. “We’ll keep in touch. I want you to know you aren’t alone in this,” he said with conviction.

  Numbly, Ann knew they had left the waiting room. Sitting down on the couch again, in the corner of the room, she curled up into a ball, holding her legs with her arms and lowered her head to pray. Before long she dozed. The day had been so long, so stressful, and so painful.

  Late in the afternoon, Shelly and Jim brought Marty and a few things from the apartment, to the hospital. They found Ann in the room of waiting. That room where everyone waited. Waiting… Oh, how hard it was to wait.

  At the sound of Marty’s voice, Ann looked up to see her daughter’s face. Unfolding and getting up from the couch, she knelt down to hug the little girl who flew into her arms. They both held each other for a while, silent tears streaming down their faces.

  “How is Matt doing?” asked the Fergusons together when Ann got to her feet, holding Marty in her arms, sitting on the couch again.

  “He has been hurt very badly,” she said as Marty listened to every word.

  “Is Matt going to be okay?” asked Marty. “Can he come home?”

  Ann wanted to say “Yes, of course,” but she couldn’t. Instead, she answered, “I don’t know, honey. He was hurt very badly in the accident. The doctors are doing their best to make him well. I hope and pray he can come home soon.”

  “Can I go see him?” Marty asked eagerly.

  “Not right now, sweetheart. The doctors want to keep him quiet for now and he’s resting.”

  “I’ll be good. I’ll be very quiet,” she begged with large liquid green eyes, so much like her brother’s.

  “Oh, I know you would, sweetie, but the doctors won’t let anyone in to see him, right now.” Ann said sorrowfully. “I hope I can see him soon myself, but I have to wait until the doctors tell me I can.”

  Marty thought for a second, “Okay. Will you give him a hug for me when you see him?” she asked with a sad but brave face.

  “You bet I will, sweetheart,” her mother replied as she gave her a big, soft hug.

  “I don’t want him to go away too,” Marty whispered softly.

  Ann almost didn’t hear it. Tears started to reflect in Ann’s eyes as she realized how much her daughter had suffered with her daddy going away, and now maybe little Matt too.

  She hugged her again, and with her lips in Marty’s hair softly responded, “We all want him to stay, sweetheart. We mustn’t give up hope.”

  Shelly sat in the chair watching Ann with her daughter. She wanted to know more about Matthew’s condition, what the doctors had said, but she knew Ann didn’t want to talk about it in front of Marty. When Ann looked up, their eyes met and Shelly mouthed, “I’ll call you later, okay?” Ann nodded agreement.

  “Ann, do you need me to do anything? Is there anything I can do at all?” asked Jim with a husky voice. You could see pain in his eyes. Ann ached to make it go away, to somehow make it go away for all of them.

  “No, Jim. I can’t think of anything right now. But, I’ll let you know if I do need something,” she told him.

  For the next hour or so, Ann sat on the couch with her daughter snuggled in her lap. Shelly and Ann talked of work, of the simple things in life, anything to ease the strain of what they were feeling. Jim sat silently, listening to the two women softly talking, looking for a chance to be of use to either of them if the occasion arose. Ann still looked at the clock on the wall quite often and wondered how Matthew was doing. The time for visiting was coming to an end.

  “Do you mind keeping Marty overnight?” she asked them.

  “Of course not, Ann,” Jim responded with a warm smile. Shelly nodded in agreement. “We have our guest room all made up for her,” he replied.

  It was time to go. Shelly stood up, along with Jim, as they came to stand beside her.

  With Marty still in her lap, Ann looked down at her daughter and softly said, “I want you to go home now with Aunt Shelly and Uncle Jim. They’re going to look after you while I stay here with Matthew. We’ll see each other tomorrow, okay?”

  Marty didn’t say a thing, but reached up and hugged her mother hard. She didn’t want to leave. She didn’t want to be brave. But she would do it, somehow.

  “Love you, Mommy,” she said as she jumped to the floor.

  “Love you, sweetie,” her mother responded as she slowly let go of her daughter’s hand, the fingertips the last to touch and the arms still stretching out toward each other for a brief second.

  Marty joined the Fergusons. Jim and Shelly said good-bye and each gave Ann a fond embrace. Then they were gone.

  Ann sat there in the empty room, realizing how much her spirits had been lifted. She appreciated her good friends, but the love she had for her little girl, their time together, had pulled her out of that dark hole a little. She mustn’t forget Marty in all of this. Marty needed her as much as Matthew did.

  Day turned to night. All was still and quiet. Sitting in the room of waiting, she prayed. She prayed with all of her heart. Ann was now alone in that room, waiting on God for his answers to her prayers.

  A nurse appeared, offering her a chance to see Matthew for the first time. Jumping to her feet, Ann followed the nurse into that part of the hospital that fought to save life the most, the ICU. As they walked down the hall on clean, polished floors, she listened to their footsteps echoing along the empty corridor, magnifying the solitude and emptiness starting to take over her heart.

  They stopped in front of two large double doors, locked to outsiders, preventing admittance to the critically ill, without permission. The doors opened to the nurse, Ann softly followed down the dimly lit hallway. The atmosphere was dominated by quiet as she passed by each small room, holding a valuable life in the balance. This time of night, the rooms were dark. Soft beeps and whirring sounds drifted to her ears.

  As she walked past each room, she prayed for each life struggling to survive in that place. Deep in her heart she knew God would do what was best for them. She trusted him. And yet, when it was your own son, the spiritual can get disconnected from the physical. She couldn’t help being afraid, feeling lost and in need of strength to face what was to come.

  The nurse stopped in front of Room C-12. “You can stay for a little while. We’re making arrangements for you to stay the night nearby,” she offered.

  Ann stood in the doorway to the room that held Matthew’s broken body. She looked at the small child in the bed. A light on the wall softly lit the room. Plaster and bandages encased his bruised and swollen body, as wires and tubes connected him to machinery that strived to monitor his life. How small and fragile he looked.

  Squeezing between the wall and machines, she sat in a chair next to his bed. Gently, she reached out her hand to touch his tiny one resting on the sterile white bedding. The nurse said something, but she wasn’t sure what, something about being nearby, she thought.

  The machines produced a rhythm that reminded her of ticking clocks, marking the passage of time in gentle beeps and clicks.

  As long as that sound is here, so is Matthew, she thought profoundly. Sitting next to her son, she fell asleep listening to th
e cadence of the monitors, holding her son’s tiny hand in hers.

  With a gentle nudge from the floor nurse, Ann awoke.

  “Mrs. Henderson, your room’s ready. We need you to leave now. There’ll be tests and medications to administer quite often in the hours ahead.”

  “Please, can’t I stay with him?” she asked softly with a breaking heart. “I don’t want to leave him.”

  “I understand, but to be honest you’ll be in the way. You can help him best by letting us do our job as quickly and efficiently as possible,” replied the nurse gently. “We’ll notify you of any changes. The room is just down the hall.”

  Ann reluctantly got up and looked down at the small three-year-old in his bed. How she wanted to lean down and give him some good night kisses, but she dare not touch his face. Instead, she leaned over, took ahold of his good hand, and kissed it gently and lovingly.

  At the door, she stopped to look back at Matthew, said another prayer for her son, and then turned with a heavy heart to follow the nurse.

  Across the hall, a few doors down, stood a door marked “Personnel Only.” Walking through the door, she noticed a short hall with supplies stored on shelves and locked cupboards on either side. Among the storage on the right, a door opened into a tiny room with a single bed, with a little table and lamp.

  “Thank you, nurse,” she said softly as the nurse returned to her duties.

  This room is probably used for staff or a visiting doctor, she reasoned.

  Changing into the nightgown that Shelly brought, she jumped between the cold bed sheets, reached over and turned off the table lamp.

  Lying in the blackness of the room, in that foreign place, she thought about how fast life could change.

  Why did Sean have to take Matthew like that? she thought as she realized again that Sean could never hurt her again. He was dead, his life over. Now Sean’s parents are grieving for their only son. Do they know Matthew was in that car? That he too, was clinging to life? Dear Lord, why? she asked Him.

  Ann closed her eyes in grief, praying for God’s mercy, for Sean’s parents, her own family and especially for her little boy. He was only three-years-old. And most of all she prayed for strength to face the things that lay ahead.

  Opening her eyes, she stared into the dark, listening to the nurses talking softly out by the nursing station.

  Life is so unpredictable. How do people adjust to this kind of trauma? I’ll never get to sleep tonight… she thought, falling into a deep, dreamless slumber.

 

  The Next Day