Slippery Steps and Flip Flops

I mentioned in an earlier post that I had injured myself while I was in Arizona. The last day we were there (our anniversary) I had just taken Gabe to work and was ready to spend a fun-filled day with Preston at the mall and in the pool. We had walked outside and up the stairs to the lobby to eat our yummy breakfast. On the way back down those same concrete stairs Preston was flailing around his bib and all of a sudden it happened. Before I knew it I was on my back and Preston was screaming, scary... I know.

My first instinct was to call him down so I jumped up to get him to stop crying but didn't get very far. By then a cleaning lady came up and said she would help me to my room but when I tried to take a step I started getting really dizzy and felt like I was going to pass out so I went back to the stairs to sit down for a minute and every time I got up started blacking out again. Luckily by then Preston had calmed down and wasn't hurt at all so the lady was holding him for me. I had a horrible aching, sharp pain in my back and couldn't move. A nice hotel guest and former policeman called Gabe for me and he got a ride over from work and the hotel decided to call an ambulance to transport me to the hospital. The hotel people treated me really well because they didn't want us to sue them I think, but the truth is I just slipped on my flip-flop. Pretty sad, huh?

It was the strangest sensation to lay there perfectly conscious with people acting like I wasn't there at all. When the paramedics arrived they were asking everyone around me what happened and would completely ignore me when I tried to answer. The story started out with me falling down 3 or 4 stairs (the real version) and ended up with me falling down 5 or 6. The really frustrating part is that they spelled my name wrong so I had to wait forever to get any medicine in the hospital because they had to wait until it was fixed... and my bills are all coming with my name spelled incorrectly.

As a precaution, since I had injured my back, I had to be put on a stretcher with a thing on my neck and couldn't move at all, even when I needed to scratch my itchy leg, let me tell you, that was torture. The one thing I'm really upset about is the fact that my camera was right there in my bag the entire time but I didn't even get the chance to ask Gabe to take a picture of me on the stretcher, you have to admit that would've been pretty cool. Oh well. You can just imagine this is me, except with blonder hair and slightly more fashionable clothes.

Anyway, After the ride in a freezing cold ambulance (they had the air all the way up!) and an itchy leg with nobody to scratch it, we made it to the hospital and as soon as they fixed the spelling of my name gave me some medication and then did some x-rays to make sure nothing was broken. Luckily nothing was, even though it felt like it. The verdict is that I had deep contusions and bruises (I think that's what they called it). In real language my muscles and nerves were all messed up, and are still almost a month later trying to heal, but much better. They couldn't do anything for me other than give me an ice pack, muscle relaxers, and a strong pain reliever needless to say the airplane ride the next day wasn't the best day of my life.

I really was lucky though, and am grateful for all the friends and family who helped me in my time of need while we were still in Arizona and when we got home and Gabe had to go back to work. I don't know what I would have done without them. Gabe's cousin Courtney who lives in Mesa was nice enough to drive up and take care of Preston for a little while when Gabe came to pick me up and took me to get my prescriptions. The poor little guy wasn't allowed in my room in the ER and went over 12 hours without nursing, but was able to live off of solid food for that long. It was kind of nice to feel like I was missed when he started crying for me right when I walked through that door. Even when I was done feeding him he was clinging to me and I was loving it because he never does that! I just hope we don't have to go through anything like that again. :)