Hospital visits and halos 7/2/04

Well, I am just back. After seeing our dear friend, and it was hard, I went to a little league (11 year old district semi-final) game where my presence was expected. At the hospital, both boys started crying as soon as they saw each other. It was the first time either of them have cried (as far as we moms know). She and I stopped ourselves, and I sat through the game with a lump in my throat, unable to think about anything but this beautiful young man in such pain. We had a nice visit, an hour, and are going back tomorrow from 1-2 so that his mom can keep a previous lunch engagement, then she's joining us at the hospital and we're going to go look at the car. He's on a bipap machine to help him breathe, and he hasn't been eating much because of the mask. He just needed a little nudging though, and we managed to get some tomato soup and some sprite in him. He's asked for banana popsicles and sour patch kids, which we're taking tomorrow. When his chest x-rays improve enough to take him off of the bipap, he'll be moved out of ICU and perhaps to another hospital. He has apparent complete use of his arms and we did much hand-holding. He has stitches everywhere (arm, legs, ear, head), and of course, the halo bolted into his skull in four places, over his ears and his eyebrows. It's a formidable device, with cranks and levers and posts, and it's holding his head sort of cocked back, haltered to his shoulders with hard plastic padded by lambswool. He had a terrifying blood-crusted butterfly bandage covering a cut on his throat which moved with his visibly beating pulse. His mom says that the car impacted the pole on the passenger side right behind the front seat, driving the exterior wall 4 ft. into the car. I can't believe we still have these boys. I'm pretty shaken. I remain astonished that these two boys were in the same accident, that my son is walking around barely scathed and his friend is so seriously injured, especially considering that the primary impact was on the passenger side of the car. I feel blessed, and lucky and grateful and amazed. Again I give thanks to God.