When we set out on this adventure, the intention from the
very beginning was the biggest DIY project we had taken on. My husband and his dad love working together,
and so much of this has really been their project. My father-in-law has played the role of
general contractor on most of the things we have hired out and has spent more
time on the site than the rest of us.
Change of plans now…
The kids say prayers every night at bedtime and almost
always ask the Lord to cover and protect anyone working on our house—Dad,
Grandpa, me, friends, and any hired workers.
They also worry that Grandpa works too hard and needs to slow down. This week, gravity forced him to slow down.
While moving the scaffolding with the help of a worker who
has been out here a few times, Grandpa decided not to wait to hand off a
section of scaffolding support and to toss it to the ground instead. The area was clear so he let it go. It, however, did not let him go. Some piece of it caught on his glove and took
him down, 15 feet, right along with it.
I was inside working on the computer and heard something metal
fall. It sounded like a ladder. Many would jump at the sound, but I hear
construction stuff going on all day long; I generally wait to hear voices after
something falls so I know everyone is okay.
This time, something told me to get up to investigate the sound. Before I was even out of my chair, Jose was
banging on my window gesturing for me to come quickly. I flew to the entry way, through on my boots
(no time to put on socks) and ran out the front door while hollering for my son
to grab my phone anticipating the dialing of 911 based on Jose’s expression.
When I turned the corner of the house, I saw my father-in-law
motionless on the ground and all the worst images rushed into my head. This may have been the most terrifying moment
of my life. I immediately started crying
out to the Lord and praying that Grandpa was alive, although he did not look to
have much life in him at the moment. By
the time I reached him, I breathed a huge sigh of relief to at least hear him
moaning—he wasn’t dead. Now, to assess
the situation. Thankfully, I tend to
keep a cool head in emergencies. I
checked for obvious head injuries—there were none, his brains were all still in
his head. I looked for anything on which
he might be impaled—nothing. I looked
for open fractures—nothing apparent. I
did see blood, but I had not yet determined its source. Then he started to move more and regain a
little more consciousness, and I ran all the options for emergency care through
my head.
Somewhere during that time, my 13-year-old son brought me my
phone. I know he was terrified. I could see it all over his face. (He really came through for me that day and
became my 13-year-old hero, staying calm, keeping his younger sisters away from
the scene and taking charge at the house after I left with Grandpa.) As I assessed Grandpa’s condition, I also
assessed how long I thought it would take an ambulance to get to the house
after I called 911 and they located our rural address. I also assessed if there was any way Jose and
I could safely get him into the truck and drive him to the emergency room myself. Then, I had to decide whether to take him to
our local ER or drive 30 minutes into the suburbs where the ER might be a
little better.
[When we considered this property, we considered many
factors. Not the least of which was its
proximity to a freeway with direct access to the bustling suburbs with their
many shopping facilities as well as medical centers nor the fact that just
across the freeway and one mile down was our small rural hospital. Several locals had informed me that the ER
here is good, you just don’t want to go there for major surgery—head into the
suburbs or the main medical center for those things.]
He started moving more and began talking and asking to be
moved into the shade (for some reason, he got really hot). (He told me later that he remembered me
yelling at him to be still. I’m fairly
certain I just used my stern mom/teacher voice, but whatever worked to get him
to be still is fine with me.) He appeared to have landed on his left side, and
once he moved, I figured out where the blood was coming from. Somewhere between the top of the scaffolding
and the ground, his left leg had violently collided with something that had
torn him up pretty badly. It was a nasty
gash, although more of a deep rip. By
this time, my girls were nearby and I called for my 11-year-old, the future vet
with a strong stomach, to bring me some towels to wrap his leg and help control
the bleeding. She quickly ran inside and
returned with two bathroom hand towels and, as she handed them to me, leaned
over to get a good look at Grandpa’s wound.
(That’s my girl…)
Since he was moving and did not appear to have a significant
back or neck injury (amazingly enough), I decided Jose and I could get him into
a vehicle. I did take a brief second to
assess whether I wanted to take him in his truck or my car and decided that,
since his truck was closer and I didn’t really want blood in mine, we would
take his. The keys were in the cup
holder. My son moved some boards out of
the way so I could get the truck as close to him as possible. Once I pulled up the truck, Jose and I helped
him climb in and get him buckled and we were on our way to our local ER. Now, I had to call my husband and
mother-in-law, which thankfully went pretty well.
Our local ER is no trauma center, but I have never been in
an emergency room where the patient was taken to CT and X-ray within 5 minutes
of coming through the door. Therein lies
the blessing of the quiet rural town. My
father-in-law was one of three patients being seen at the time and given that
his condition appeared serious, he got priority. They took him to get checked out while I got
him checked in and my mother-in-law arrived.
Long story short, it ended up being a lot better than it
could have been. He ended up getting
transferred to a major facility in the city due to trauma caused to his
lung. He had fractured three transverse
vertebrae and had a terrible laceration on his left thigh. We immediately sent out text messages, phone calls
and emails to family, friends, church groups, etc. to start sending out prayers
for his condition. Prayers were answered
quickly too! When he arrived at the
major trauma center in town, his lung was no longer an issue (at the local ER,
he was having serious pain in his chest and they had clearly seen a small
pneumothorax). Praise the Lord, for
healing him quickly!! They did take him
to surgery to repair his leg and kept him a couple of nights for observation.
Now home and recovering, this has been a wake-up call for
him to slow down—the harsh realization that he is no longer 25 years old. It also means that my husband’s primary build
team is down from 2 to 1, so we are going to be hiring out a little more than
we had intended. That’s a small price to
pay and of much less of a concern than Grandpa’s recovery though.
The “cement board”
was screwed down on top of a layer of vinyl flooring circa
1970-something. The vinyl flooring was
on top of a layer of linoleum circa 1960.
The linoleum was on top of another layer of linoleum from 1947, which
sat on top of a layer of newspaper—including The Houston Post—from February
1947. I’m guessing this newspaper served
the same purpose for the floors as the feed sack did for the walls. I must admit, this was a pretty cool
discovery—dusty, like everything else right now, but really, really cool!
