I don’t do strong very well. I have never been good at being the strong person. At times I can be then and there, but later I fall to pieces. What happens when I don’t have Rich there to hold the pieces together? He’s the strong one and my comfort.
I woke up yesterday morning to the news that Richard had “had a bit of a bingle with a car” while tiding to work. Bit of a bingle? He ended up in hospital in the emergency department after being taken there by ambulance! He will be fine but it’s still not the way I like to be woken up. His dad’s message was that he had broken his wrist and was concussed and that they would be keeping him in observation for a few hours. So I got up and had the quickest shower ever, a piece of toast and jumped in the car and went to find my boy.
I had no idea what state I’d find him in. I expected to be taking him home in a few hours so was thinking he’d be sitting up in bed with pain relief while he waited for his wrist to be done. What I found was a shock. When they brought him back from x-ray, he was lying on the bed, with a neck brace on (as a precaution)and his face didn’t look too pretty. He was awake and happy to hear my voice (as I was talking to his mum on the phone). All I wanted to do was give him a big hug and I felt like I didn’t know where I could touch him.
We waited around the hospital all day, with me moving the car every two hours )in a bid not to get a parking ticket!). As he wasn’t going to be able to see an orthopedic surgeon until the following day, they were going to reset his wrist a bit to take away some of the pain. His parents had found a highly recommended hand/wrist surgeon and had organised for Richard to see him the next morning and he’d operate on him that afternoon. So after they reset his arm, we were waiting around to be discharged so I could take my poor tired, hungry and sore boy home. We were eventually discharged just after 8:30 last night.
Which brings us to now. It’s almost 4am and I feel so lonely. I have my boy in bed with me but I’ve never felt so alone. I don’t feel as though I can cuddle up to him and that’s all I want to do. So instead I’m downstairs in the dark, crying my eyes out and typing my heart out in an attempt to clear my head and then try and get some sleep. The seriousness of today scares me and my biggest fear is losing him and all the things we have planned. As I went back to sleep this morning after he’d left for work, that was the thought that was in my head, ‘the only thing I hate about him riding to work is that it increases his chances of being in an accident’. Little did I know one has already happened….and reasonably close to home.
Richard was riding down one of the side streets to get to the bike path when there was a car driving very slowly. So he overtook them on the right (as you do) when they spotted the street they wanted to turn right into and did so without indicating. They hit Richard before they reached the street. He remembers the car coming towards him, and then he was out for a few mins (not sure how long exactly – possibly 6-8) and remembers waking up when the ambos were there. What’s so stupid is that if he had of overtaken them on the left (illegally) he would have been fine!
What scares me the most is that these are all the injuries he has received from when he was hit by a car that was going slowly….I’m terrified to think of what he might have been like if they were going faster. I’m trying to not go there, but the mind does what it does. From what we can work out from the information we’ve seen in the TAC claim form, it possibly looks like the driver didn’t stop? We’ll have to see what the police report says. How the hell could you hit someone like that and just drive off? It makes me so mad and scared.
So, I don’t know if any of this is helping me ‘debrief’ from today’s events. Time will tell. I do know that I haven’t really been sleeping tonight and so I thought I’d come down and write about it in an effort to get it all out of my head. I have another day of being strong ahead of me tomorrow. We go and see the hand surgeon at 11, and from there Richard will be admitted to hospital and operated on that afternoon. More fun and games and waiting I’m sure.
The main thing is that Richard is fine (although a little sore) and so am I. I’m exhausted (which explains some of the tears) but fine. I will be strong again tomorrow because that is what is required. But look out on the weekend mum and dad – I’ll be wanting some hugs!