I haven't been up to writing this post until today, but I wanted to share what has been going on the last weeks with me and my family. This is difficult to write and I couldn't help but cry as I was going through these photos, but I have to share what can happen to the victims of a drunk driver.
A man decided to get drunk, got in his car, and hurt my family.
On February 3, 2021, the boys and I brought our dog Piper over to my parent's house to meet their new rescue dog Luna. Our dogs got along wonderfully and we had a long walk and a great visit. Luke, who is 16 and has a driver's learner's permit, was driving us home. Our house is only 4 miles away from my parent's house. I was in the front passenger seat, Isaac was in the back seat behind his brother, and Piper was in the back of our small SUV.
Directly in front of us was a telephone pole, and slightly to the right was a huge concrete drainage cover.
We were waiting to turn, the traffic on this small 2-lane road is always very busy. But suddenly the road cleared both ways and I remember telling Luke that it was a miracle that during 4:30 in the afternoon during a weekday it was all clear for an easy left turn.
Suddenly our car was flying through the intersection incredibly fast and I heard Piper and Isaac screaming. I turned toward Luke and he had this horrified look on his face and was trying to keep the car on the road. We flew over both lanes, over a muddy ditch, and then slammed on the other side on an embankment. Our airbags did not deploy.
When we stopped moving my first thought was that Luke had wrecked the car and I couldn't figure out why he had accelerated so quickly. I couldn't hear anything as I was in shock, looked over at the boys and they were alive, so my first thought (insane) was to get out of the car and check the damage.
I opened my door, tried to step out, and my right leg collapsed and I fell on my face in the mud. I was in shock and looked at all of the cars lined up on the road and I worried that those people in their cars were laughing at me because I was so clumsy.
I got up, in pain, and looked at the back of my car, which was gone as it was completely smashed in. Suddenly I realized that this was not just Luke going too fast and having a fender bender. I looked where the back of my car used to be and Piper, my sweet pup, was crushed in the back, alive but bloody. He wasn't crying anymore, just looking at me and panting. He was also in shock and I rubbed his head once and started screaming for help.
Then I heard screams behind me and I realized that my children were hurt. I pulled myself to the front seat and found that Isaac's legs were crushed between the front and back seats and he was screaming in pain. He had blood around his mouth and I first thought he was internally bleeding, but later I found out that he had just bit his inside lip. I asked him if he was OK and he screamed "my leg is broken, my leg is broken".
The front seat had broken and was lying on Isaac's leg and Luke was confused and in shock just sitting there. I asked Luke to try to help me get the seat off Isaac's leg but we couldn't shift anything. Meanwhile, Luke was completely out of it and kept on asking me what had happened, over and over again. I have never been so terrified in my life.
I realized I needed to call for help but my phone was somewhere under my seat. Thankfully some good samaritans had called 9-11 and within minutes the firetrucks showed up. The paramedics told me that Isaac's leg was broken, and they were going to have to use the jaws of life to cut him out of the car. They gave Isaac some pain meds. They asked my permission and I remember saying "yes, please", and that I "trusted their judgment 100%". Anything to stop my baby from being in agony. Luke and I had to get out of the car so they could cut Isaac out.
That was when I noticed the big pickup truck that hit us was not too far from us, also on the embankment. Until this moment I had not realized that we had been rear ended and that there was another car involved.
Our car went to the left of the telephone pool and his car went to the right side of the concrete drainage cover. Neither one of us crashed into anything on the other side of the road.
I finally found my phone and tried to call my husband Paul, but he was seeing a patient and didn't pick up. I called the front desk and apparently was pretty incoherent because Paul raced from work not knowing if we were all alive. He said he had never driven with so much fear in his life. The cars were backed up around the wreck and he was driving around them when a police officer tried to stop him. He told him "I am not stopping, that is my family in that car!" and he was escorted to us.
At this point I realized Luke had a bad concussion, he was wondering around asking over and over again "What happened, is everyone ok, was it my fault, who was driving, where were we going, where were we leaving, is Piper ok, etc." It was nonstop, I would answer a question, he would say "ok", and then ask it again. I was frantic, convinced that he had a brain bleed, so I was running around asking for help. A paramedic looked him over and said he was ok, he was walking around and not high risk, and that Isaac was their first priority right then.
I then asked about Piper, if they would try to get him out of the car too, and they said "Ma'am, we will take care of him, but your boys are our first priority right now". I felt like the worst mom for even asking about my dog when both my kids were so hurt, but at the same time devastated because Piper was a member of our family and we loved him so much and I couldn't get his panting, scared face out of my mind.
I sat with Luke and Paul (who finally got there), crying and crying while they were cutting Isaac out of the car and loading him in the ambulance. Then I saw that they had cut Piper out of the back of the car. They pulled him out and he apparently had a broken back, because he was on the ground flopping around, trying to get up. It was horrifying, everything that was happening was horrifying. Then a Fire Marshall (later I found out he is a friend of my father) walked up with a shot gun and told me that they were going to have to use it on Piper. I completely understood, but asked if I could say goodbye. He told me it was better that I didn't and I know now he was right.
Paul told me that he heard the shots and looked over at me, but I was in so much shock over everything I didn't even hear them. I have no idea what happened to his body and I hate that I didn't get to say goodbye. Piper was a joy and he didn't deserve to die that way.
Luke and I went in one ambulance and Isaac in his own and Paul met us at the ER. Luke and I were checked out and I had deep tissue bruising and some shoulder/back pain and Luke had a bad concussion. Since there was so much intrusion in the vehicle they had to do CAT scans and X-rays on all of us. Luke and I were released that evening.
Isaac had a concussion and his femur was broken and dislocated. They had to put his leg in traction and brought him to the Houston Medical Center Children's hospital for surgery. They inserted a metal rod from his hip down to just above the knee. Paul went with him and stayed by his side 24 hours a day until he was released. I was home with Luke.
This was the before and after X-ray of Isaac's leg. I am so thankful I didn't see the "before" until they had the "after" image.
He did great.
And then my broken baby boy was sent home!
They also found my little guardian angel pin that came with my car. I bought the car used from a little old lady (true story) and I asked her if she wanted it back. She said no, it would keep me safe.
Now that pin is in my new car. I know God kept us safe, but that pin is staying in my car!
Both boys, to this day, have zero memory of the wreck. Luke remembers sitting at the stop sign, but nothing else until that night when we got home. Isaac can't remember anything that happened most of that day. He was really drugged up initially because his leg was incredibly painful. Paul sat there and cried with him. No father wants to see his 13-year-old son scream as his leg falls over to the side but his foot stays sticking up.
We had a major a/c leak under our wood floors back in Oct/Nov and are in the middle of a major forced renovation. We have no kitchen/bath/running water on the first floor, and the rest of the first floor looks like an episode of "Hoarders".
Funny, I thought this "Renovation of Hell" was one of the more stressful things I had gone through. That was before Feb. 2021 hit us.
But I had both of my boys home and we were all alive and would heal. I was still crying all of the time, thinking about what my boys were going through and that Piper was dead. But as the days passed I started feeling a little less grief and felt blessed that we were all alive. And more and more anger toward the drunk driver that hit us.
We looked him up and he had 2 previous DWI's in the last 13 months, this was his third. He was so drunk that witnesses who had been passed by him on the road with the stop sign where we were hit said he was going 50-60 miles an hour and hit our car without braking.
Our large bright red SUV with three neon yellow bumper stickers on the back asking people to "Please be Patient, Student Driver".
There were no skid marks. No wonder I felt like we were flying.
How was the drunk? Well, he was peachy keen. So wasted (he completely failed the sobriety test) that they had to hold him up to "walk" him to the police car. Paul said he was 10 feet away and could smell the alcohol on him. He is still in jail, apparently unable to pay his bond, and next month he goes to trial. They are charging him with Intoxicated Assault with Vehicle, Significant Bodily Injury. This should come with years of jail time and we hope we can make a statement. For those people who say we are going to get rich from this accident, they are wrong. He is a 50-something unemployed couch-drunk who was wasted at 4:30 in the afternoon and living with a friend in an apartment just up the road. He isn't even on the lease.
I told Luke next time he needs to get hit by a rich drunk. Maybe that joke was in bad taste, but you either laugh about it or you cry about it, and I am sick of crying.
This drunk had 2 DWI's in the last 13 months yet his car insurance sold him the minimum liability policy. At this point I don't know the extent of our medical costs, but it looks like it is going to be over a quarter of a million dollars. And Isaac might need additional surgeries and it will be a a year or two before a full recovery. And he has to have physical therapy.
That drunk's insurance is paying out $60,000 total medical and $4000 for our car. We hope to find a Texas legislator willing to sponsor a bill that would raise the auto insurance liability minima for anyone with a previous DWI conviction, so if you know of any politicians willing to work with us, please let us know.
So my active child has had to learn how slow down so he can heal.
We were then hit by the Texas extreme arctic weather disaster. It was unbelievably cold and we lost power for 24 hours. It was 10 outside and 35 inside, except our bedroom (thanks to a generator which kept it a balmy 55). We had two teenage boys in our bed and 4 rats in the bedroom in their cage.
One pipe burst in the garage, but it didn't do much damage other than deprive us of water for a few days.
Then more tragedy struck. Paul's sister Peggy, who has ALS, had her breathing assist machine's backup power fail when they lost power in Houston. She passed away, they weren't able to get to her soon enough. Her wonderful husband Leo was there with her, but no one else could be there with them because of all of the ice. Peggy was one of the most wonderful people I know. This was a horrible loss, and I blame the power grid/windmill failures in Texas for her death. Our family is heartbroken. Thankfully Leo and Peggy have two loving daughters, two grandkids, and all of the rest of the family to help Leo get through this dark time.
We don't get snow here in our part of Texas. Isaac has asked for years to go somewhere where there is snow because he wanted to play in it. So we finally had snow and we were going to get our kid out there in it. We were all so grief-ridden, and I needed to see a smile on my son's face. I had borrowed a wheelchair from my parents and we pushed Isaac around the subdivision through the snow and ice. He loved it and even made a few snowballs.
I can't tell you how much anger I felt toward that drunk because he deprived my son of having a rare snow ball fight with his family and friends.
If I start counting our sorrows of 2021 the list becomes overwhelming. So we have decided to focus on the positives, as much as we can. That drunk has hurt us, but we aren't going to let him hurt us anymore.
We survived what could have been a deadly drunk driving wreck. It really was a miracle no one was on the road in front of us, stopped at the stop sign, or crossing the street. We would have been killed. Paul would have lost his entire family in one moment.
We are so blessed to be alive.
Isaac has started physical therapy and has graduated to a cane. We call him Mr Peanut.
Our house is still a mess, but things are getting done.
Both boys appear to be mostly recovered from their concussions, but it is doubtful they will ever remember the wreck. And maybe that is a good thing? I have physically healed, but sometimes am still haunted by the memory of seeing my kids and Piper, suffering, in the car after we were hit. I have cried myself out the last weeks. It is going to take us all time to heal emotionally. But we will get there.
Life has been tough lately, but I have realized that even though horrible things happen, life goes on and things almost always get better.
And we have a new bright spot in our life! I will tell you all about Bob Hoover (in the photo above with our family) in our next post.
If you made it this far, thank you so much for reading. And please, don't ever let your friends and family drink and drive. That is why I want to tell our story; if we can stop one drunk person from getting into a car and driving it is worth it.
