The Accident

As many of you may already know, Ray and I were in a car accident on Saturday, June 24th.

Before I start this story, yes, the baby and the Jag are fine.

We were taking our friend, Chris, to the airport Saturday afternoon. Due to legal reasons, I can not go into the details of the accident, but I can tell you about all the fun I had at the hospital!


Shortly after the accident occurred the ambulance arrived. I was put into a neck brace, laid on a stretcher and rushed to the nearest military hospital. Inside the ambulance I tried my best to answer all the medical questions that were asked. (Note to self and others- do not attempt to say words like Sickle Cell Anemia or pregnant when your entire jaw is strapped down to a plastic board).

Suddenly, during the ride I felt a rush of warm liquid in my shorts. Complete fear and panic took over. "Oh God, I'm having a miscarriage. No, God, please, no!" The liquid was increasing. I was starting to cry. I tried to gather myself enough to tell the paramedic what I was feeling, and just when I was about to speak I heard him say, "Oh, I sorry. I got the IV bag leaking all over you. Sorry about that."

I swear, if my arms weren't tied down to that board I was ready to do some serious hurt to that fool.

While I lay there thinking of ways to cause bodily harm to the paramedic, my violent fantasies were shattered when I heard the idiot say, "Okay Mrs. Mattingly, I'm going to put your IV in now."

'Oh, no you're not!', I thought. After almost making me think I was having a miscarriage, I don't even want you breathing too close to me, let alone have you stick me with a needle.

"Hey John, keep the speed steady. I'm installing an IV."

Keep the speed steady? He must be out his mind. He better stop this thing. I have a bad enough time getting an IV when I'm in the ER and now you want me to let you stick me in a moving vehicle? Oh, you have got to be kidding me.

As I tried to move I realized that every part of my body was strapped down to the board. I couldn't even turn away when he stick the needle in. I screamed, I cried, and the bastard had the nerve to say he didn't get it on the first try and that we will have to try again.

We? We ain't trying anything. The only thing I'm trying to do is wiggle my foot free so I could kick his butt. However my attempt was foiled by another poke in the arm. I swear if he didn't get it right this time I was going to flip this entire board on to of him. The evening news would have reported it:

"A paramedic died earlier today during a routine ambulance drive after being suffocated under a black pregnant woman strapped to a board."

Lucky for him, he got the IV in correctly and what seemed like a second later, I was being wheeled into the military hospital ER.

The nurses there were very nice. My nurse, Mike was funny and really tried to make the best of a bad situation. As I was laying there waiting for the doctor the pain started to get worse. In fact it was almost unbearable. I started crying and screaming again. Mike told his assistant to grab the first doctor he sees in the hall and to drag him in to see me.

This random doctor came in and asked what was wrong. I told him I was having extreme pain in my head and his response was, "So, why are you crying?"

"Because usually extreme pain fucking hurts!!"

Yes, I'm sorry, I did curse. But at that point I was beyond polite talk and that had to be THE MOST STUPID question that I have ever heard come out of a medical professional's mouth.

luckily my actual doctor came in and took over. Before he could give me any medication he had to check my spine for injury. A group of nurses assisted in rolling me over and checking me out for spinal injury. When everything appeared fine I was removed from the board and placed on a bed. However I had to keep on the neck brace. Mike gave me some nice drugs that relieved the pain, but would not harm the baby.

I had two CT scans, two X-Rays and an ultrasound done. The nurse, Mike stayed with me for all of them. Sometime during the evening Ray and Chris came in to see me. They were quickly ushered out to get fitted with neck braces of their own until other doctors were able to give them the okay that nothing was serverly damaged.

Sometime, late in the evening the doctor removed my neck brace. Honey it was like being freed from slavery. I just wanted to get on my knees and kiss the ground. 'I's free everybody. I's free!!' Oh, it was such a relief to just be able to move my mouth and scratch my neck.

After a physical test the doctor felt I could go home without a neck brace, however, I was not going to get the cool drugs that Ray and Chris got. I was reduced to simple Tylenol for my pain.

The medicine that was given to me in the hospital really made me nauseous. Even though they gave me anti-nausea drugs, my stomach was feeling pretty bad. After seven hours in the hospital we were all tired, hurt and hungry. Since we all need to take food before taking our medication we decided to stopped at a Jack-in-the-Box on the way home. After dropping off Chris at the airport, (he still had a flight to catch), we headed home.

I love french fries, especially when I haven't eaten food for seven hours. After a long and painful day it was nice to finally be home. Ray and I dragged ourselves out of our now damaged Jag and into the house. Just as Ray opened the garage door for me to step into the house, I thrust my purse into Ray's empty hand and puked like a hero.

I managed to make it to the downstairs bathroom and continued to puke my guts out.

Now women listen up! Men may promise you the moon and the stars. They may offer you diamonds and gold and take you on trips all around the world. But when your husband is standing in the garage with a water hose at one o'clock in the morning washing your puke off the pavement, that right there is real love!