We are THAT family!!

I have a 6 page paper, an edit on a 3 page and two classmates papers I need to workshop all due in two days, so needless to say...I chose to write in my blog!

I recently came across a blog that I love. It has amazing stories, advice and neat links and is found here, www.wearethatfamily.com I love the title of their blog, "We are THAT family". She goes on to describe THAT family as the ones with the black cloud following them around! Hey...I'm pretty sure WE are THAT family too!

So I shall now give you yet ANOTHER example of why we are THAT family!

This past Sunday was a beautiful day here. Sunny, a little cool but comfortable and an excellent day for a picnic at the lake! After church we stopped back at home and loaded the car up with chairs, blankets, books, a cooler and the kids bikes and headed off to Pollock Pines and Jenkinson Lake!

We had driven by this awesome lake before but never had been there for the day. I was SOOO excited to sit by the water, read a book and watch the boys fish. We found a great spot, parked and unloaded the car. Our "spot" was down a good sized hill but had trails all the way down. So we loaded up our hands, told the boys to get their bikes but stay on the trails and we headed off! The below picture is from where we were parked! Our destination was the water way down below. Isn't it beautiful!


We were there all of 20 minutes when Austin came back up the hill like this...


Staying on the trails proved too difficult (if not impossible) for Austin. The last words yelled excitedly out of his mouth as he took off on his bike were, "I'm going to BOMB this hill!".

The next words from both Matt's and my mouth were, "BRAKES...BRAKES.....HIT YOUR BRAKES....TURN BUDDY, TUUUUURRRRRRRRRRRRRNNNN!" And there he went, flying down the hill, crashing through plants and never getting the brakes to slow him down. At the end of this hill is a 5 foot tall break-water with large rocks that separates the beach area from the trail. Austin hit the large rocks at the break-water and he and his bike flew about 20 feet to where he landed on the rocky beach.

After witnessing our son flying through the air at a high rate of speed we both dropped our stuff and ran...leaving Ryland to catch up. (That little boy is a champ, along the way down the hill he grabbed a bag of potato chips and found his way to us, where he sat on a rock eating chips!)

The scariest thing was not hearing Austin, he was silent. Matt beat me there, but when I was just about there he began screaming. He had lost consciousness and had no idea who Matt was, he was slurring his speech and outright screaming. Matt held his head still while I tried to look him over.

He kept screaming that he needed help and that he hurt everywhere. He continued to ask what happened, where he was and how he got so hurt. His face was hit on the right side and he was complaining of wrist pain. Matt and I continued to look him over and knew we were going to need some help. Some very nice people had come to help and we had them contact the Ranger, who then called for Medics.


It was so nice to have the Fire Dept. and Medics arrive, I knew that he was getting appropriate help. They were very concerned by his severe mechanism of injury and the fact that he was still very confused, he didn't know where he was, what the day or year was or how he got in this situation. The Medic decided he was going to skip our local hospital and they were going to take Austin to UC Davis Children's Hospital in Sacramento, due to his trauma. They briefly considered to airlift him, but he was completely stable, so they decided to go by ground.

The very nice people who came to help continued to help us and loaded everything we had (which was strewn all over the hillside) back up to our car. The Fire Dept. loaded Austin in the ambulance and Matt rode with him. Initially they said they were going to go at normal speeds and that I may follow them down, but once they got all set up to go they changed their minds. I could no longer follow them and they went with lights and sirens all the way down to Sacramento. Ryland and I went straight to Sacramento. I called my family, told them what had happened and asked for them to meet me there.

Family is awesome...they all dropped what they were doing and showed up to the E.R. before the ambulance got there and obviously before I got there. It was so nice to pull into the E.R. and have my sister take my car and Ryland and everyone else there to help!


Austin had a CT scan of his head done and X-rays of his arms, shoulders, neck and head; he had urine analysis and 2 separate blood screenings done. Everything came back clear, (Thank God!) They wanted to observe Austin for awhile and encouraged him to eat. (All of these tests and reports took about 6 hours or so) He was able to eat a few crackers and drink some juice, but then he became very nauseous and they had to give him some medication for the nausea. At that point they decided to take a CT scan of his abdomen, which also came back clear! This entire time Austin had a roaring headache that he rated a 10 out of 10 on their pain scale. After all of the tests came back clear they were able to give him Tylenol which helped his pain.


Austin escaped any serious injuries or broken bones and was diagnosed with a concussion. A severe concussion, but it could have been so much worse! The Medics said more than once that his helmet really saved him! And I'm grateful his favorite drink is milk!

Today, 2 days later he is still suffering some serious side-effects of his concussion (which the Dr's. say is normal and could last weeks). He is very nauseous most of the time, has a headache that comes and goes, is sleepy, groggy and confused a bit and is having very restless sleep. He is having a challenging time right now.

He saw his Dr. again today for a check-up and she said as long as things don't get any worse he should be fine, and that he should start to get better over time. The Dr. has him out of school until his headaches are completely gone and he is able to eat without getting nauseous. He can't participate in anything recreational or mentally stimulating until a week after all of his symptoms are gone.

He gets a new helmet though! Although right now he doesn't even want to talk about riding his bike!

We are busy thanking God for allowing Austin to make it through this trial with very little injury! And we are praying that he recovers quickly, starts feeling better and is able to return to normal 6 year old things soon!

I want to thank everyone who has sent well wishes, phone calls and to my family who dropped everything to help us on Sunday!