Jess and I went over to see my mom, my sister, my cousin from Vermont, my brother, his wife, my nephew, and my two neices. Around 6:30pm, my brother and his family left. 10 minutes later, he called to say he’d been in an accident and that an ambulence had been called. Jess, my sister and I drove to meet him. There was a triple rear-end accident with my brother at the front of it all. My nephew (13 years old or so) and my neice (almost 2) were being put into an ambulence with their mother riding with them. My brother and my other neice (6 months) rode back to my mom’s house with me. My brother was going to borrow my mom’s car to get to the hospital and then, eventually, home.
However, by the time we got back to my mom’s house my brother’s elbow had swolen and he complained that he couldn’t move it. He was anxious, however, to make sure his family was okay. So, with my sister and Jess following my brother and I in my mom’s car, we drove out to the Children’s hospital in Fort Worth. Jess went in to check on them while my sister waited in the lobby. My brother and I walked across the street to the other hospital to get his arm looked at.
They gave him a shot of morphine when he first got there, which made him quite loopy. Then the took x-rays, determined that it wasn’t broken, fitted him with a splint, prescribed him vicodin for the pain and discharged him. This took about three hours. I know that ERs care for more critical patients first, and I fully understand that. However, no ambulences arrived, and very few new patients arrived during the time we were there. Three hours seemed to be quite a long time to look at an x-ray and fit a splint. Then again, I have no clue how an ER works, how many doctors were on staff to handle non-critical patients, or any of that. I’m grateful that he received care and that his injuries were minor.
My brother isn’t exactly the best patient in the world. He’s quite whiny, doesn’t provide all the information he should, and can be quite rude at times. Couple this with the morphine and he was a real pain in the ass. I’m very thankful that everyone at Harris Methodist that worked with him was very friendly, very polite, and very patient. The only exception to this would be the doctor. He was very direct and nearly unwilling to deal with my brother’s attitude or questions. He spent as little time as possible speaking to us, and, on several ocassions, we had to have the nurses track him down because we hadn’t had our questions answered or our concerns addressed and the nurses couldn’t assist us.
After he was discharged we walked back to the Children’s hospital. My nephew seemed to be fine with only seat-belt bruises across his chest. His x-ray showed that nothing was broken and they were merely waiting on the results of his urine test to discharge him. My neice was also fine, it seemed. However, they wanted a urine sample from her as well, which meant that they just had to wait until she was ready to go.
About an hour later, they discharged them both. My neice was perfectly fine, and my nephew had only the bruises on his chest. My brother decided he wanted to go back to my mom’s house to see his daughter, so, back into the cars we went getting back to my mom’s house around midnight.
Shortly thereafter, Jess and I began the 1 hour drive home. It was misting out enough that visibility was poor and the roads were very slick. Despite the 55mph speed limit on most of the roads we travelled on, I almost never went over 45. About half way home a police officer made a quick U-turn got up on my ass flipped his lights on and pulled me over.
As he approached me, he used his flashlight to look through the trash in the back of my truck. Then he told me that he had pulled me over because my license plate light was out. Apparently having a messy truck and your windows cracked open when it’s raining means that you’re on some form of narcotics because I was asked more than three times in regard to whether I had any such drugs in my vehicle. Additionally, he was quite curious as to why someone would drive in the rain with his windows cracked, as though I’m the only person in the world who had ever done this. Eventually, he took my license and insurance and went back to his car.
On the way back to his car, again he looked through the trash in the back of my truck with his flashlight. We must have sat there with his lights shining on us for at least 15 minutes before he returned. He apologized for the delay attributing heavy radio traffic as the culprit, handed me my license and insurance card, told me to drive safe, and wished me happy holidays.
Jess and I didn’t get home until 1:30am. We’re both exhausted this morning.
I’m glad that my brother and his family are doing okay. My brother was starting a new contracting job today however, is unlikely to be able to drive with the splint on. Additionally, they have to go through the trouble of finding their car (which was towed) and finding a rental car this morning. I hope everything works out okay for them. The worst part is that my brother had been looking for a job since he was let go a few weeks ago. If he doesn’t get this new job because of the accident, it could put his family in quite a bind.