The Baseball Accident part 2

Throughout the whole debacle, we were consistently reminded of the goodness of people around us. We felt so many blessings from people who had heard about the accident, and since half the young men in our Ward are on Dax's team, that was a lot of people. Mostly, what Mom and Dad were doing was sitting waiting for doctors, so we tried to answer texts and messages, and Dad wrote a long email explaining to our friends and families what had happened. Dax had the idea to send a video of himself talking to Mark so that Mark could see that he really was okay, despite the fact that he was in the hospital. 

On both Saturday and Sunday nights, neighbors brought us dinner, which really helped. Dax's friends showed up as well, bringing Mountain Dew and treats, and lifting his spirit, even though he'd have to wait to drink all those bottles! The boy's dad who hit the ball reached out to us in apology, and we made sure that he knew that we placed no blame and accepted the injury as an unfortunate accident. Then this sweet boy gave Dax a new pair of sunglasses to replace the ones that were shattered by the baseball. 

Sunday picture.

On Tuesday Dax and Mom met with the surgeon. They scheduled surgery for Thursday. They plan to go in through Dax's cheek, grab the area of the bone between his eyebrow and cheekbone with a hook, and pull it back into place. Then, they will assess its strength. If they think it needs more help, they'll go in through the hairline and add a permanent titanium plate. 

Dax never really complained about the pain from the baseball injury. He managed the pain and swelling well with simple Tylenol, but the vomiting was more difficult on him. All day Sunday he couldn't eat, and clear liquids seemed to come right back up. Finally, around dinner time he kept down the broth from some ramen. Slowly, we added other liquids, and on Monday, despite losing 9 pounds, he seemed able to eat most things. (He requested fettuccine alfredo on Tuesday night, which proved to be a little too much for him, and he could only eat half a plate.)

Monday picture.

Tuesday pic

After half a plate of dinner, Dax went with Dad to his baseball game. He couldn't play, of course, but he could still run the Game Changer app, which keeps stats. He was also asked to give a pre-game speech, which he very, very briefly did. ("Go win like you did on Saturday," or something along those lines.) The boys were very happy to see him.

Dax also had a follow up with the eye doctor. After examining his eye more fully, they also recommended we do surgery since the fractured bone is pushing into his eye causing it to bulge slightly. Putting the bones back into place will help to keep his eye healthy. We were grateful for the confirmation. 

Wednesday pic waiting for the eye doctor.

Dax has been in such good spirits. He is a trooper.

Though there is still a lot that needs to go right, we have seen many miracles and kind hearts throughout this little tragedy. We are grateful and blessed that Dax will make a full recovery.  

The Baseball Accident

Baseball is a dangerous sport, and we've always known that injuries happen. We've dealt with sore arms from pitching, but Dad seems to have taken the most damage, with a broken pinkie from a line drive at third, and a permanent scar in his mouth from taking a line drive at second, but both of those were minor compared to what happened to Dax before a Saturday morning game in the Saratoga Springs league.

He left for the 10:30 game at about 9:30, with Dad (the coach) showing up a little later. Around 10:00, just as Dad was gearing up to leave, Dax called totally frantic! He said he’d been pitching in the cage and taken a line drive to the face. He could feel a dent in his skull just at the corner of his eye, and he was certain that he'd broken his skull. Dad told him he was on the way and tossed some ice in a bag. Natalie was in the shower, so Dad left Seth with what information he had and burst out the door. Then he called Dax back as he drove over to Patriot Park. Dax was really upset, begging and pleading with Dad to get there. Dad asked where Dax was, and he’d walked out to the road by himself (No adults were there, and kids apparently didn't know to stay with a head injury!) Dad was driving “erratically” to put it mildly, but he picked him up and had already put in the directions to AF Hospital 22 minutes away. Dax actually looked pretty ok: minimal swelling, he was alert, and there was only a tiny lesion at the tip of his eyebrow. But he was really suffering. He threw up right after they got out of the car at the Emergency Room. In fact, he threw up for about the next four hours. He kept refilling those long blue up-chuck bags and replacing them. The doctor ordered a CT scan around Dax’s eye to check for fractures. Sure enough, he had fractured his occipital bone on both sides of his left eye. That meant he needed a second CT from a different angle to see if the bones were pushing into the muscles around his sinuses or eye.

Dax's eye looked rough.

The second CT Scan showed that the dent Dax had felt in his skull just between his cheekbone and tip of his eyebrow was pushing into the muscles around his eye. His skull was definitely broken. Dax was referred to Primary Children’s Hospital in Salt Lake to see if surgery would be needed. Without surgery, it was possible that there would be nerve damage that would cause permanent loss of eye movement (not vision, but the ability to move your eye.) We ran Dax home to change and grab necessaries, and Bishop Gurney helped us give him a blessing. Dax refused all pain medication, but the vomiting persisted all the way into the hospital and beyond. We made it to SLC around 2:30. We saw half a dozen doctors, (trauma, maxillofacial, ENT, neurology, ophthalmology, etc.) all back at PCH where Seth had surgery all those years ago. (Seth stayed with Melanie throughout the day rather than making a triumphant return to the hospital.)

He rode in a wheelchair on his way to the CT scans.

Seth came to the AF hospital, but didn't want to spend all day at the hospital with us.

The doctors were concerned about eyes, ears, sinuses, muscles that move the cheeks, brows, and of course, the brain. Though Dax had only lost consciousness for a few seconds, and he had full memory before and after, the vomiting indicated a concussion, and we weren't sure how bad it was. (We only knew 2 of the doctors, one who was the father of my student who now has 6 kids, and one who confessed to following Mom on social media.) Dax was mostly quiet through all this. He seemed most concerned that his cousins' trip to Florida with Grandma and Grandpa might be affected (I asked, and even with surgery, it shouldn’t be, so he can still go fishing for marlin).

Back in Primary Children's brought back a lot of memory.

Ophthalmology said that Dax had blunt force trauma to his retina. This was causing the flashing lights that he could see. The doctor could see the contusion on the retina, but she expects it to heal like any lump. She said it is unlikely to change or permanently affect his vision, so that felt like a win. However, surgery was still necessary, based on the broken skull piece that was pushing into Dax's face. 

After many long hours at the hospital, we took Dax home with hope that this was nothing more than a broken bone (though a broken bone that required surgery), and tried to get some sleep. 

Dax had to pass a road test to go home, which meant walking around the hallway without falling or getting dizzy. 

What it looked like right before heading home.

Dax doesn’t remember the actual impact, but he does remember just before and after. He remembers throwing the pitch (the last one in the empty bucket) and then clutching the net around the cage to keep from falling. He remembers making his way over to his phone and calling Dad. Then he staggered out to the road, all of which he remembers. The CT scan showed no damage to his brain, so we are thinking there is no serious concussion, just a few broken bones. There was a protective net in the cage, shaped like Utah for right-handers. However, after Dax threw the last ball from the bucket, he reached down to start gathering balls, and that's when he was struck. The blow shattered his sunglasses, which left a little cut on his face.

New Chicks

We've been planning new chicks for a while, and we knew we had to get them after Spring Break as that is our longest time at home. So as soon as we unloaded the van, we headed to IFA. We actually stopped at 3 IFAs, but we did find most of the chicks we wanted. Dad got his buff orpington, which he named Buff Orpington. Mom got a Sapphire Olive Egger, which she called Rosario (Rosie for short). Dax got a silver wyandotte, and he's calling it Tornado. And Seth got a black copper maran. He cycled through a lot of names before settling on Ninja. Now we have a coop in our house until the end of the school year. Here's an introduction to our new flock.

Little Rosie

Buff Orpington

Ninja

Tornado

We love how they sleep on their faces as babies.

Seth holding all the chicks. Even after a few days, they change so much.

Spring Break in Kansas City

We only had a day in Kansas City, and this one was about family. We decided to meet Ty and Savannah and the boys. They wanted to go to the zoo, and that sounded great to us. We met about 9:30 at the gate and their boys immediately took to our boys, excitedly showing them all their favorite things in the Kansas City Zoo. This zoo is quite a bit larger than our zoo, so we did a lot more walking. They had some cool animals, too. We even rode the Skyride over the top of the zoo, and you could see the animals below.

The boys loved Seth!

We had so much fun with the Alders.

Riding the skytram.

We chuckled about these signs all over the zoo. 

The zoo was a ton of fun.

They also have a small aquarium.

Mom and her best buddy!

Such a fun morning!

We spent most of the day at the zoo, and then took Ty to a quick lunch for his birthday. Then we ended up back at the hotel to relax for a few minutes before our biggest adventure of the day, the Royals game. The game wasn't all that exciting. Bobby Witt, Jr. had a double and made an amazing double play. But that was about all the Royals managed, as they lost 2-0. Still we had great seats right down by 3rd base. Ty's family even came down from the upper deck and watched the last few innings with us.

We walked to the stadium from our hotel.

Add another stadium to our growing list.

George Brett is an iconic player.

There is a cool fountain at this stadium.

We enjoyed sitting with Ty and Savannah and the boys at the game.

We loved seeing them in Kansas City!

It was a long drive home, and we started out early. We listened to General Conference and Harry Potter. We stopped at a rest stop and Mom made lunch. The weather was good, though. Finally, we arrived in Rifle, Colorado, and checked into a hotel. 

The next morning, we drove up into the hills above Rifle to see the waterfall at Rifle Falls State Park. We'd seen this way back before Utah's Adventure Family began. It was just as good as we remembered. There was a huge triple waterfall that you can walk right under and on top of. Then there were some shallow caves that we explored. We ended up spending around an hour, which didn't delay us coming home too much. Luckily, we were in time to pick up our new baby chicks!

Rifle Falls is gorgeous.

It is so picturesque.

Can you see the boys?

You could even walk behind the waterfall.

The caves were fun to explore.

We had fun checking out all the little caves.

This was a great stop.

We climbed up into all sorts of places.

The rock formations were so cool.

We saw a little rainbow as we were leaving.

Leaving Nauvoo

On Wednesday we woke up to breakfast in the hotel in Nauvoo. This was breakfast made by Mom, and it included eggs and sausage, along with the pancakes left over from the day before. Today we had a lot more driving to do, but we want to do a few more things in Nauvoo. First, we wanted to walk around Nauvoo State Park. This was a short loop trail around a reservoir. It was a nice hike, and we saw a red-bellied woodpecker, along with a lot of other birds.

We enjoyed this nice lake trail.

It was shady and all along the lakeshore.

After the hike we decided to drive down to see if we could see a bald eagle reported to be down by the river in Nauvoo. But then, miraculously, the Mansion House was open. As it was closed all week, it was the one site we hadn’t seen in Nauvoo. We quickly parked and hopped out, but the building was really busy. Luckily, our favorite sisters from the day before saw us and agreed to sneak us in between groups, giving us our own private tour. We accepted that little miracle, and never really worried about seeing the eagle after all. 

Then we began our long drive down into Missouri. Mormons have never really been welcomed in Missouri, and we don’t really care to visit even today. But there were a few Church history sites we wanted to see. Our first stop was Adam-ondi-Ahman. This has been much expanded, and we hiked two short trails, visited two viewpoints, and read all the signs. Miraculously, we ran into our next-door neighbors, who were headed to Nauvoo, and chatted for a little while, too.

It was so windy when we visited!

We could barely stand up!

It was so fun to run into our neighbor.

Dad and Mom hiked down into the valley.

Adam-ondi-ahman was a nice little stop.

Next, we made another short drive to Hawn’s Mill. This site has not been updated at all, and there was very little to see. We were glad we went, as Mom’s great-great-grandfather died there, but there is only a small plaque laid nearly 100 years ago.

The Hawn's Mill site.

The gravel roads took us up and down over blind hills as we drove to our third destination, Far West. We were excited because this was our final Church History site in all the country. We’ve now seen them all from Sharon, Vermont, to San Diego, California. 

Farr West Family Pic

On the way into Kansas City, we stopped at a park called Penguin Park. It was not hard to see why. There was a massive statue of a penguin, along with an elephant, kangaroo, and giraffe. Each had an opportunity to climb, slide, or hang from. We didn’t stay long.

The giant penguin was super fun!

You could climb up into the kangaroo pouch.

We had skipped lunch in favor of snacks, and we were very hungry. So, we stopped at a place called Joe’s BBQ. Since Kansas City is known as the City of Barbecue, this seemed appropriate. It turned out to be a great decision as the barbecue was amazing! We had brisket, ribs, and pulled pork. Sides included pork and beans, street corn, cornbread, and fries. We loved it and ended the day full!

This meal was so good!!

We all loved it!

We enjoyed a lovely sunset on the way to the hotel.