My Poor Niece

Monday I was at work trying to finish up my duties when the phone rang. It was a ring I had heard many times before, but this time I immediately knew something was wrong. I quickly grabbed my phone and answered. On the other end was my mom, upon hearing her voice I knew we had a problem. My mind immediately began running through my family members; wondered what had happened. My mother began, "Tracy (my sister-in-law) called and said that Amber had been hit..." at this point I was going crazy because my mother was taking so long to get out the story and what was happening. She continued.... "Amber has been hit in the face with a softball, her nose is broken and so is her cheek. She is at the emergency room right now, as soon as dad gets here we are leaving for the hospital." My mom also told me that she had done a CT scan and that everything looked fine there. Which was a relief to me, you know me, I always start thinking the worst.

I called Mike and gave him the information and he told me he was heading to the hospital to check on her. Being at work 80 miles away makes you feel pretty helpless. You want to be there and help in whatever way you can, even if it is just pacing the halls in the hospital. But because I couldn't offer much help, I figured I would stay at work and get a few things done. Finally, I couldn't stand it much longer, I sent Mike a text asking him for an update. He immediately called to let me know that they were going to be taking her to UVRMC in Provo. I decided I need to leave work and meet them at the hospital. I arrived at the emergency room just a couple minutes after Amber. She was sitting in the waiting room when I arrived. I looked at her and she smiled up at me and I knew all was going to be okay.

Looking at her, I could tell her nose was broken and her left cheek was swollen, but also somehow seemed like it was sunken. I sat down next to her and started talking with her for a few minutes. She seemed rather chatty even for a teenage girl. She seemed a little too happy and I quickly realized that she okay because they had given her some pain medication. We spent the majority of the night in the hospital and it wasn't until late evening that they released her to come home. The ER doctor and Plastic Surgeon had both come in and described what had happened to her. She had a broken nose, her sinus was broken, and her cheek was pretty much shattered. Since then, she has had reconstructive surgery and should be recovering.

I have a couple of really good pictures showing Amber and her swollen face. But she has made me promise that I would not put any pictures of her on my blog. Since I am keeping my word I instead included a picture of the flowers we gave to her. They look much better once the paper has been taken off and you can see them better. :-)

Amber, I hope you get feeling better soon. We all love you.