Alyssa’s Fall

How do you ever get the image of your daughter lying crumpled at the bottom of the basement stairs, not breathing, out of your head?  How do you delete the mental playback of those wide eyed, terror filled blue eyes rolling back into oblivion before the seizure began?  Ban the thought of blood trickling out of her mouth from biting or injuring her tongue in the fall?

I’ve been haunted by the images and horror of the experience since my 3 year old fell down an entire flight of basement steps landing on a lightly carpeted concrete floor.  She came out of the hospital 3 days later with no physical ramifications from the event, but the mental and emotional impact on our entire family is evident today and probably will be forever a part of our psyche. 

I will never forget the terror of the reality that my daughter’s life was in danger, real, physical, immediate danger.   I am not an overbearing Mom and some people even called me paranoid before this happened, but my children are just so precious to me I will go above and beyond to protect them. But accidents are called accidents for a reason.  I have also come to believe that to some extent they can be prevented.  The purpose of this post is not to criticize anyone’s parenting styles or decisions, but to just raise awareness about accidents that can possibly be prevented. 

My main lesson has been just because they can do something on their own, doesn’t mean they should. 

Sure, my three year olds are not babies anymore who have to be followed each move they make.  We do not have to hover over step by step as they go up and down stairs.  Sure, they can do it alone, but if I had better safe guards in place, maybe this whole ordeal could have been prevented.

I also wrote the following documentation of a near death tragedy because I want Alyssa to know one day what a fighter she is and all she has overcome, but mainly so others will hopefully read the heart wrenching words and remember them.  Remember what we went through and maybe do an inventory of your own house and habits and put in place a few new safety measures to prevent simple accidents such as falls and head trauma from happening. 

I just saw a story come on TV about a mother who’s 5 year old died from falling through a screen in their 2^nd story house and I just cried and cried.  A spilt second accident can take away the most precious things in our lives, so if there’s anything I can do to prevent that from happening in mine, I will do it.  Whether it be installing a hand rail on the steps, putting back up a baby gate so they don’t have free reign access to the steps, not allowing them to ride bikes or scooters without helmets, no playing in the street, not even checking the mail alone (there was a 12yearold boy in the trauma room next to us that night who went out to check the mail and was hit by a truck and his entire face was smashed in).  There are simple things we take for granted that we let our children do that can just be modified a little to provide them more safety.  I don’t think it makes me a bitch to tell my kids no to some things, or watch over them more closely even though they are growing bigger and more independent. 

Just because they can do more things on their own doesn’t mean they should.

So many people expressed concern over what happened and wanted to hear all about it, for the first time understood what it was like to suffer Post Traumatic Stress.  Especially right after it happened, ‘Alyssa’s fall’ was all anyone wanted to talk or ask questions about.  I avoided talking about it much on Facebook and began avoiding social situations because I knew it was going to be the 1^st and sometimes only thing people wanted to talk about. 

Most people were just genuinely concerned, but others, the blood hounds, were like the rubberneckers on the expressway about causing another wreck to see the damage of the mangled cars on the side of the road.  People asked specific questions about her not breathing, the seizure.  And every time I was forced to re-encounter the event, my heart felt squeezed with pain and that  image of her lifeless, limp body on some plain of consciousness in between our world and another was all I could see and I just wanted to crumple in the middle of the party or grocery store and cry.  Sure she was OK, but all the ‘What Ifs’ or alternate endings is what got me.  I came so close to losing my baby and it was the last thing I wanted to talk about.

My life has forever been changed by what happened, and it’s not all bad.  I hug my children tighter, I have more patience with their toddler ways, and I love them even more, if that’s possible.  I know how frail they are even though they seem so grown, such Big Boys and Big Girls who will always be my babies.  I am more scared, life is viewed through a rose colored glass of danger.  It’s hard for me to go to the playground because all I see is a deathtrap.  Actually everywhere I go; every situation we encounter is quickly evaluated through my jaded eyes for potential danger, and let me tell you, potential danger is everywhere.  But I must still let me kids be kids and have fun and be independent, but not at the cost of their lives or safety.

So without further ado, here’s the first installment of our ordeal in all its gory details.  Some of these experiences I have never even told my closest friends or family members, but it’s my hope this story will prevent another family from losing a child, or at the least prevent an accident from happening.

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