My Everything

Ch. 7 too close to reality

The anticipation was causing Sophie's stomach to flip and nausea to peak. She was doing her best to not seem the least bit intrigued by a potential life changing phone call, especially around Phoebe.

She barely slept last night as Phoebe eagerly awaited a phone call. Sophie rarely kept her phone off silent but it's been checked multiple times that the volume was turned up to maximum. Mark said no matter what he would call them even if Phoebe was not selected.

Today was definitely going to be the day and they both just tried to stay busy and continue their normal routine. Phoebe went to school and Sophie went back to work.

    Sophie was still having an internal struggle at work. Wrestling with the unknown and unsure if this was the best time to have such a dramatic change. She saw how easily Phoebe had warmed up to Chace and wasn't completely sure if Phoebe understood that his role of "Father" was just a role. There was nothing "real" there.

Chace was not now nor will ever be any type of father figure. If she decided to decline this opportunity how would she break the news to Phoebe and Mark? She was praying fervently for God to help make this decision for her.

    Thankfully work was quite busy so it was easy to throw herself in and be momentarily distracted. Sophie was working the critical care section and the emergency radio went off that a trauma alert was coming in from a motor vehicle accident.

Sophie began setting up the room to receive the patient for when the ambulance would arrive. The doctor, respiratory therapist and the ER pharmacist began to file into the room. Out the windows they can see the lights and sirens of the ambulance entering the EMS off load area.

Paramedics opened the back door of the ambulance and on the stretcher was a man. He was completely unrecognizable from abrasions and gash marks where his skin had been exposed. He was unresponsive and pulseless. The paramedics had  intubated him and another was doing chest compressions.

    "This is a 32 year old male who was unrestrained and thrown from his vehicle. Unresponsive on scene down time so far is 20 minutes. No previous medical history wife was the driver and followed us here in another ambulance. She is stable," the paramedic rattled matter of factly.

    They transfer the patient off the ambulance stretcher onto the ER stretcher. Respiratory begins to secure the patient's airway and prepare him to be attached to a ventilator. The doctor and pharmacist collaboratively work together to administer potentially life saving medications.

Sophie replays the facts: at this point the patient's heart is not beating on its own and being that he has gone without a pulse for 20 minutes his probable outcome was most likely poor.

Sophie and other team members begin to cut off his clothes to better treat him. Sophie grabbed the patient's ripped pants to place them in a belongings bag when out plopped the patient's wallet.

It opened to a photo of what was presumably the patient and a typical staged Christmas photo. The man in the photo, free of road debris and blood, was quite handsome. He had one arm wrapped around his wife as she leaned into him with a wide grin. With his other hand he held a beautiful toddler girl as she smiled towards the camera. The family in this photo had no clue that this would most likely be their last Christmas photo. That life would never be the same.

Sophie closed the wallet and began to place it in the belongings bag. Sophie was fighting back the tears as she tried to regain her composure and refocus on the patient. Normally Sophie had no issue detaching her emotions and just focused on the clinical side of things. This situation hit closer to home though.

"How many rounds of epinephrine has he had now?" The doctor inquired at the head of the bed.

"He has had 3 so far," the charge nurse reports back.