Author Blog

Sitting next to Eliza, we could overhear the conversations of the legions of doctors that oversaw her treatment. With injuries as severe as hers, there was no clear path to follow; there were many options discussed before a decision was made. This happened over and over again. This fascinated me and oddly, it gave me confidence and new respect for the jigsaw puzzle that treatment becomes in severe injuries.

It became clear that timing is everything. Before they could do anything about the breaks they had to treat the lung and stabilize her back. It was greatly in her favor that she was young, and that she had been fit before the accident. It was also in her favor that UVA Intensive Care sees a higher than usual percentage of horseback riding injuries.

Her arm also required surgery, which they performed the day after we arrived. Eliza’s elbow had been shattered; X-Rays taken after the surgery showed a nest of metal, plus screws holding all the metal in place. Years later, when some of her elbow metal was removed, we kept it in a glass jar. It looked for all the world like it came out of our local hardware store.

UVAPavilion II. 1997

UVAPavilion III. 1997

UVA Pavilion IX. 1997

UVA Pavilion V. 1997

UVA Pavilion VII. 1997

The ICU rules were that visitors MUST leave between noon and 1:00 p.m. It was in these breaks that we discovered the beauty and tranquility of the gardens behind each pavilion on the Lawn of the University. Each has a section that is open to the public, delineated by their lovely serpentine walls and with welcoming benches for sitting. It was such a respite to take our lunches from the cafeteria and make the short walk up to a different garden each day. It helped us maintain at least a toehold on everyday reality, reminding us that time might have stopped for us, but not for others.

TO BE CONTINUED

The coastal road from Deer Isle to Belfast in August is usually a clogged mess, but in the wee hours of the morning we could speed…and did. Especially when we turned inland on the straight road to Augusta, past darkened vacation houses around shimmering Lake George to our left. After Augusta it was interstate the rest of the way and our speed got serious; we got to the Portland Airport in plenty of time for our flight to Washington D.C.

We had had an update from Chris Derby, with both good and bad news. Eliza’s oxygen levels kept rising, but it was becoming obvious that she had sustained other severe injuries. He assured us that by the time we arrived at her bedside they would have a clearer picture after using sophisticated imaging.

Although exhausted, we were still euphoric that she was alive. We also had faith that she was in good hands. The airplane trip was uneventful, and soon we were headed south to Charlottesville in a rented car.

Each slowdown en route was magnified a hundred times in our mind, we were so anxious to get to the hospital. We had to force ourselves to stop at traffic lights once we got to Charlottesville. Finding a place to park, signing in, waiting for the elevator – it was all torture. But we had not given a single thought in all of this as to how she would look.

The shock came when we were ushered into the Intensive Care Unit. She looked like the Michelin Man; the hydrating fluids had blown her up to grotesque proportions. She was so heavily sedated with morphine she was like a beached whale in the bed, with tubes everywhere and machines beeping. The doctors had put her into an induced coma and she seemed miles away from us.

This was the point at which the euphoria cracked, and reality set in. I can’t remember how we reacted as it has blurred in my mind, but I do remember that a friend of hers who came to see her a few days later when she was conscious hastily left the room rather than burst into tears in front of Eliza.

By this time they knew the extent of her injuries, and they were all on her left side. She had broken her femur, arm, collarbone and back and punctured her lung. They had already operated on her leg, and stabilized her spine with a rigid metal “halo” that screwed into her forehead.

TO BE CONTINUED

It is hard to overestimate the kick in the stomach that we got from one moment sitting on the steps of the porch in Maine, relaxed and happy, to the next moment trying to comprehend that our daughter has just had a very serious accident. We are not with her, and are far from airports on an island off the coast of Maine.

After Strother’s call we sit there, numbed; the sunset has lost its beauty, dusk is coming on, and our happiness is replaced by cold terror. We feel helpless, waiting for enough time to pass for us to get an assessment of Eliza’s condition from the hospital.

Our decision for the emergency paramedics from the Rockfish Valley to take her to UVA hospital was based on the fact that UVA is a regional trauma center and that they frequently deal with horseback riding accidents.

It takes more time to get to UVA hospital in Charlottesville than it would have taken to get to the hospital just over the mountain in the Shenandoah Valley off of I 64, however at the time we made the decision we didn’t know that among her other injuries, she had also punctured a lung.

On arrival at the Emergency Room her oxygen level was at 37%. When this call came through it seemed that our worst fears were justified, and our immediate goal was to start getting ourselves down the coast to her bedside. But no, we were told to stay put while they further assessed her condition. This way we would be able to give permission if they needed to operate.

It was quite obvious that if they didn’t get her oxygen level up quickly it wouldn’t matter what other injuries she had sustained, and so their immediate focus was on this. A tube was inserted through her chest wall to deal with the collapsed lung.

Since it had gotten late we lay down, half dreading the ring of the telephone, and yet hoping with every fiber in us that when it came it would bring positive news. Sleep was out of the question; prayers took its place.

A young doctor named Chris Derby was in charge of her case, and it was he who finally called around 2:00 a.m. to say the words we were so hoping to hear, that her oxygen level was steadily improving. She was young, and fit, having rowed all four years at college, and he felt confident that we could leave on the three-hour drive to Portland to catch a plane for Virginia. Euphoria swept over us. We felt in our bones that if she was given a fighting chance she would make it. We jumped in our car, Virginia bound.

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Many years ago, in 1998 to be exact, our daughter, Eliza, was running a small camp for family members and their friends at a family place on Afton Mountain. It was towards the end of the last day of camp, and she and one of her counselors were riding up to the top of the mountain to a picnic and awards ceremony.

It was dusk when they came to an open area called “Aintree,” after the famous British racetrack. The “track” is a long, oval path where we used to race our ponies, with a few jumps on the upper section of the oval – barrels end to end, post and rails, a handmade dry stonewall.

The young counselor wanted to jump, but Eliza thought it was close to being too dark, and suggested that they have a canter around the oval instead. They started around, with the counselor in the front. She was above the turn that takes you around to the top of the oval when the next thing she knew there was a riderless horse beside her.

Horrified, she looked around, and saw Eliza crumpled on the ground under the old tree that marks the beginning of the turn up the hill. Eliza’s horse, Lucks, a big black quarter horse with a white moon face, galloped off. Within an eighth of a mile Lucks came to a fork in the road. To go straight would have taken him back down to the barn and his pasture, a choice that you would expect of a loose horse. Instead he chose to go left, up the mountain to the top, where the campers were. This choice was one of the many miracles that day that saved Eliza’s life.

At the top of the mountain the first thing they see is Lucks, reins flapping and stirrups clanging, charging up the road. The second thing they see is the counselor, spooked nearly senseless, blurting out that Eliza fell at Aintree and may be dead.

My cousin Strother was there with his SUV that had a phone in it (unusual for those days) and he drove fast down to Aintree and found Eliza, conscious but groaning in terrible pain and with her left arm sticking out at an un-natural angle. She was trying to sit up to get her breath, but he wisely kept her from doing so while he called the ambulance.

Jump north to Deer Isle, Maine, where we are sitting on the porch admiring the sunset, when Strother calls in from on the ground next to Eliza at Aintree. Where, he asks should the paramedics take Eliza; UVA Health Center or the just-built new regional hospital between Waynesboro and Staunton? UVA, we say. He tries to get Eliza to talk to us, but she is in too much pain.

TO BE CONTINUED