CRACK! Blackout. I was unconscious for at least 3 minutes that doctor said based off of my strange heart rate. I had woken up and the world was sideways. Dirt was on my left side and the grass and horizon with the storm clouds was on my right side. I had been lying on the gravel road near a curb and a drainpipe.

The dirt stuck to my face as I stood up and I tried to wipe it away with my right arm… there was a problem I thought to myself. Starting at my right shoulder there was no feeling. No matter how hard I tried there was no motion. As I looked down I couldn’t see my right hand. It was tucked behind my forearm and my right pinky finger was touching my right elbow. Half way up my arm I saw my bright white bone piercing through my skin as it was shining clearly in the sun that was just about to disappear behind the clouds. At that moment the feeling started to come back to my arm and the pain was excruciating as I ran inside to find my mom. My mom was not so calm about it as she almost fainted as well once I showed the break in my arm to her as she was painting my new baby brothers room. My mom had called my dad at his work and she told him what had happened and what she should do with my arm until we got to the hospital. He had said to put it in a magazine and tape it until we were to get to the hospital and the doctors could look at it further.

Before stopping at the hospital my mom met my dad at his work office and he came with us to go to the hospital. For the next half an hour drive it was dead silent as my parents were trying to figure out what to do and how much this was going to cost as all parents do. The one sound that I could hear was the Chevrolet Suburban trying to speed to the hospital and the whistle of the other cars we were passing.

All of the things going on at the Methodists Hospital gave me a headache. It reminded me of a New York office floor with all of the telephones ringing and everyone running around everywhere except it smelt like Purell. A nurse saw my arm and immediately grabbed me a wheelchair and sat me in it and rolled off without my parents. That was the first time that I had looked at my arm and the blood had started to bleed through the magazine and I couldn’t look any longer. The next thing was all a blur. But I remember sitting in a room that had walls as curtains with my mom and my dad sitting in chairs in the corner. The nurse gave me a shot that stayed in my arm and it looked like a basketball pump then a clear tube got connected to the needle and into a bag hanging from a pole next to me. Once the machine started to work the right side of my body went stiff and then numb. I cried the most through that part of the incident than any other part.

The lady next door just had her son break his arm too and so she had went down to the gift shop and bought me a stuffed dog that I kept with me until I got home and I brought it everywhere in the hospital. To this day I still don’t know if that lady next door had bought that for me just to get my to shut up or if she did really feel bad for me and she was being a kind stranger. The doctor came in and said the only words that I could understand that night and also the only words that I still fear to this day, “We are ready in the Operating Room for Nicholas.”

They once again rolled me out of the room and then we passed through a set of doors and we got to the, “Movie Hallway,” with the bright white lights rolling over your head and the long narrow hallway that had no doors, windows, or color to it. We then stopped and we had gone into another room that seemed like it would be out of a doctor movie or show with everything white and all of the operating tools were laid out perfectly in order and they were clean with a nice chrome finish. The room was silent and then a mask came down over my face that had been covered in drying tears. After that mask was laid down on me I was out like a light. The operation lasted exactly 2 hours and 51 minutes long. I woke up after those dreadful 171 minutes to be alone in an open room with 6 other gurneys lying next to me. My parents were behind a giant glass window waiting for me to wake up.

The doctor came in and had told us everything that was broken and I had broken both my Ulna and my Radius in 3 different places along my forearm just right above the wrist. The Doctor also mentioned about keeping me overnight so they can check on my arm in the morning and assign me some medicine to take for the pain. After that talk with the doctor my dad had left to go home to check on my brother and sister because they were just left with the neighbors as we rushed out of the door to leave earlier that morning.

I was checked into a room at about 9:15 and I was starving and I wasn’t allowed to leave my room so my mom was the butler for the night bringing me food from the cafeteria. After about 15 minutes of laying in bed I was sound asleep and I had my mom right beside me in a chair and she had fallen asleep after reading me, ‘The Tooth Book,’ by Doctor Suess. The next morning I woke up and I had gone to the bathroom with the cold floor sliding against the bottoms of my feet. No later than 2 minutes later a nurse was there in my room checking on me and within 5 more minutes she cleared me to leave the hospital. As I walked out my mom had told me what was in my arm… 2 permanent metal rods and 1 steel plate. She also had said that because I had torn so many tendons that my complete right arm wont ever be strong again and will always have to take care of it and watch for it. When I got home there were a bunch of cars in the driveway and I had thought that everyone knew about my arm and they came to see me. But as I walked in the door I saw my dad in the kitchen holding a chocolate pudding cake the wrote in white frosting, “Happy 6th Birthday Nickle-Pickle!” I had totally forgotten that I just turned 6.