It’s amazing how one can be skating along and then in an instant, boom!  On the floor, in pain, bleeding, jaw broken in two places and looking ahead to months of soft food/liquid diet.

We were at the Fairview Christian School skate night at the Skate Deck in Everett, WA yesterday, Saturday, Nov 13th and had been having a great time with friends.  Then, right at the end, came the call for races.  Leigh decided that she would participate and felt pretty confident with her balance.  Well, the start was called and they were off.  She ended up being in fourth place (of four) and so, her competitive spirit kicked in and she decided to push things a bit.  After rounding the first turn for the second lap, she tried putting on speed to overtake the person ahead of her and suddenly her balance was gone and she was down on the floor.

At first it didn’t seem too bad, but then it became apparent that she was in a lot of pain.  We rushed out to her and she was bleeding pretty badly from a gash in her chin, she reported that her chin hurt and her ears felt cold.  One fellow was very helpful right away.  Apparently he’d been a hockey player and had seen (and/or experienced) similar injuries before and he was able to help her and to take charge of the situation.  We got the blood stanched and figured out a plan to get her to the hospital.

There was quite a bit of confusion, but we finally got it arranged to have Morgan go with the Ramos’ and Korin went with us to the emergency room at Providence Hospital on Pacific in Everett.  We arrived there at about 7:30pm and got the care she needed over the next 7 hours.  Though the triage nurse did not make a complete diagnosis, through Leigh & Korin’s communication with the radiologists and nurses, she ended up getting x-rays for her right  hand, pinky finger and wrist (nothing broken there!) and then a CT scan of her jaw.  The final diagnoses was that she had broken her jaw in two places.  At the chin and also by her left ear.  They are clean breaks and won’t require too much to get re-aligned, but she will be having her jaw wired shut for 4-6 weeks and will be on a liquid diet for at least that long.

There’s been great support from our Fairview School and Church families.  We really, really appreciate their prayers and their help in the form of dinners and assistance with getting Leigh to her various appointments.