Jennifer Blacklock

Wednesday evening I sat on the porch with Willa on my lap, watching the kids ride bikes and bat baseballs.

I combed my fingers through Willa’s curls to peel off some remaining cradle cap I noticed, and I felt something. A bump? Not quite. More like a soft spot, but I know what soft spots feel like, this was different.

My first impulse was to get on the internet and see what it could be, but I know my tendency to grow anxious for nothing, especially close to bedtime, and I’ve learned not to put trust in webmd and such sources. I could tell that Willa was obviously her regular happy, healthy self, so I stayed off my phone.

The next day I felt again. Still there. I couldn’t shake the oddness of it and decided to turn to google but keep a level head. As I searched, it seemed “bulging soft spot” was the most fitting description, and everything I read said that it could be a medical emergency and deserves a trip to the ER. Long lists described potential horrors ranging from meningitis to brain tumors. My hands and feet felt hot and cold and my heart beat fast as I prayed for strength and wisdom for me, and health for my baby girl. I called the older kids and we gathered around Willa and prayed for her, anointing her with oil, all of us with tender hands gently pressed on her tiny body. I called Justin, my husband, and Kim, our pastor’s wife, and we made a plan. Kim would watch the middle kids, Lyla and Perry, while Leo, our oldest, would come with me to take Willa to the ER where Justin would meet us. We dipped cold lasagna into bowls for lunch, hopped in the car, dropped Lyla and Perry off with backpacks full of books and toys, and headed to the hospital.

There are two fears or worries on the way to the ER like this:

One is that nothing will be wrong and it will be a total waste of time and resources.

The other is that it won’t be a waste.

None of the doctors or nurses at the hospital were concerned about anything serious, they could see that the baby in front of them was comfortable, happy, and right where she should be developmentally; though they agreed the spot was odd. A CT scan was ordered “just to be safe”. Justin took Leo to his office while they waited.

The doctors and nurses asked if Willa had had any bumps or falls recently. I recalled the awful moment from a couple weeks ago when the older kids and I had been watching Andy Griffith in the afternoon and suddenly heard a high-pitched squeal. “Was that Willa?” I had gasped as I ran to my bedroom. I’d laid her on our king-size bed to nap; she’s rolling-around-age, so I had placed a buffer of pillows around her. But she was screaming on the floor when I ran into the room. I picked her up frantically and walked her around the room, bouncing and “shh”ing and patting. I felt her head for bumps and checked her to see if she was bleeding, checked to see if her eyes looked normal, having a very limited knowledge of head injuries. She was gradually soothed as I walked her around the room. Both of us calming down, I looked out the window and saw our goat having her babies (!), a moment we’d been anticipating; I wrapped Willa in the Ergo wrap on my back where she fell back to sleep, and the kids and I headed outside to tend to goats. That night, Willa seemed uncomfortable- I assumed sore from her fall- and I comforted her by nursing through the night.

Normally I would have poorly estimated how many days ago the fall had been, but because I had pictures of the newborn baby goat on my phone, I was able to put a date to her fall from the bed.

Nothing could have prepared me for the shock of learning that that fall had fractured her skull.

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The radiologist told me to please not feel like a bad mother as I fell into tears at the news. She reassured me that these things happen all the time and she wasn’t at all concerned for complications for Willa with the size of the fracture and the fact that two weeks had already passed and she was fine and normal, both in personality and development.

The ER trip that I had anticipated being “nothing” now meant a transfer to the children’s hospital and hour further away. The doctor said this was an unusual situation, since the injury had happened two weeks earlier, but that it was protocol for her to be observed overnight for such an injury. They also informed me that, due to the type of injury, they were having to put in a report with CPS (child protective services) for suspicion of abuse/neglect.

As if the initial shock wasn’t enough.

The hospital staff again reassured me that this was all simply “protocol” and that nothing would come of it.

As Justin and Leo arrived and I prepared to go with Willa to the new hospital for the night, we were informed she was going to be transferred by helicopter. They told me that I “may or may not” be able to ride with her (my nursing seven month-old!) and that they had to place an IV even though there was no medical need. My husband politely insisted they take her by ambulance instead so she wouldn’t have to have an unnecessary IV and could have a parent with her. The hospital staff grew argumentative as Justin respectfully but assertively stood his ground, repeatedly asking why a helicopter transport was necessary when our daughter was completely stable, and insisting we would rather wait for an ambulance.

I piped up shyly and asked if there was a possibility we could just take her to the other hospital ourselves, if their concern was the ambulance taking seven hours, as they had been claiming.

A big man who had gathered with other staff in our doorway stepped aggressively in and loudly said to me “look, I’m the ER manager here and I can tell you right now, that’s not gonna happen.” The radiologist calmly told him to please let us have our conversation.

Justin stayed calm and repeated that we weren’t fighting or becoming hostile with them, we would do whatever we needed to do to take care of our baby, but we’d still prefer to avoid a helicopter transfer if possible.

I was shaky and sweaty and cold from anxiety by now, but managed, “wait, are you saying we legally can’t leave here with our baby right now?”

“That is correct”.

I wondered if I was going to faint; I felt hot and cold and scared and tense and far-away. The helicopter medics kindly said they’d come back if needed and stepped away. A doctor said they would call the EMTs and see if it was possible for us to get an ambulance, to which the answer was yes, and the wait, only 30 minutes.

I comforted my eleven year-old as we waited, though he seemed calm, I knew he must be pretty shaken from all that.

The ambulance ride was better, though Willa did fuss, having to be confined in the stretcher. The EMT put Bluey on his tablet for her to watch and made her two latex glove “balloon toys”.

The rest of the night was a roller coaster of difficulties sprinkled with God’s grace:

A nurse brought Willa a rattle toy and me a snack (which I would not have time to eat).

One doctor scornfully asked if I was an “antivaxxer”.

I called my close friend who’s been gone for the summer, and we talked for a half hour that made me forget for a while where we were.

We waited in the bright, loud triage room for three hours.

Justin’s coworker brought me a phone charger and sandwich, along with a stuffed animal for Willa from his daughters and told us they were our family there now if we needed anything else and that they would pray for us.

The neurologist said he didn’t see any reason for Willa to stay but that it wasn’t up to him.

Willa had to have a full body scan (X-ray) and screamed while I stood helplessly outside the room.

I talked with my sister who encouraged me, and several other family members called or texted with encouragement and prayers. Kim and another woman from our church were in near-constant prayer for us the whole time.

I was interviewed by CPS as my mind and body longed for rest. They told me that tomorrow a caseworker would go to our house and interview Justin and the kids.

Multiple doctors asked me accusingly why I hadn’t brought Willa in sooner.

It was midnight before my head sunk into the flat, plasticky hospital pillow where I nursed Willa to sleep. Passing trains woke us up regularly, along with nurses checking vitals, but we had a few hours of broken sleep.

In the morning we FaceTimed Justin and the kids. Oh how my heart ached to be with them, to take Willa home! Sadness and confusion and disappointment showed on my children’s faces. We chatted about how they would milk the goats since I wasn’t there, what the hospital was like, how we missed each other. I told them how a nice nurse had brought me some yogurt for breakfast and how we couldn’t wait to see them, hopefully later that day.

How could this be happening to us? As the morning hours crawled by, the unfairness of the guilt-tripping and false accusations weighed on me more and more heavily.

Justin became more and more convinced as he pondered the situation that the hospital didn’t have the right to keep us there. I had been told, and relayed to him, different times that we might be able to leave. “Overnight”, “24 hours”, “as long as it takes CPS to finish their investigation”, “possibly tomorrow or the next day”, “it could be three or four days”. Hope dwindled, and I felt utterly trapped.

I asked if I could take Willa out of the room and was told no.

I tried to watch some TV but found it overly-stimulating.

I talked to Kim and updated her that there weren’t really any updates except that Willa was medically cleared to leave and we were just “waiting on the CPS side of things”, which is what I was being told by the doctors.

I met our new doctor for the day, who seemed caring enough but also gave me that answer.

I understood why there was a report made, that this was protocol. I understood the implications of what a situation like this could mean, under different circumstances. But keeping us in the hospital until it was “wrapped up” seemed beyond unnecessary. It became unbearable to sit there waiting for nothing. Waiting for them to say they had decided we were fit to take our baby to our home. Everything had gone well with the interview, as far as I could tell. All I could do was tell the truth, and it was pretty straightforward. While the fear of them taking custody unjustly nagged at the back of my mind, I tried to quiet it and stay rational, knowing there would be no justification for them to do that.

I had been told that the caseworker assigned to us would contact me this day. I waited as long as I could and finally called her just before 10:00 AM. She seemed rushed and uncaring as she told me my case wasn’t really hers but she didn’t know whose it was going to be yet and that someone would contact me later. I had already begun to realize that every minute we inched toward 5:00, it being Friday, meant an increasing chance that they would keep us through the weekend if things kept on like this!

I became more insistent with her, “I don’t want us to be stuck here any longer than we have to be, I really need someone to get going on our case as soon as possible”.

She said there needed to be communication between the caseworker and the doctors; I asked when this communication was going to happen. She replied that there had been some communication last night “I believe the caseworker there spoke with the doctors, and I guess there were some inconsistencies with your story, so you’re just going to have to wait for your case to be given to who it will be assigned and they’ll get with you to discuss next steps”.

Inconsistencies?

I quickly finished the phone call and hung up. Inconsistencies? What was she talking about? I began sobbing on my sofa bed, little Willa asleep next to me.

I cried out to God to deliver us from this place. “Lord you KNOW, you know we’ve done nothing wrong! Vindicate us, God!”

Two hospital staff walked in as I finished my sobbing. Sniffling, I greeted them, and they asked how I was doing. I broke down again. “I know you don’t know me, you don’t know us, I know we’re just patients, but if you knew us, knew our family… if you knew me, you’d know… I’m a good mother! I take very good care of my children! I didn’t do anything wrong!” I mentioned how the caseworker on the phone had mentioned inconsistencies, “what inconsistencies could there possibly be? Is it because we have a rug? Because she fell onto a rug? Maybe she shouldn’t have a fracture if there was a rug? Well she did! And there is!” I hopelessly cried that I didn’t know what to do. The women had been nodding quietly as they listened to me, but now one said “that’s exactly why we’re here”.

She introduced herself as a forensic investigator and said she would determine exactly what I was talking about and send her report to CYFD (children, youth, and families department). She was professional but also showed genuine compassion. After the interview with her she explained that according to her forensic knowledge, it was clear to her that this was an accidental injury and that was what she would send along to CYFD. She also comforted me by informing me that the soft spot was good- it meant that the body was doing its job and healing itself. I remembered our prayer over Willa before we came to the hospital and realized that God had already answered it. It all was such a clear and direct answer to my tear-filled plea for help and few moments before.

Continued in Part 2…