I know EXACTLY what they’re talking about

Yesterday I read this post and I started to think how much (sadly) I can relate to it.

Because everything changed for me on November 3rd, 2006.

Conner, Dallas and I were at Primary Children’s Medical Center, in one of our many stays. We were waiting for Ben to come home to the hospital, and it was getting late, and still no Ben. So I called a few times with no response. I was getting a bit worried. A few minutes later, a nurse pokes her head in and tell me: “there’s a fire marshall on the phone, he says that there was an accident at your house”.

NO.

So I talk to the fire marshall, he tells me that my house burned down and my husband was inside. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. This must be a sick joke. Who gets a call like that? No, my husband was on his way to me, to his family, this can’t be. He tells me that he’s being airlifted to the hospital next door, that he should be there in about 15 minutes. I think I got that call at around 8pm. I didn’t see him until 11pm. At 10pm I watched the news from the Burn Unit waiting room. The first story of the newscast was mine. I was looking at my house on TV, or what was left of it. It felt surreal.

I remember one day while Ben was still at the hospital when his social worker came up to me and asked me how was I doing. I told her: “I just can’t deal with me right now, I have too many things going on to focus on my feelings and needs”. That’s how I moved for days, numb, in shock, on autopilot. Even though I had help from family and friends, it was too much for one person to take.

3 weeks after the fire Ben left the hospital and we settled in an apartment in Salt Lake since Conner was spending more and more time at the hospital. Those days were just awful. Ben was still healing, physically and emotionally, he had therapy, his wounds needed care, he was dealing with PTSD. Then there was Conner, who was not doing well, so fragile. And Dallas, a newborn.

Another memory: driving back home from the house (or again, what was left of it), I started to cry. All this anger came onto me, anger towards whoever did this to us, changed us in a second, took all of our possesions. Our first house, the house I spent the first years as a married woman, the house we brought our 2 children from the hospital, it was all gone.

Then December came and changed my world once again, and this time I had an even harder time seeing a silver lining in all of it.

But after many many months I started to see it, just a little bit. My husband is here with me, I have a beautiful son who pulled me through. And even though Conner was no longer with us (physically) he is in our hearts, in our minds and he doesn’t suffer. Life can change in a second, can turn everything upside down. That sweet baby of mine taught me to face it the best I can and then keep going.

So that’s what I’m doing.