September 18, 2010
At 7:32 pm you posted on your myspace page from home these words SOME PEOPLE WERE BORN TO MAKE OTHERS FALL
At 7:58 pm you posted on your facebook wall these words OH HOLY HELL ON A NIGHT LIKE THIS YA GOTTA GO RAISE SOME HELL
Some time after 8:00 p.m you left the house.
At 9:49 pm I was joking with a friend about how naive I am because I thought one of the past big brother contestants had been on a dating show like The Bachelor and he was pointing out to me that it was a playboy channel hook up show for sex. I was drilling him how he knew so much about these things since he claims to be the innocent one of the group. The movie Aaron was watching had my attention so I decided to tell my friends goodnight and finish watching the movie with him.
It's now around 10:30 pm.
Aaron decided to go attack my birthday cake which sounded pretty good since I didn't eat any of it earlier. He came back downstairs and we began watching the movie again. I decided I wanted ice cream too but told him to not pause the movie since it was getting late. I was loading the blender with ice cream and decided to add a piece of the boston cream pie birthday cake to it like someone with the munchies. If I had added a little Worcestershire sauce and a little ketchup it would have been called a David creation after a night out. I had just opened the fridge to get out the milk to add to the concoction I was creating when there was a very forceful knock on the front door.
The rapid fire of knocks made me think it was one of Aaron's high school friends. It was nothing for them to stop by late at night on weekends to watch movies. I figured Aaron would beat me to the door so I stay in the kitchen to finish up the milk shake. The knocks changed to the door bell ringing several times. I stopped what I was doing & walked to the door. I could see the police officer standing on the other side of the smoked glass door and felt that sense of dread began to build up inside me.
It's 11:00 pm
I opened the door to a very young, extremely tall Bolivar police officer who looked no more than 15 years old asking me if this was the home of David Sims. As I was answering yes I was wondering with dread what you had done, did you get stopped, get in a fight, get caught smoking pot, were you in jail,,,, but my thoughts never even conceived that you were hurt. You were larger than life, you were indestructible, you were David Sims.
The officer ask if I was your mother. "Yes".
"Mrs Allen your son was found in a parking lot unresponsive and was taken to CMH".
I thought unresponsive meant passed out, as in drinking alcohol. I would later learn it meant you had no vital signs. At that moment I'm thinking he meant you were passed out, so I'm sure the officer was wondering why I was taking all this so calmly. I ask him what parking lot and what were you doing there. He went on to ask me who you might have been with that night & why you might have been in the parking lot of the Esquire.
The Esquire? That's the old movie theater off the square, it's now used as a church. There was no reason for you to be in that neighborhood. You wouldn't have been walking, you supposedly had a double date that night with a new girl you had just met named Mandi, you met her father, why are you in this parking lot?
He repeated the questions as I tried to process why he was asking me these questions but not really saying anything, especially not telling me how you were. He told me that you were found alone. I said that's not right, where was your date? Suddenly it hit me by the weird questioning something was wrong and I heard the words come out of my mouth as if I was standing across the room.
"Is my son alive"?
It had been just 65 days prior to this night that I had ask this very same question to Boo on the phone when he called franticly to beg us to hurry and get to them because they had just been in a wreck and it's bad. At that time I also had to ask him if Aaron was alive. Boo didn't know, he said there was blood everywhere, he said he was covered in blood but he wasn't hurt, at least he didn't think he was hurt. I asked him where Aaron was, Boo couldn't find him. I thought Aaron had been ejected from his truck. Boo said he was trying to find help and couldn't find his way back to the truck. I knew he was in shock and I tried so desperately to stay calm for Boo's sake while my body, mind, heart and soul were screaming in such raw pain and suddenly he exclaimed he found the truck. I ask him was Aaron breathing. He couldn't tell, I ask him to check Aaron's pulse. I'm still amazed to this day that I asked those questions so calmly when all I could hear was that loud high pitch ringing noise in my ear. Rick made it to the wreck before any rescue wirker. I don't even want to know how fast he drove while I stayed on the home phone with Boo. Rick started checking Aaron over relaying everything to me on the phone. He kept saying "Aaron wakeup, it's time to wakeup". I was holding my breath but screaming in my mind please God, please God, please God. Aaron moaned. I never was so relieved to hear a sound like that in my life, he was alive.
At the moment I ask the officer if you were alive. He amazed me when he had this look on his face of total surprise and announced he had no idea but he'd check. Please God, please God, please God. I wonder now if that surprise look was him realizing I had no idea what unresponsive met. Time stood still, my breathing was so shallow as I stood there not moving, all I could hear was this loud high pitch ringing in my ear that I now know is the sound of extreme fear. He grabbed the mic that was attached to his shoulder and called someone and ask if you were still alive.
"Yes"
I exhaled and told the officer I need to wake up Rick. You were in the hospital and we needed to get there.
I thought unresponsive meant passed out, as in drinking alcohol. I would later learn it meant you had no vital signs. At that moment I'm thinking he meant you were passed out, so I'm sure the officer was wondering why I was taking all this so calmly. I ask him what parking lot and what were you doing there. He went on to ask me who you might have been with that night & why you might have been in the parking lot of the Esquire.
The Esquire? That's the old movie theater off the square, it's now used as a church. There was no reason for you to be in that neighborhood. You wouldn't have been walking, you supposedly had a double date that night with a new girl you had just met named Mandi, you met her father, why are you in this parking lot?
He repeated the questions as I tried to process why he was asking me these questions but not really saying anything, especially not telling me how you were. He told me that you were found alone. I said that's not right, where was your date? Suddenly it hit me by the weird questioning something was wrong and I heard the words come out of my mouth as if I was standing across the room.
"Is my son alive"?
It had been just 65 days prior to this night that I had ask this very same question to Boo on the phone when he called franticly to beg us to hurry and get to them because they had just been in a wreck and it's bad. At that time I also had to ask him if Aaron was alive. Boo didn't know, he said there was blood everywhere, he said he was covered in blood but he wasn't hurt, at least he didn't think he was hurt. I asked him where Aaron was, Boo couldn't find him. I thought Aaron had been ejected from his truck. Boo said he was trying to find help and couldn't find his way back to the truck. I knew he was in shock and I tried so desperately to stay calm for Boo's sake while my body, mind, heart and soul were screaming in such raw pain and suddenly he exclaimed he found the truck. I ask him was Aaron breathing. He couldn't tell, I ask him to check Aaron's pulse. I'm still amazed to this day that I asked those questions so calmly when all I could hear was that loud high pitch ringing noise in my ear. Rick made it to the wreck before any rescue wirker. I don't even want to know how fast he drove while I stayed on the home phone with Boo. Rick started checking Aaron over relaying everything to me on the phone. He kept saying "Aaron wakeup, it's time to wakeup". I was holding my breath but screaming in my mind please God, please God, please God. Aaron moaned. I never was so relieved to hear a sound like that in my life, he was alive.
At the moment I ask the officer if you were alive. He amazed me when he had this look on his face of total surprise and announced he had no idea but he'd check. Please God, please God, please God. I wonder now if that surprise look was him realizing I had no idea what unresponsive met. Time stood still, my breathing was so shallow as I stood there not moving, all I could hear was this loud high pitch ringing in my ear that I now know is the sound of extreme fear. He grabbed the mic that was attached to his shoulder and called someone and ask if you were still alive.
"Yes"
I exhaled and told the officer I need to wake up Rick. You were in the hospital and we needed to get there.
I rushed into the bedroom, woke Rick up and told him that the police were here telling me you had been found in a parking lot unresponsive and you're now in the emergency room at CMH, I needed him to get up now.
Rick was as confused as I was talking to the officer. He also thought maybe you were found passed out from drinking and wondering why you would have been dumped off near the square. The police were more concerned with who you were with that night. Rick told him who the girl was and that she was related to Nathan who you were also suppose to be with this night. Rick even went on to tell him that you said she was really sweet and you really liked her. We were wondering if there was foul play and apparently the police were wondering that too. My mind is racing with a million questions, did you go out with this girl, get messed up and she just dumped you out of the car? I was flying out the door telling Aaron to go lay down with Ariel so she doesn't wake up and we'd call in a little while.
We arrive to the ER and raced in just to be told to take and seat and someone would be out to talk to us soon. It felt like we waited for an eternity. Finally a police officer came out and asked us who you were with that night. I was so anxious to to get to you and needed to know you were ok but all the officer did was ask the same questions we had already been asked.
Do you know who your son was with tonight, had he ever used drugs, if so what was his drug of choice? I told the officer that you had been clean for a while and was doing really good but your drug of choice would be smoking pot because you were ADHD and pot slowed your rapid fire thought process down enough to allow you to multitask and because of that medical marijuana needed to be legalized. I didn't want him to see you as some pothead, you were an intelligent man with an IQ of 147 who also suffered from ADHD and social anxiety. Pot just happened to be the thing you discovered that "fixed" you.
I was ready to scream for them to let me back to you but was trying so hard to be calm. Finally a nurse stepped out and said that you were getting a CAT scan and as soon as you were taken back to your room they would come get us. That meant you were alive. I tried to remember what a CAT scan was. I thought maybe you broke something. More questions to ask you when I get to your room.
Rick finally was fed up and ask the officer what was going on. He told us they didn't know every much, that apparently some women were driving by the Esquire and spotted you laying in the parking lot, it was dark and you were unresponsive. They stopped and loaded you up in their truck and brought you to the hospital. Other than that they didn't know anything and neither did we. That little voice in my head whispered "why would women stop in a dark parking lot and pick up a dead body?" I pushed this aside for now, I just needed to get back to you, I needed to see you with my eyes and touch you with my hands.
Your cousins Zach and Boo arrive at the hospital and waited with us to go back to see you. The nurse finally comes out and warns us that you are on a respirator. She explained that when you were brought in you had no heartbeat and were not breathing, you were a code blue. The ringing is building back up in my ears but now I'm feeling this pain shoot through me as if a rod pierced my whole body as lightning struck. My God, you died. Unresponsive meant dead. Don't faint don't faint don't faint
They were able to revive you with an electric shock to your heart but a machine was breathing for you. The biggest problem was they didn't know how long you had been unresponsive or what caused it so they were fighting against time. A brain cannot function without oxygen for very long before damage occurs and we needed to know how long you went without breathing.
The door to the ER is held open for me and I'm running to your room before they can even tell me which room. It's like my body knew on instinct to find you. I get there and find you hooked up to all kinds of machines. The respirator is down your throat and you are gagging trying to cough it up, your chest is seizing and rising off the table. You gag several times then it stops and you relax. I grab your hand and push your hair back from your forehead and tell you I'm here, don't worry, it will be ok. You gag again, I quickly turned to the nurse and she explains that your body was fighting against the respirator and that you would calm down pretty soon. I thought you were having a seizure so it was a relief that it was a normal reaction. I imaged it didn't feel good having that down your throat. I relax a little bit more but I needed you to wake up, to respond to me.
They were able to revive you with an electric shock to your heart but a machine was breathing for you. The biggest problem was they didn't know how long you had been unresponsive or what caused it so they were fighting against time. A brain cannot function without oxygen for very long before damage occurs and we needed to know how long you went without breathing.
The door to the ER is held open for me and I'm running to your room before they can even tell me which room. It's like my body knew on instinct to find you. I get there and find you hooked up to all kinds of machines. The respirator is down your throat and you are gagging trying to cough it up, your chest is seizing and rising off the table. You gag several times then it stops and you relax. I grab your hand and push your hair back from your forehead and tell you I'm here, don't worry, it will be ok. You gag again, I quickly turned to the nurse and she explains that your body was fighting against the respirator and that you would calm down pretty soon. I thought you were having a seizure so it was a relief that it was a normal reaction. I imaged it didn't feel good having that down your throat. I relax a little bit more but I needed you to wake up, to respond to me.
The ER doctor came in and told us that the CAT scan showed no brain injury which was an amazing relief. Now we need to look at the heart or lungs for what happened to shut you down. We were also told that you had a small amount of alcohol and Valium in your system but it was such a small trace that it wasn't possible for it to stop your breathing or stop your heart so it was looking like maybe you had a heart defect or something happened to your lungs.
I ask the nurse what time you were brought in and who they were. She said it was 10:00 p.m and that she didn't know who they were but a woman ran into the ER and said she needed help getting you inside. The nurse said she went outside and took one look at you and focused everything on you because you were blue, not breathing and there was no heartbeat. You were dead. The woman proceeded to tell her as she got your lifeless body out of the truck that she was driving by the Esquire and saw you laying there unresponsive so she loaded you up and brought you here. Your nurse didn't slow down to ask her any more questions because at this point saving your life was her top priority but she did hear a younger woman call the older woman mom. She said the women didn't wait around for anyone to get any more information. She turned around and they were gone.
I ask the nurse if you had your cell phone on you because you never went anywhere without it and that you texted instead of talking to people so maybe it held a clue. She got your bag of cloths and no cell phone was in it. Rick decided that maybe when you were picked up that your phone fell out of your pocket. It's 11:20 p.m and I'm calling your phone to see if maybe the woman that dropped you off has your phone, maybe it fell out in her truck. No one answers. Rick takes Zach and they go to the Esquire to search the parking lot for your phone but find nothing.
I ask the nurse if you had your cell phone on you because you never went anywhere without it and that you texted instead of talking to people so maybe it held a clue. She got your bag of cloths and no cell phone was in it. Rick decided that maybe when you were picked up that your phone fell out of your pocket. It's 11:20 p.m and I'm calling your phone to see if maybe the woman that dropped you off has your phone, maybe it fell out in her truck. No one answers. Rick takes Zach and they go to the Esquire to search the parking lot for your phone but find nothing.
The ER doctor came in and told us that they needed to send you to St John's hospital in Springfield because they were better equipped to handle pulmonary. I wasn't sure what that meant but I figured it had to do with your heart. I thought maybe you had a heart defect or something similar to cause this to happen but in the back of my mind a billion questions raced, why were you in that parking lot, where was your date, where was Nathan, who was the woman that brought you here, where is your phone that is only out of your hand to shower, why won't you wake up.
I asked if they were going to transport you by ambulance because I wanted to let them know that I would ride with you and fear set in when they said no they were airlifting you. Any time someone is airlifted it is a life or death situation. This felt so serious but no one is saying the words. No one is saying you might die or that you are in critical condition. It's all the unspoken words that were like burning needles being pushed deep into my body one at a time but I had no time to think about it because the helicopter was in the air to come get you and it would only take 8 minutes to fly the 25 miles to St Johns while we were stuck driving the car. I kissed you and told you I was running home to grab some things and I would be there when you got to the other hospital.
Time was moving fast. I was in a race with a helicopter.
I asked if they were going to transport you by ambulance because I wanted to let them know that I would ride with you and fear set in when they said no they were airlifting you. Any time someone is airlifted it is a life or death situation. This felt so serious but no one is saying the words. No one is saying you might die or that you are in critical condition. It's all the unspoken words that were like burning needles being pushed deep into my body one at a time but I had no time to think about it because the helicopter was in the air to come get you and it would only take 8 minutes to fly the 25 miles to St Johns while we were stuck driving the car. I kissed you and told you I was running home to grab some things and I would be there when you got to the other hospital.
Time was moving fast. I was in a race with a helicopter.
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