Everything happens for a reason....

I'm usually a firm believer in this. Today my foundation was rocked alittle when I took a call that for the life of me, can think of no good reason for it to have happened.

I got the first of 2 calls from an elderly male who said that a car had just backed up and ran over a child...a 5 year old to be exact. I dont know how long it took me to get the call going, but I'm guessing just a few seconds. The caller was a bed ridden man who has an in home nurse come and take care of him. The boy was the nurses child. Since my original caller was bed ridden, he couldnt give me alot of information, so once I had the call going, thats about all I can do, so I disconnected. At this point, it was just another "poor kid, sheesh" and I was ready for the next call to come ringing into my ear. Low and behold, the next call comes from a cell phone, with alot of screaming in the background, then it disconnects. So I call back to try and find out whats going on and see if someone needs help, or its just a bunch of kids out of school with nothing better to do than prank 911...I'm wishing it had been a prank. On the call back, I get a guy who's a nervous wreck and can hardly talk to me. Come to find out, he's on site of the kid being ran over, I still dont know if he had any relation to the kid or not, at this point, I guess it doesnt really matter much. I try to get some info out of the guy and I can hear what I came to find out is mom screaming in the background, screaming and puking at the same time to be exact. The training kicks in and I start asking for the info that the old man couldnt give me, "is he trapped under the car", "is he awake", "is he breathing", the answers to all 3 being no. I try to get this guy to start CPR, I'm not even sure he knew what the initials meant, but he didnt want to try, I know thats his option, he doesnt have to do it, but I'd have given anything to swap places with him right then. Would it have made a difference if someone had tried? Dunno, but I'd have liked to have tried. My caller said mom was trying to do CPR, but with all the screaming and vomiting, I dont think it was as good an effort as someone else could have done, am I blaming her? GOD NO! I would have been a wreck myself had it been Elliot. Ever since he came along, calls involving kids have impacted me in a way they never used to. No call ever bugged me, ever. Sure some are ugly and remind me how evil man is, but they never upset me or anything. The whole time I was on these calls, it was Elliots face I pictured on that kid, it put a huge knot in my stomach which still 7 hours later is still in my stomach. Several times now today I've thought to myself "whats that mom doing right now", she sure isnt playing with her son, or putting him to bed, or giving him a bath. Her entire families lives must be in total turmoil right now, and I'm guessing it will be a long long time before it resembles anything close to what they considered "normal". Maybe this was a sign that my leaving 911 really is the right decision, for my own sanity, I'm going to treat it as such, I could think of alot better ways god could have pointed it out to me, but thats life. Did writing about this help? yeah, maybe alittle.

As little sleep as I'm going to get tonight, I know that mom is going to get alot less.