Our Accident

My son and I were on our way to run a very normal errand. It was raining and we were merging onto the highway. It was going a bit slower than normal because of the rain and all of a sudden I felt a SLAM from behind me! I remember seeing the sunscreen that I keep in the little pocket on the back of my chair fly forward and hit the dashboard. My son started hollering that his bag between the seats with all of his travel activities had fallen and he couldn't reach his crayons. Out of the corner of my eye I see a vehicle whiz past me and then I realized we had been rear ended and the person had just drove off.

I was still trying to process the whole situation, trying to calm down my son. I just kept moving forward in traffic. Then I realized the entire back window of our van was just GONE! I reached down and of course I had forgotten to grab my phone on the way out because we were just running a quick errand.

I should have probably pulled over at that point but I didn't. This world is scary. That person could have rear ended me then had a buddy come kidnap us once we pulled over. I was alone with my kid in the pouring rain with no phone and was not thinking rationally. I decided to just go grab the things I needed to with my errand (very quickly) then went home and called my husband. But just FYI if you are ever in an accident you are supposed to pull over :) It's kinda a law. But life happens.

Just a FYI do NOT rely on me in a crisis situation. I just can't deal. My husband was calmly asking me what details I recalled of the accident, what time was it, what color was the other vehicle, what road were we driving on. Poor guy got screamed at as I sobbed "I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT THE STUPID CAR LOOKED LIKE THEY JUST DROVE OFF!!!! JUST COME HOME I NEED YOU HOME NOW!" If you know me I am an absolute non yeller! I hate all things yelling, and as I hung up on my husband after cry/screaming all that at him I sat down and thought who the heck am I right now, pull it together! I had held it together pretty well for the sake of my son I think, and hearing my husband's voice I just lost it.

I literally just sat on the couch watching my phone until he walked in the door. I was just so shaken up I couldn't think. There are times when God clearly shows me that he put my husband and I together on purpose and this was just yet another one of those times. He came in with his amazing calmness. Didn't even call me out on hanging up on him and yelling, because he knows me so well that he knew I didn't mean it. Just sat down at his desk and talked me through the next 4 hours or so. Ok sweetie I need you to get a piece of paper and try to recall anything about what happened. I am going to call the police station. Etc etc. He just brought the entire atmosphere of the whole thing into this calm, chill, it's going to be ok situation. Praise God for him. When I was a frazzled mess, he was strong.

Since I had left the accident scene we had to drive down to the police station and fill out paperwork. We drove the broken van there. Again my "the world is a bad place" brain was thinking great the window is broken and we are in a parking garage down town. I quickly grabbed all my baby carriers (which are $100 a pop!) and shoved them into a bag. (Because some thug is gonna come looking to steal my baby carriers in a parking garage down town, but again irrational thinking here they were probably the most expensive things kept in the van haha) and tossed my toddler on my back in another baby carrier and we walked. I'm sure I looked insane with my giant bag of carriers plus the diaper bag and my kid the size of a 4 year old strapped to my back but it's the police station I'm sure they've seen worse :)

I got done writing out my entire statement etc etc (which was about as long as I have typed so far). And realized they had given us the wrong instructions so they were like oh we'll just shred this one and you can do it again. DO IT AGAIN!! Seriously, Do you know how much I just wrote by hand dude! Again my amazing husband to the rescue. He kept the paper I wrote and sat and copied it over to the new paper for me. Didn't even ask just did it. God, thank you.

My son was very concerned about the "ice" in the trunk. I couldn't for the life of me figure out what he was talking about. Then I realized he meant the broken glass. To him the only thing he'd seen shatter like that had been ice. So that's what it was in his mind. He chattered on about that "ice" the whole way home. He kept saying, "It's not nice to hit things mommy, that person wasn't nice." "Will someone hit us again?" Bless his sweet heart. We were able to explain to him that accidents happen. That person wasn't a "bad guy". Most likely just a "distracted guy" looking at a phone or not realizing the traffic had slowed down because of the rain. It does us no good to hold anger toward that person. Accidents happen, could it happen again? Yes it could. We just try everything we can to be a safe driver and trust that God will protect us. Big lessons for a little guy. But we had an open door to talk about it so we talked.

Thankfully one of the guys my husband works with offered us their garage to park the broken van in for the night. They totally didn't have to do that and they will never fully know how much their kindness impacted us. All my worries of leaving the van "open" in our apartment parking lot were gone and I was able to sleep soundly that night. We decided to stop for ice cream on the way home. I think it helped my son to realize things were going to be ok. Fast forward a few days we find out the van was "totaled" as in it was such an old vehicle it would have cost too much to fix it.

My husband was looking for comparable vans to ours for insurance purposes and he found one about 2hrs away same year and model as ours just a different color. He looked at me and said we'd be stupid not to go look at this right? So we took a mini trip and just made a day of it. Bought the van on the spot after a test drive and spent the day at a museum with our son. Kinda funny how something kinda tragic ended up being something to push us to spend some much needed time as a family. I know we wouldn't have made that trip just because. So I am thankful for it in a way.

I was talking to my mom group friends about our stroller that had been damaged because it was in the trunk of the van. My friend found our EXACT stroller for sale online only 20 min away. I grabbed it right up of course! Just so cool how God provided comparable things to what we had. We just had to work for them a bit by driving to get them etc. Isn't that how life is. God has great things for you. Just like we had to drive 2hrs to go find that van and put a little effort in, if you give a little effort to God he'll reward you HUGELY!

I LOVED my window stickers. It was kinda my "thing" and people would spot me in town and be like hey I know you because of your window stickers. So I got all silly emotional about those. BUT it just made me think about life. Most of those window stickers are not things I am currently doing... breastfeeding, cloth diapering, even phasing out of baby wearing unfortunately. Sometimes we hold onto things a bit too long and God just completely has to shut a door for us. So in a symbolic way God took my van and my pretty window stickers. I took it as a sign to move forward with life, and not hang onto the past. Get rid of things that have been "stuck to me" and start fresh.

My son had an extremely hard time letting go of the old van. I honestly did not expect that. He SOBBED! the entire way home from saying "goodbye" to it. (We had to go clean it out etc of course). We tried to explain to him that we would find a new one. He didn't want that at ALL haha :). Then I realized this is the only vehicle he's ever known. His special seat, his special "van only" toys in his bag, the DVD player, riding with his friends to special places etc. This was the first real "tragedy" in his little life.

I ran an errand and left Daddy and my son for a bit and came back and they were sitting together at the computer browsing vans. My husband said, "He keeps saying, "no we can't get that one the trunk isn't big enough for all mommy's stuff". (it was one thing I kept saying that we would need a trunk big enough to hold the stroller etc since we no longer have a garage) Bless his sweet little heart, he was looking out for me.

Our kids pick up on SO MUCH. They have the capacity to feel SO DEEP. I just needed to slow down and remember that it impacted him too. His innocence in the situation kept me sane for sure sweet little guy.

He played "accident", actually still is as I'm writing this, with his cars. "slam, slam slam". "Mommy, his ice broke he has to get a new car now." Kids work out hard things through play. Totally normal. Play is healing for him. He's going to be ok. When we got the new van he was so mad because it was red and he wanted a green one. Sorry buddy a lot more goes into choosing a vehicle than just the color :)

I am not sure why I felt the need to write this all out, maybe it's healing for me too somehow. It stunk because we had just got the oil changed, filled it up with gas, put new plates on, I had recently added a couple new window clings etc etc. And then boom it's gone. Just a reminder that nothing in this life is permanent. We think we have things all figured out and "safe" and "nice" and arranged just exactly how we want or think they should be. Then God throws a curve ball at us. Usually when I curve ball happens it's because we've been stuck in comfort for too long and God has something better in store for us. I was so comfortable in that van, but even though the new one is the same make and model the wipers aren't broken, the glove box closes, the doors are automatic, the storage thing has a cover on it so I can actually use it in this van etc etc. This one didn't have a DVD player but ya know it's not really that important. God took away the not so important stuff and gave us some nicer stuff. Isn't that how life goes when we just trust him :)