Yesterday was bittersweet

July 1 is not an easy day for our family.  It marks an anniversary of the loss of one of our own.  It means another year has passed without her.

We are a small family on my mom's side.  My Mamaw has one brother, my great-uncle Frank.  My mom has one half-sister and one sister.  My aunt Tara has one son, Stewart, my aunt Kim has three children, Nikki, Grant and Ally, and my mom had three girls, me, Lindsay and Morgan.  My Papaw passed in 2001.

On July 1, 2007, a Sunday morning just like many other Sunday mornings, we were getting ready for church.  I do not remember what I was wearing but I remember where I was standing when I answered my cell phone.  I was at the top of the stairs in our very first home when my mom called, "Nikki has been in a car accident and we are on our way to the hospital."

Amazing how your world can be tilted on it's side in less than 20 words and 3.5 seconds.

Details were scarce.  No one knew much more by the time we made it to the hospital ourselves.

What we did know was that her accident was somewhere after 4:00 am.  Apparently, she had been out the night before, dancing the night away, happy and free.  She was on her way home and we are not sure what happened next.  What we knew is that her car had gone off the road to the right, then when back across the highway to the left, hit the guardrail and flipped over into the opposite lanes of traffic.  She was ejected during the flipping.

Someone passing by a few minutes later called in a car facing the wrong direction on the highway, not even seeing her.  When the ambulance arrived, she was taking merely three breaths a minute.  They rushed her to the hospital.

There was an unfortunate delay in her family being notified because of a technicality with paperwork and addresses not being changed after a recent move.

We were all gathered outside the trauma unit, huddled together in a small office barely big enough for a few chairs and a small table.  And it was there that we sat for two days.  Two long days of trying to figure out if our Nikki was going to make it.  Two long days of, "If we can just get her stable enough to move, we can find out if there is any brain activity at all." Two very long, very emotionally tiring, very exhausting, days.  Arguably the worst two days of our family's existence.

It was this final test, a perfusion scan, that would determine if she would remain on the ventilator or if Nikki's parents would have to make a decision I hope I never have to.

When the news was delivered, the doctor took my aunt and uncle into the tiny waiting room that had been our makeshift gathering place for over 48 hours.  In our heads, we all knew before they opened the door and in our hearts we had been preparing to say goodbye.

The traumatic loss of someone you love, I feel, is harder to accept.  That sudden ripping away of someone from you leaves a bigger, uglier scar.

Nikki's passing was an incredibly difficult time in our lives and we all have the scar to prove it.  However, a few positives did emerge- our family, although small, has been tight-knit since, and it was the experience with the nurses and staff that cemented my love for nursing.  The care and compassion the staff showed to us in our time of despair was overwhelming.  I wanted to be a part of that world.  I wanted to be there for someone else's family.

Yesterday marked the 7th anniversary of our loss, but Heaven's gain.

Until we see you again, sweet Nicole.