The risk of a cheerleader by RandomGuY210, literature
Literature
The risk of a cheerleader
It was the start of her second semester at college. It was nice outside and Julia and her best friend Anna are on the way to their first cheerleader training this year. They started as usual with their warm up and with some stretching exercises. Julia was the girl on top of the pyramid and it took her a lot of training to get there. Today they started just with a little one and that went perfectly fine. They already did a few ones today and they are preparing for the last one when Julia saw Tylor walking near their training place. She always had eyes for him but never had the courage to ask him on a date or even his phone number. When she went on top of the pyramid she saw that Tylor met with a girl and she watched Them. As they both kiss she lost her focus on the sport and just imagine what she would do to that girl that kiss the boy she loves just in that moment. While she was in her thoughts her right foot start to slip off the shoulder from her teammate and when she realize it, she couldn’t hold anymore and slid from the shoulder. she lost her balance falling backwards, trying to hold on a teammate and it nearly went good but she was to high and none of her Mates had the stability to hold a falling person. She fell down on and hit the ground head first. She heard a loud crack and then nothing. Her teammates scream and saw her how she lays on her chest on the ground and not moving. Then she opens her eyes, She tried to stand up but feels how she went numb, breathing got really hard and she saw Anna as she turns Julia around over her screaming for help. She try to mouth that she can’t breath and stare in Anna’s face. Then everything went black. She opens her eyes but it was different, there were no Anna, no other cheerleaders and no screaming. She saw tubes over hear head and heard a rhythmic hiss that she couldn't identify. She didn’t felt any pain but she realized she didn’t feel anything at all. She lays completely flat and could only look up to the ceiling of the room, it must be a hospital room. She tried to understand how she breaths cause she realized that she didn’t inhaled the air by herself. It was to much for her brain to understand and she driftet back to sleep. Next time she woke up, someone was there but she couldn’t move. She tried to talk and move her lips but she didn’t get a sound out. Suddenly a young nurse appeares over her face. „Don’t try to talk Julia, you can’t yet. Try to calm down, everything will become clear soon. Do you have any pain, if so blink one time, if not two times“ the nurse says. Thoughts rushing to their mind as she has so many questions but she try to focus on her question and blink two times. „Okay that’s good. I will inform the doctor and he will come by later and give you more details“ she smiles and disappears. Julia was even more confused than before, why can’t she talk, what had happened, why can’t she move something?? The next hours felt like days for her. She don’t know how nicht time has passed when the door seems to open and someone comes in. Suddenly a few faces looking down on her. She recognizes the nurse from the morning but the other two she hasn’t seen before. „Hello Julia, my name is doctor Carter“ a middle aged woman introduce herself, „you already know your nurse Linda and this is our physiotherapist Doctor Owen“ all of them smiling down on her. Julia opens her mouth to say hello but still no sound comes out. They see the look on her face and doctor Carter try to make her feel comfortable „Julia don’t worry, your voice will come back. You had a serious accident while you had cheerleading training at school. I will do a little test now and tip on different positions at your body and I want you to blink when you can feel it, okay?“ Julia still wants to say yes and mouth it but she also blink. The doctor nods and went out of her field of vision. About 30seconds later she can see her again and as she felt a touch on her chin she blinked and was ready for the test. But the doctor put the pen away and had a sad face while she looks down on Julia. The nurse hands the doctor a X-ray scan and she Shows it up to Julia „As you can see here, that is your head and your spinal cord. There you can see the different vertebrates and as you fell down the pyramid you hit the ground with your head and it shattered your C1 vertebrate completely and with that your spinal cord. I know this is much to take in.“ she takes a few deep breaths and try to smile as she looks at Julia. „That means that you are a quadriplegic now. So you probably won’t be able to move or feel your body below your chin.“ as she said that, julia was frozen. Her face didn’t move a little bit, just staring at the doctor in shock. Julia wanted to scream as loud as she can but still she remains silent and tears streaming down her face. The doctor continues „because of how high it served your spinal cord, the link between your diaphragm and your lungs is also disconnected. You are currently on a ventilator that helps you breathing through the little hole we created in your neck. You probably won’t be able to get off it ever so I have to classify you as a C1 complete quadriplegic and ventilator dependent. I am really sorry Julia“ she says and has a tear herself in her eyes. Julia was shocked. That can’t be true. She was only 19 and has her whole life in front of her and now this. No that can’t be her life, she will getting better and walk out of this room. She still cries in silent as her visitors left her room. She was so exhausted from crying that she went back to sleep. She opens her eyes as she heard her name multiple times, it was Linda her nurse. „Hey Julia wake up. It’s better for you to stay awake a bit. I don’t want that you are awake for the night“ she smiles and wipe the tears away from Julia’s face. „there are a few things that are new now Julia, should I show you and explain about it. If yes blink one time, if no then two times“ she says in a very soft and friendly voice. Julia feels safe for a moment, totally forgetting what the doctor told her a few hours ago. She blinks one time. Linda moves to her head and press a button on the bed and Julia slowly moves up a bit so she is not completely flat and can see her bed better. She can see the tube now that comes from her throat and goes to the side of her, she tries to move her head but nothing happens. Her eyes looking down, her arms laying limp on either side and no matter how hard she try to focus and move them, nothing happens. The same for her legs, they were just laying in front of her but she can’t feel or move them. The nurse pulls Julia’s hospital gown to the side and reveals a diaper. „That’s one thing that happens when your are paralyzed Julia, you can’t control your bowel or bladder anymore. You see here this tube that comes out of the diaper, it’s a catheter that sticks in your urethra and helps you to pee“ Julia was in kind of a shock, she didn’t know something like that would be possible and in need for her to use. Linda grabs the tube and holds it up and then show Julia a bag that hangs on the side of her bed. „Look Julia, your urine just flows trough this tube and then collects everything in this bag so it’s very easy and you don’t have to go to the toilet.“ well the nurse sounds like that would be something good, Julia couldn’t feel it in the same way. „We will talking later about your bowel routine and management but let’s focus now on the suctioning. Because you don’t breath by yourself, you can’t cough anymore and your lungs need to get suctioned with this machine“ Lind shows her a long tube and is kind of nervous what will happen next. „Try to be calm and focus on me Julia. I need to unplug you from the ventilator for the time of suctioning“ Julia panicked inside and her eyes widening as Linda tells her about the procedure. Linda stroke her hair and try to make her feel more comfortable. As Linda pulls the tube out of her trach it feels like suffocating, she try to breath in. Nothing.breath out.nothing. The reality set back in and Linda puts the tube into her trach and start the suction, it feels very unpleasant and Julia can’t keep the tears inside and they rolling down her ckeeks. Linda finished as fast as she can and put the tube back in, you can see the relief in Julia’s face. She looks exhausted. Linda put the device away and stroke Julia’s head „you did a great job, you are so strong“ then she moved to her side and take her arm in her hands, slowly bend it back and forth. Julia stares at her arm while Linda stretches it but she can’t feel a thing, it’s weird to see how your limbs get moved but you wouldn’t even recognize it with closed eyes. She bend her fingers up and straight them a bit, when she let her hand go, Julia can see how her fingers curling back into a fist nearly. Linda does the same with her legs and feet before she went away for few minutes. She comes back with a lot of braces „Julia I have to put them on your feet and hands now so it prevents your feet hand fingers from curling and bending down. It’s just a help for your joints“ Julia blinks only as she watch Linda laying her hands and feet into the braces. What would it change, she couldn’t do anything with them otherwise. After the adjustments on her feet and hands, Linda put something to eat through Julia’s feeding tube. „In the next week we will figure out how you chew food again and starting with talking lessons“ she smiles and give her a final stroke to her hair, then she left. Julia was alone. Alone in a hospital bed, unable to move any part of her body. The sound of the ventilator rushing through her ears every second, reminding her that she is only alive because she is connected to a machine. They will never be apart from each other, connected for a lifetime. As she slowly close her eyes she drifted to sleep. From the first day of a different life. A day that will look like many more in her life and there is nothing she could change about it. One day a cheerleader and the next, a ventilated quadriplegic. Interesting what the new life has to offer for Julia.
My ventilator gently pushed air into me. It's sound and rhythm comfort me greatly, especially knowing that it's responsible for keeping me alive. I love being so dependent that I cannot even breathe without assistance. I watch every day as my caretakers slowly move all of my limbs and suction my trache. I love that I am unable to do any of this for myself, all I can do is move my eyes. I communicate using an iPad above my head that has eye-gaze technology hooked up to it. If I were to try and talk all that would come out is a moan (if that) since I'm almost entirely locked into my body. The only movements that I have are spasms, which are completely out of control and attempt to cause contractures in my limbs. At this point, we have managed to keep the contractures away from everywhere except my hands, which are balled up around my hand braces. Let me explain to you how we got here though since a lot has changed. I was using my walker when I left off last time. That quickly didn't
I'm kind of stuck at the moment with one step too far. I have one more chapter completed but I haven't been able to decide where to take the story next. I'm wondering if anyone who has been reading it has any requests/ideas?