Missing Without A Trace

by Rider, Tanya

  Someone tapped him on the shoulder. Tom turned and looked at a woman, without really seeing her.

  “My name’s Susan,” she said. “I’m the patient media rep.”

  Tom finally understood. Susan explained that she would help him to face the media. She was very calm, which unnerved Tom at first but, in time, her measured responses eased his stress.

  “She’s not here yet,” Tom said, frantically. “How is it that she’s not here yet?” Had he actually beaten the helicopter to the hospital? Though he had rushed through traffic, he figured that the helicopter should have landed before he got there. From what he could gather, Tanya had been transported to the local golf course for the airlift.

  Tom paced a while before a nurse took him to a family waiting room, then he went outside to smoke the last cigarette he had on him. He was desperate for answers and his head was still spinning, but he realized that Tanya must have been alive—or clinging to life—if they were airlifting her. He returned to the family waiting room and Adam called again.

  “I can see the chopper coming in!” he said.

  Tom could hear the thumping blades of the chopper approaching the hospital. His heartbeat quickened. He would see his wife again!

  “Thanks, man!” Tom said. Relieved, he tried to bolt through the door.

  Susan intercepted him. “You can’t go that way” she said in her characteristically calm voice. “And you won’t be able to see her until after she goes through triage.”

  Adam arrived and Tom started to relax. He and Adam walked back to the waiting room but it took another smoke plus ten minutes before the staff gave him permission to see Tanya briefly. Arriving at the triage area, Tom and Nancy, Tanya’s mother, found the floor littered with wrappers from the medical materials. He could tell that the emergency crew had done a lot in a short time, but it was evident that they had much more to do.

  When Tanya’s eyes found Tom, they softened and tears welled up in them. As the medical team wheeled Tanya past them, Tom saw the gash on her forehead, where a flap of skin was bunched up and scabbed in place. The medical team took his wife and disappeared around the corner. Tom looked at the x-ray hanging on the lighted board and saw a clean break of her collarbone.

  Tom and Adam walked into a busy hive of news people who came from all directions with about six cameras and a dozen microphones pointed at him. Spilling out of their news vans, the cameramen stumbled over each other to keep up with the reporters.

  “Mr. Rider!” they called. “Mr. Rider, do you have a comment?”

  “My wife is alive,” he said. “But barely.”

  Rushing to stabilize Tanya, doctors in the Harborview Emergency Room completed blood tests, x-rays and CAT scans. Since she was dehydrated, they intensively infused fluid near her heart. Her body temperature had dropped from the normal 98.6 to only 87.6 degrees, so they aggressively rewarmed her body. Her blood work revealed that she had too much sodium and acid in her blood. Further, her muscles had begun breaking down, releasing muscle fiber contents into the blood, which contributed to kidney damage. She was in acute kidney failure. Her lungs had leaked and she had air behind the abdominal cavity lining, in the middle of her chest, and in her right armpit. Her left shoulder was dislocated and she had fractures of her ribs, left clavicle and a spinal vertebra. A deep laceration on the left side of her forehead cut through her eyebrow, exposing the connective tissue sheath that covers the bone. From her seat belt, she had pressure ulcers on her pelvis, legs and abdomen, and deep patches of dead skin dotted her chest, abdomen, left elbow, both hips and both legs. And neither of her legs had a pulse.

  Not only had Tanya been trapped in her vehicle, but her body was crushed. Her bones were broken and her lungs were leaking while she wasted away without food or water for eight days.

  The Emergency Room transferred Tanya directly to the Intensive Care Unit, so Tom went up to the ICU waiting area. He was in a good spot to see Tanya as they wheeled her past him. She looked peaceful and beautiful, though she had an oxygen bag over her face and wasn’t breathing on her own. Allowing the medical personnel room to work, Tom stayed back, but it pained him to be so close to her and, yet, unable to touch her. Desperate to help, he couldn’t.

  Finally, the doctor gathered Tom and Nancy, Tanya’s mother, into a private conference room, where he talked about Tanya’s condition in general and her left leg in particular. The muscles, nerves and blood vessels in Tanya’s leg had been compressed for so long that the leg had developed ‘compartment syndrome.’

  The doctor said they had two options—removing the leg or trying to save it by performing a fasciotomy. This surgery had only a twenty percent success rate. If it did not succeed, Tanya—who ate only health foods and exercised faithfully every day—would lose her leg. While the doctor was trying to finish his explanation, Tanya’s mother jumped up. “Take it!” Nancy screamed. Several times, Tom had to ask Nancy to quiet down so he could get all the information from the doctor, so that he could make an informed decision. Tom knew that Tanya would want to save her leg so that she could exercise, and the doctor said that it would not risk Tanya’s life to try to save it. For Tom, this was the determining factor. He knew that, if there was even the smallest chance of success, Tanya’s love of working out would win in the end and she would make it work. He made the call to save Tanya’s leg. The medical staff rushed Tanya to the Operating Room for the emergency surgery, in which doctors relieved the pressure by cutting away the connective tissue covering her muscles.

  In the waiting area, Tom’s two phones rang nonstop. The missed calls and messages piled up. Late in the evening, Susan told Tom that the media were requesting an interview and she offered to set up meetings with the press, which Tom agreed to do so he could get it over with. Susan would need a few hours to set it all up.

  To reduce the amount of shock on Tanya’s body, the doctors put her into a medically induced coma. When Tom saw her after the operation, she was on a respirator. Longing to hear her voice, Tom watched her sleep. Her pulse was steady but she looked so frail, so thin. Her face was drawn and taut. Above her left eye, her forehead was bandaged, but he still thought she looked beautiful. Someone had braided her long blonde hair and coiled it into a bun to keep it out of the way, but dirt and blood still infused the matted mass and Tom found himself picking bits of glass from Tanya’s hair. Her fingertips and knuckles were scabbed black. She had large bandages covering her torso, right thigh and her left leg, from her hip to her ankle. Tom sat silently watching her chest rise and fall to the rhythm of the machine that forced oxygen into her airways.

  The nurses came back to check on Tanya and change her wound dressings. As the nurses moved Tanya, her moans tore at Tom’s heart. To get out of the way, he left the room and wandered away for a while. When he returned, he sat and watched her for about an hour. Except for his prayers, his mind was empty.

  At about three in the morning, it was time for Tom to face the news crews that had set up individual areas as their sets. The lobby was a mess of wires, lights, cameras and clamoring reporters, all wanting to break the story and all asking the same question: “What happened?” But only Tanya could answer that question. Susan directed Tom to sets for Good Morning America, TODAY and then others—the next and the next. Finally, he gave a press conference to answer questions from all of the local news crews. In each interview, Tom complained about the red tape but praised the Sheriff’s office.

  A news crew got him a hotel room, where he went for a shower, and then he checked on Tanya, who lingered in the deliberate coma. Tom came and went, looking in on her, sitting with her, hanging out in the ICU waiting room, and wandering around the hospital before he returned to sit by her side.

  In the mid-afternoon, he found his way back to Tanya, who was still on the respirator. Her chest rose and fell and her eyes danced under their lids. Tom smiled, hoping she was having a nice dream. Looking at her, Tom considered the irony of what had happened. Before the accident, he and Tanya had final
ly been happy. For the first time, Tanya had seemed to be elated, finally living the life she had deserved to have from the start. Both of them had been in a great mood. Working for what they wanted, they chased the American dream and felt as if their lives were in perfect order—financially, physically and emotionally. Leaving all of their family turmoil in the past, they had moved on, made a clean break from Tanya’s family a few years earlier, so the endless drama of Tanya’s mother competing for her grandmother’s favor had been stripped away. It had been liberating, like dropping dead weight. Indeed, everything had felt so right. And, then, in an instant, it all came crashing down.

  The nurses returned to the room. They needed to move Tanya and, when they did, she cried out with tortured sounds, even though she was in a coma. While the nurses worked on Tanya, Tom wandered away to roam around the hospital for a while. When he returned, the nurse told him that they’d just removed the respirator. They had tried to do so earlier, but she hadn’t been strong enough to breathe on her own. “This time,” the nurse said, “she’s doing just fine.”

  Tom went to her and saw that her color was returning. Taking slow, deep breaths, she looked like a sleeping, peaceful angel. A halo of golden hair surrounded her face, and Tom realized that someone had washed out the blood and redone her braids, although it was still very tangled. He also noticed that he finally smelled Tanya’s familiar scent, not the sick smell of blood.

  Tanya’s doctor came in.

  “How is she?” Tom asked.

  “Well, she’s breathing on her own and her kidneys are back to one-hundred percent,” said the doctor. “All in all, she’s doing much better than we could have hoped.” The doctor smiled with confidence at Tom. “We’re going to keep her unconscious for another day or so, to give her body more time to heal.”

  Tom looked down at Tanya and noticed a slight smile across her lips. Wherever she was, Tom knew that it was pleasant. After the doctor left the room, the nurses came in to change her dressings again. After enduring the regimen for a few days already, he knew that the entire procedure took the nurses about three hours. He left the room.

  Tom avoided the news crews and walked with his friend Jonathan out to his car. Jonathan worked for SoundBuilt, the small company that tom worked for. Jonathan told Tom that Gary, their boss, was going to pay Tom for his time off and that he didn’t have to return to work until Tanya was ready. Tom’s coworkers at SoundBuilt offered to give Tom their vacation time and help with the house. Jonathan also offered Tom his condo near the hospital, so Tom could shower, change and rest when he needed to, and then he took him to the mall to pick up some clothes. SoundBuilt paid the bill, and then Jonathan treated Tom to a hefty steak for lunch.

  When Tom wandered back to the hospital, he found a cart full of flowers and a growing stack of cards and letters from around the world. While Tanya slept in the coma, Tom read some of the letters to her, believing that she could hear his voice at some level.

  The doctor returned with more good news. They would keep her in the coma for a while longer, but her kidneys continued to function at one-hundred percent. Her leg was still in jeopardy but it, too, was slowly improving. As the hours passed, and days turned into night, Tom continued to meander through the hospital hallways whenever the nurses came in to change Tanya’s dressings. He’d eat an energy bar or gulp down a cup of coffee or a 5-Hour Energy shot, and then he’d return to sit by Tanya’s side. Refusing to sleep until Tanya was out of danger, Tom picked up more of the cards and read them out loud to her.

  My most powerful first memory was seeing Tom. Stronger than anything, clearer than the pain of those first days, the image of his face is the first thing I remember. They had me so loaded on medication that I wasn’t sure any of it was real, but the first thing that I knew was real was Tom. He was standing over my bed, smiling at me.

  Another time, I woke up and realized that there were lots of people around me, fiddling around my legs. I asked the nurse for something to drink.

  “We have juice,” she said.

  I was disoriented. I had no comprehension of the seriousness of my situation, so I looked at her and asked, “Does it have sugar in it?”

  “We have water,” the nurse replied.

  “Bottled?” I asked innocently.

  The nurse stared at me, incredulous. She couldn’t believe that I’d be so picky.

  Then, another nurse tried to get me to tell her what had happened. “Do you remember going off the road?” she pressed me. “Did you fall asleep?”

  I didn’t even know who was asking me the questions. Though I had asked for my glasses, no one could find them and I couldn’t see past the edge of my bed. This added to my fears, as I couldn’t even clearly see the faces of the people around me.

  “I don’t know,” was all I could tell her.

  When Tom returned to Tanya’s room, her mental fog had lifted. She was coming out of the coma and he was elated. But, then, Tanya spoke.

  “Why did you leave me down there for so long?” she asked, scowling at him with pure hatred in her eyes.

  Tom had never heard her speak in such a cold, hateful tone. He looked at Tanya and felt crushed by the look of pure loathing on her face. Tom noticed that Nancy was soaking up all the turmoil and she seemed to be enjoying the look of pain on Tom’s face. He looked at Nancy. Tom realized that Tanya’s mother had been in the room, talking to Tanya, before Tom walked in and he couldn’t help but wonder if Nancy had put the thoughts into Tanya’s head.

  “I called you for help,” she added. “I even called the police and they laughed at me!”

  Tom couldn’t bear it. He was stunned, and felt the blood drain from his face. Heartbroken, he didn’t know what to say or do, and he couldn’t bear the look on her face or the tone in her voice. His mind reeled. He turned and left the room.

  Walking down the hospital corridor, he latched on to something she had said. Had she really called 911? Shaking with anger, he fumbled through his stack of business cards, found the detective’s number and left a voice mail. Then he called the radio shows to vent his anger. He wanted to use the media to get the message out that what had happened to Tanya should never happen to anyone. He wanted to honor her survival by making sure that such disasters didn’t happen to other people. He wanted to tell the world that 911 operators need to be trained to handle missingperson reports with understanding, compassion and urgency, and that police departments need to establish more effective criteria to safeguard human lives.

  After Tom’s rant, the Sheriff called one of the local radio shows, trying to curb the damage to her department. Then, the Sheriff called a press conference. Although she hid behind “procedure,” she did apologize to Tom for the “poor customer service” he’d received from those who served under her command. That was worth something, Tom thought, feeling vindicated that, at least, he had made the Sheriff see why the system needed to change. But it wasn’t enough. And, as soon as Tanya was found, it seemed to Tom like the games began. Tom thought the Sheriff’s office acted like a small child playing a game of “Look over there! Don’t look at us!”

  Tom walked into my room and I gave him the best smile I could manage.

  “What happened?” I asked. “Why am I in the hospital?”

  “You were in a car accident,” he explained.

  “How’s my car?” I wanted to know. “Is my Element okay?” It was the first new car I had ever gotten and I loved it! Tom told me not to worry about anything but getting better. Then, he said something that confused me.

  “Babe, you’re a miracle,” he said.

  “What? A miracle?” I asked. I didn’t understand how I could be a miracle. “Why?”

  I tried to get him to tell me what he was talking about, but he wouldn’t. “Not yet,” he said. “Just concentrate on getting better so you can get out of here…”

  “I don’t understand,” I persisted.

  “You were lost for awhile and then we found you,” he said. “That’s enough for
now. Don’t worry. You’ll have your car when you’re ready and we have all the time in the world. Just get better and I’ll take care of everything else.” I could tell by the look in his eyes that I would not get any more answers, so I let it drop for the moment.

  I was heavily medicated for the next few days and my mind and memories were blurry but I know that over and over and again and again, I asked Tom about what had happened. I wanted the full story but he kept telling me to just worry about getting better. Then, a few times, he said more, but he stopped when he sensed that I couldn’t handle any more. He was right. I couldn’t handle much at first. “We’ll stop there, for now,” he told me. “Just know that you’re loved.” Still, sometimes, I’d forget and ask him again.

  It took me a while but, the more I learned, the more I saw God’s hand in it. How else could I explain it? To live for eight days is well beyond the odds. I believe that He kept me safe and, mostly, whole. For the most part, I still have all my parts. Some are changed, some are banged up, and most have new scars, but—even with the scars—they’re still mine.

  The lead surgeon entered the room with an entourage of nurses and medical students.

  “We have to get her ready for surgery,” said an older charge nurse. “So, you’ll have to come back later.”

  Although he had only been able to spend a few minutes with Tanya, Tom felt revitalized. He was grateful that they had Tanya so doped up that she wasn’t in as much pain and didn’t seem to remember what had happened. When he came back, he brought Tanya her cell phone, which she kept under her pillow so that she could call him whenever she needed to.

  Meanwhile, some good Samaritans had gone to the accident site and searched for things that had been left in the ravine. Among other things, they found Tanya’s social security card, a book that contained the plans for the house she and Tom were building, and other important papers. The person had retrieved the items and returned them to Tanya with a note that said, “I thought you may need these.” As a true act of kindness, this gift was given to Tanya with no claim for credit. This good Samaritan gave part of Tanya’s dream back to her, without even leaving his or her name.