Help support the Rise of the Phoenix
Not even really sure where to start on this story, but here goes nothing. On June 5th, I made flight arrangements to travel to Florida the weekend of the 27th, to be in North Florida by June 28th, the due date of my future granddaughter. My daughter had my grandson via an emergency c-section, 18 months ago, and was planning to have a scheduled surgery to bring little Jupiter into the world. Everything was scheduled and seemed to be going according to plan.
On June 21st, my daughter had her final doctor’s appointment leading up to the surgery and they advised her that they would need to move the surgery up to June 25th due to scheduling of the OR. It caused quite a stir and was definitely going to throw a wrench in the gears of travel. I quickly jumped into super-parent mode and spent the next three hours changing every travel arrangement that I had. Rental car, hotels, airfare for two people, dog boarding, etc. was all changed in a whim. Not even an hour after making all of the new arrangements and spending hundreds on top of what was already booked, the doctor’s office called and advised the doing the surgery Friday would be one day too soon so now they were going to schedule it for Tuesday. I proceeded to move all of my travel arrangements back to their original dates, losing hundreds in the process, and then the powers above wrote their own version of the story on Wednesday June 23rd and Jupiter Reign was born after a scare and a rush into the hospital for my daughter. This was not the optimal setting we were looking for, but my granddaughter was born healthy, safe and secure and my daughter was doing well after her surgery, so all was good in my eyes. I missed the birth but would keep all of my travel plans in place to spend as much time with the newborn as possible.
June 26th, Jordan and I flew out of Las Vegas headed to Orlando, Florida on a red-eye flight that left at 10pm PST and landed at 6am EST. We were super excited to meet this little girl and proceeded to rent a car in Orlando and drive straight up to Jacksonville with the intent to see the family later that afternoon after a quick nap and time zone adjustment. I got the rental car, loaded our luggage and we high-tailed it to Jacksonville to our hotel. 120 miles later, we pulled into the area of our hotel and stopped at a CVS pharmacy because Jordan hadn’t been feeling well during the trip. My phone rang while we were sitting outside the establishment, and that’s when it all went to hell.
It was early Sunday morning and my daughter was in the back of an ambulance with my grandson. He had been playing with the family dog, a large breed mutt that had been re-introduced into the family after spending a solid year plus up with friends in Georgia. The dog’s playful actions took a quick turn and he bit Phoenix (my grandson) right across his face.
I quickly gathered what I was doing and raced towards Wolfson’s Children’s Hospital in Jacksonville, Florida. I met the ambulance at the same time that they pulled up and found myself quickly behind closed doors with my daughter and the physician team that was assessing his injuries and checking him in from the care of the Jacksonville Fire Department. Phoenix was screaming bloody murder and crying streaming tears of blood. It was immediately a trauma that required several doctors and attending surgeons to asses and to stabilize him to ready him for surgery. Once they stabilized him and called in the surgeons they would need, he was prepped and readied for upcoming surgery and simply needed to wait out the time since last eating the night prior.
At 5pm that day, Phoenix went into reconstructive surgery to mend the wounds and start the process of healing. One puncture on his right cheek was a deep 4mm gash and required 7-8 dissolvable stitches. After a CT scan, it was found that one of the punctures had fractured his nose in several places and would require additional care during the upcoming surgery.
The left eye was the worst injury of all. The dog's puncture pierced clean through his entire top-left eyelid, barely missing his eyeball and it severed completely the tendon that holds and controls the action of his top eyelid. Dissolvable stitches were used again for the eyelid and the area surrounding the left eye. In hopes of saving some functionality of his eyelid, the surgeon stitched his tendon to the eyelid during this surgical procedure. Ultimately it was still great news from Dr. Alvarez of the Nemours clinic, who completed his surgery, that his eyes seemed to have sustained zero injuries that wouldn't heal with time. We were all on bated breath waiting for this news and it was a small sigh of relief when my daughter and I met with the surgeon following his 90 minute operation. They placed protective eye lenses over his eyes to protect the area and then placed his poor little arms in "no-no's", a protective splint that stops him from being able to bend his elbows and would help to keep him from messing with his eyes as the wounds healed and become itchy. He was super groggy from his anastesia but this was the first time that we were able to establish his overall demeanor and get him to start opening his right eye. The following pics are right after he returned to his room at Wolfson's from his surgery.
The days following changed everything about my daughter's daily life. Keeping in mind that Breanna had a c-section surgery herself just 4 days prior to this surgical procedure and there is a new 4-day old little girl that needs her attention in addition to the now injured little man. He was placed on very strong antibiotics and his dressings had to be changed at least 3 times a day and ointment applied to his eyes and his wounds on his face. I can tell you from personal experience that maintaining this schedule for the following three days as we awaited our follow-up visit at Nemours took everything in the tank to complete and to keep up with all of this mentally and physically.
On Wednesday, we visited Nemours and met with Dr. Alvarez. Phoenix still had too much swelling to assess his overall eyesight and eyelid use but she cleaned out the wounds with the help of two assistants holding him down and scheduled us back for July 12th to assess the overall need for a follow-up surgery. By this point, he had been opening his eyes pretty great and really trying to see everything going on around him. The left eye was starting to open after the doctor cleaned him all up in there but the eyelid is still not functioning as normal and the follow-up surgery, if needed, would be to repair the tendon that was severed and hopefully limit the extent of cosmetic changes that will continue to haunt him into his upcoming years.
As you can see from the timeline that depicts one week of healing, this is going to continue to require extensive attention and maintenance to properly heal. My daughter was set to return to work after a few weeks of nursing the new baby but this situation has changed that for the foreseeable future until all surgeries are done and Phoenix can play and be a kid without the eye guards, arm splints and the concern of infections, eyesight issues, etc...
I've donated my time, effort and energy extensively over the past few years, ,especially during Covid and the past year. Medical bills, medical supplies, doctor appointments and travel needs will all cloud the next several months of my daughter's small family. Nick has and will be working full time to continue to make ends meet but it will be a few months before things get back to normal for my daughter and she is able to return to work herself. This is the only format that I've used to tell my extended family and friends about the injury and I appreciate everyone that has even read into our tragedy this far to still be reading this now.
I started this Go-Fund me to help raise some money and awareness for my daughters young family to cover some of the main housing bills and needs that they are not going to be able to fulfill over the next 60 days. I think there will be enough emotional support needed for the next 30-60 days to bypass the concerns of everyday bills and the such, keeping in mind that my granddaughter is still just a few weeks old and the accommodations for my grandson will continue to need to be changed as his recovery and follow-up surgeries occur. Keeping an injured 18 month old busy while bringing a two-week old into the everyday world seems like too much for most to handle but my hat's off to my daughter and her little family. They have sacrificed anything and everything that they need to in order to put Phoenix's healing at the front of all of it.
Every dollar will help! Every donation will help with fuel costs, transportation to work and everyday medical and living expenses that over the next crucial weeks will allow them to focus on his best recovery. Please donate if you can and it nothing else, keep this little baby in your thoughts and prayers as we all wish for a full and speedy recovery. Thank you.