Split Second

First, let me emphasize: Luke is perfectly fine.

We had a little scare while we were on vacation. I hesitated to write about it for several reasons, but I decided to do it because it just serves as a good reminder to all of us how quickly things can happen with kids and how amazing God is.

Remember the popsicles on the porch picture from yesterday's post? Right after that, the kids decided they wanted to go swimming at the pool. We were back at the condo in Litchfield. There were three families there - ours, Tucker's and Emmaline's. There was a flurry of activity of kids trying to find swimsuits and flip flops and waterguns and moms trying to find dry towels. Some stuff had been left in the car after the morning at Pawley's Island so there were a few trips down to the car to retrieve lost shoes and pool toys. It was a chaotic several minutes.

I thought Luke was with Kevin. Kevin thought Luke was with me. Where was Luke? It is a horrible feeling especially when a pool is involved. He had gone to the pool with Emmaline's dad (Shaun) and their kids. Shaun didn't know that Luke doesn't know how to swim without his floatie. How long had they been gone? Not sure.

Kevin ran to the pool which thankfully was just down the sidewalk. Our daredevil child, Luke, had jumped in without his floatie while Shaun had his back turned putting sunscreen on his kids. My hands are shaking just typing these sentences. I didn't think Luke would get in the pool without us there. I was so very wrong. Thank the Lord a stranger (an older grandfather type) was in the pool and saw that it looked like Luke was having trouble. He pulled Luke out and set him on the side of the pool. We think this was about the time Kevin got there. We didn't fully realize everything that had happened - like how long he was under or how long he struggled until the gentlemen said something about it later. It is so hard to put into words the absolutely terrifying feeling of "what if". Luke still wanted to swim with his floatie so we let him.**

Of course, we had several conversations with him about how he is only supposed to go in the water if Mommy or Daddy is with him. Fast forward a few hours. He starts complaining that his tummy hurts. I vaguely recall reading about something called dry drowning or secondary drowning(where a person "drowns" from fluid in his lungs long after being in the water like later at night when he is sleeping). Since we hadn't been there and didn't know how long he had been under or how much water he had taken in (Shaun hadn't seen any of it either), we decided to take him to Urgent Care. It might have been overeacting, but there was no way I could let him go to sleep knowing that there might be something wrong. The doctor looked him over and took a chest xray. Everything checked out ok and we went back to the beach house.

It was later that night that I had a complete freak out meltdown knowing that things could have ended very differently for our family that afternoon. This was only Tuesday and we were supposed to stay through Friday. I was ready to pack up and go home, but we stayed anyway.

The Friday before we left for vacation I did a devotion for a Titus 2 women's group that I go to at our church. I talked about Hagar in Genesis 16. It is a great story if you've never read it. At that place, she gave God the name "El Roi" which means "the God who sees me". We talked about how God sees us when we are sad or lonely or frustrated or even happy. I am so thankful that God sees my son and can take care of him and provide angels to protect him (in the form of a grandfather at a resort pool).

This whole situation reminded me that life is so fragile and that I'm not perfect. No matter how hard I try to protect my children and watch my children and take care of my children, I still mess up. I've beaten myself up a million times since this happened and God keeps reminding me that He can take care of my boys so much better than I can.

**Because he still wants to go to the pool and swim and jump in and put his face in the water and isn't acting any differently than before our trip, we're thinking (hoping and praying) it must not have scared him or that possibly the man pulled him out so quickly Luke didn't really have time to panic. Either way, he's signed up to take a few swimming lessons in a few weeks. The focus will be water safety.