Matthew's Zip Line Accident

On Monday, September 10, Matthew had an unfortunate encounter with a zip line. Matthew was waiting for Toby to pick him up from a friend's house after football practice while I was at a P.E.O. meeting in Vale. The nearby barn had a zip line installed in it, and the boys decided to play on it while waiting for Toby. What 10 year old boy wouldn't think a zip line was awesome! Unfortunately, during Matthew's final trip down the zip line, the line became unattached from the wall causing Matthew to crash to the cement floor with his momentum still propelling him forward.

I do not take my cell phone into meetings, so I did not know about the accident. As my mom, sister, and I were saying good-bye after the meeting, Toby pulled up. I was surprised to see his pickup, and as soon as I saw Matthew's face I knew something was wrong. Toby and Matthew frantically tried to tell us what had happened, and as we evaluated his injuries, I knew that he needed to go to the hospital. Matthew had facial injuries and had also chipped his two front (permanent) teeth. Matthew really did not know at that point how bad his injuries were, so we tried to make it sound like a few simple stitches would fix him right up! We quickly transferred Matthew to my car and drove to Ontario. My mom and Tiffany were in Tiffany's pickup, so in an effort not to scare Matthew, they called our dentist on the way and asked him what to do about the teeth. Our dentist is Rhett Tipton, and let me just say, he is amazing! He met us at his office at 9:30 at night! He is so good with kids and did an excellent job of calming Matthew down. While there, we found out that although the teeth were chipped, Matthew should not lose them completely. There was a small fracture in the root of one of the teeth, but Dr. Tipton was pretty confident that the fracture would heal. We did discover; however, that Matthew would have a long road ahead of him to fix the two front teeth.

After the exam by Dr. Tipton, we went on to the E.R. in Ontario. We were there until after 1:00 in the morning! Fortunately, the scans and x-rays revealed that he did not have any broken bones. Originally, they were concerned that his thumb and jaw were fractured, but he was very lucky! On the downside, Matthew received 20 stitches to sew up the two gashes on his face. He was very tough, but was also glad when it was finally time for us to go home. Matthew was quite sore and could not eat very easily, so he stayed home from school the rest of the week. The accident also cut his football season short, as Matthew was not able to play again due to the possibility of re-injuring himself.

Considering how bad the injuries could have been, Matthew was a very lucky boy. Hopefully, this will be our last visit to the E.R. for a while!