Reaching Forward

9

After their appointment at Meredith's OB/GYN, the couple parted ways to get ready for a long day at work because no sooner than they had went on call there was a head trauma case arriving. Since all of the other interns had been on rounds earlier, they were already assigned to other attendings. So, Meredith was paired with Derek.

Meredith, Derek, and Bailey were waiting outside of the emergency room doors when the ambulance arrived. The EMT who was rolling the stretcher with a young girl on it began to recite the patient information, "Mia Hanson, five year old female crush injury to the abdomen and blood trauma to the head. BP 90/60, pulse 110."

Derek had seen many children with head injuries before and it had always been awful to see but this time it went deeper. Being the professional surgeon that he was, he had learned to push those feelings aside until the patient was well, "How was she injured?"

The EMT paused only for a millisecond, "Backed over by her mom's SUV."

Upon hearing this, Derek side glanced at Meredith; he wished that Meredith wasn't there to hear that but he couldn't worry about that right now. He had to save this girl's life. While he and Bailey moved the girl into the ER, Meredith stayed behind with who she assumed was the girl's mother to get more patient information.

Surprisingly, Meredith was able to stay calm through all of this. It was her job and she knew that being pregnant wasn't going to diminish her ability to do her job. It wasn't until what came next that threw her off. Apparently, the woman she was taking to wasn't the child's mother; it was her nanny. Meredith knew all too well about having a nanny. She had several growing up as a child and they were all stern, like her mother. That's probably why Ellis would hire them in the first place.

After getting all of the required information, Meredith was now in the ER examining room with Derek and Bailey. While they were searching the girl's head for the exact cause of her brain trauma, the father entered the room. He began laying blame on both of the women. But, mostly, he was upset at his wife for not being able to forget about her job for five minutes to watch their daughter. Bailey took this time to live up to her Nazi name and give them all a wake up call by telling them that it was the car's fault.

Meredith couldn't help but wonder if this is what her parents' relationship was like, her dad yelling at her mom about not being home enough and too concerned with her job. Actually, she figured it was only partially like that. Her dad did disapprove of her mom being at work so much but from what she had seen of him it didn't seem like he had the nerve to say anything to her mother.

Derek proceeded to order a CT scan so Meredith wheeled the girl upstairs while Bailey followed. Once they arrived, they were having a hard time trying to get the girl to stay still so the scan could take the best picture possible. The girl kept saying she was scared. Meredith tried to comfort the girl by saying that her mommy and daddy were here even they were barely paying any attention to her. So, she tried to tell the girl that it was just a big camera that was going to take her picture. The parents finally came over to their daughter and the mother tried her hand at soothing the girl but she just cried out for her nanny. Meredith watched as the mother ignored the comment and told her daughter to be very still but the girl still wanted her nanny. In the back of her mind, Meredith continued to tell herself that she wouldn't let her child end up like this but it didn't help that all her experiences told her otherwise.

Being brought back to her thoughts when the mother starting singing, the girl became upset again for it seemed that her own mother didn't even know her favorite song. Meredith just stood there in silence; she almost felt pity for the parents. Almost being the definitive word here.

Once the CT results appeared on the screen, Bailey discovered that there was internal bleeding in the girl's abdomen and they would have to control that before any brain surgery could be preformed.