Why There is Blood on my Carpet (also known as the longest run-on sentence ever written)

Has this ever happened to you?

Has your three-year-old daughter woken up in the middle of the night – oh, say around 3:45 am – and then come into your room where she attempts to climb into the reclining chair in your room (where she plans on sleeping the rest of the night) only while climbing up onto the chair, she slips and hits the metal table next to the recliner in *just* the wrong place – that sensitive area right under the nose and right above your lip – so she starts crying, but you are a deep sleeper and your wife isn’t really, so you sort of stir but aren’t too worried because you don’t know that she’s hit her face on the metal table and also because, hey, your wife has got this but then you hear your wife say, “She’s bleeding!” and then you’re wide-awake because you are concerned, not only about your daughter’s well-being but because you’re unsure if blood easily comes out of microfiber, so you get up and the bathroom light turns on and your wife is sitting down with your daughter and blood is just pouring out of her little nose, and it’s kind of scary because the washcloth is filling up with blood and there’s blood running down your daughter’s arm, and she’s freaking out because it hurts and your wife is starting to freak out because she doesn’t know how this even happened and it’s an awful lot of blood and in your head you start to think, “Is this a normal amount of blood for a three-year-old to lose from a bloody nose” but then you remember from your 9th grade health class that you have to apply pressure on the nose to get the bleeding to stop, and so you helpfully begin to say, “We should apply pressure” but then your wife looks at you and says, “I’m starting to black out” and you say, “What?” and then she doesn’t respond, so you take your daughter off her lap and grab your wife’s shoulder and arm, and say, again, “What?” but she doesn’t respond and you let go of your wife’s arm and her entire body just goes limp and crashes backwards into the shower door and vanity, not like she’s trying to rest or lean back for support, but like she’s lost consciousness – because she has – and you pull her forward and try to get her off the closed toilet seat, but she’s unconscious and is actually really heavy because it’s dead weight (not because she’s heavy, mind you!) and you drag her out of the bathroom and lie her face down, but she starts twitching and her breathing seems to stop, and she’s only taking erratic, short breaths, and this freaks you out so you think that the best way to stop freaking out is to get your wife to wake up so you start yelling her name because you have a loud voice – probably the loudest voice of anyone you know – so if there’s anyone who can pull someone out of unconsciousness by sheer volume, it’s you, so you start yelling your wife’s name, along with helpful instructions like, “Wake up” but it’s not working, and your daughter is standing there holding a washcloth which is now entirely drenched in blood, and she’s shaking and you start to worry about her now and questions start racing through your head like, “Is she shaking because she’s cold?” and then you think “Or is she shaking because she’s scared?” and then you think “Or is she shaking because she’s lost too much blood and now she’s going to faint, too?” and you feel this wave of something start to come over you and you think “My wife isn’t responding to anything I’m doing and it’s been a few minutes and her breathing is really weird and I can’t get her to wake up and this isn’t normal and I’m actually kind of scared right now” and so you run out into the kitchen and grab your phone and call 9/11 and as it’s connecting you think about a guy from your church that you know pretty well who is a dispatcher for 9/11 and you wonder if you’ll hear his voice, but it’s a woman, and she takes your info, and says the ambulance is on the way and while you’re on the line, she tells you to turn your wife on her back, which you do, but it’s tough because she’s heavy, mainly because it’s dead weight, not – mind you – because she weighs a lot (no!) and in the time it took to simply flip your wife over, you hear the ambulance rumbling outside and you think to yourself, “That was less than a minute,” but your sense of time is all screwed up, so maybe it was 2 minutes, but it sure didn’t seem much more than that, and you run outside and wave your arms like you’re on an island and they’re in a helicopter search and rescue party, which is silly, but you’re not responding super well to the pressure and the guy yells from the ambulance, “We see you” but he says this with just a hint of “so you can stop that now” which sort of hurts your feelings but you don’t have time for that now, so you run back inside and your daughter is kneeling down by her mommy and saying, “I love you so much,” over and over and your wife is still unconscious and you stare at her stomach to make sure it’s moving – and it sort of is – every few seconds, sporadically and then suddenly 6 huge guys with big boots and yellow pants and red suspenders come in and one of them, who is easily 6’5″ starts asking you what’s going on, and his calmness is contagious and you hear the other guys working on your wife as she lays half in the hallway and half in the bathroom and the big tall 6’5″ guy gets down on one knee and starts talking to your daughter, and you’d think she’d be scared, but she laughs at him and say, “You’re nice” and you show the fireman the bloody washcloth and he calmly looks at you and says, “Yeah, noses can bleed a lot” and you say, “This much” and he – again, so calmly – says, “Yes” and suddenly you feel like everything is normal (or will be normal soon) so you turn your attention to the bathroom, where your wife is now hooked up to some machines and these giant men – maybe they seem giant to me because of their boots? – are saying things in firm but kind voices, things like, “We’re trying to help you, ma’am, you need to help us. Now can you sit up?” And one of them says, “Blood pressure is normal” and the other responds to him and your wife sits up a little and says, “Why was she bleeding” and for the first time in 8 minutes, your wife responds in a sentence and you realize she’s regained consciousness and she starts rubbing her eyes and you assure her that your daughter is okay, and then the fireman says, “We need you to stand up, and if you can’t stand up we’re going to have to take you to the hospital” and so your wife slowly stands to her feet, and you see that her pajama top is dotted with little baby girl hand prints of dark red blood, like a macabre pre-school art project and the men check your wife’s vitals again and ask her questions again, and then say something to themselves, and begin packing up their things because everything has stabilized and these are men who deal with emergencies and so they begin to file out of the house back to their giant machines and your wife is now talking normally and asking what happened, and your daughter is changing out of her blood-stained pajamas and washing off her face and as you walk out to your front sidewalk, you yell a thank you to the men, who don’t turn around, because they are men who deal with emergencies, and the super tall 6’5″ fireman – the calm, kind one who calmed you and your daughter down – says, “No problem” and they shut their doors and the machines begin to rumble off and then you walk inside, close the door, and for the first time, you realize you’re sweating and that your heart is still racing, but everything is okay, and your wife and daughter are calming down and getting ready to climb back into bed and you have the fleeting thought you just cost your city and neighbors probably a few thousand dollars and you feel a little guilty about that, but more than anything you feel grateful that everyone is okay and bummed that your son somehow slept through the whole thing because he would have loved seeing the firemen.

Has that ever happened to you?

Because it happened to me.