Last Thursday was a big day for our sweet Gracie....in some good ways but also in some not so great ways. I snapped a picture of her as she left that morning, not even knowing what all would happen throughout the day.
The first thing was that she had an orchestra contest for UIL. Her performing group, Symphony, joined with some of the band members to make 'Cinco Symphony' for this competition. She'll have a separate UIL competition later in the year that will be just the string Symphony which is how they perform the large majority of the year.
They sounded sooooo good! They played 3 pieces and then also did a sight reading portion of the competition. They got "1s" in all areas which was a "Sweepstakes" award...the best they could receive. We love that she has the opportunity to be Symphony and learn so much from her director & peers as they practice & perform. They sound so beautiful when they play (most of the time anyway! lol)
The other big thing happening that day was her 1st track meet! She has been so excited to run track this year, and has come home from practices with red cheeks & a large, healthy appetite. They have a large number of participants, and can only take a limited amount to each meet, so we knew she might not get a lot of chances to be in an actual meet. This past week, she was selected to be the "4th runner" in the mile, and we were all very excited. Only 3 participants actually "count," but they can take a 4th who participate in an effort to get experience and work on their personal best. She was well aware what being the "4th runner" meant but was still excited.
One of her friends was throwing the discus, and they were happy to have another friend come to support them.
It was about 3 hours after the start of the meet before the mile run began. It didn't quite go the way we expected it to go. Shortly after the beginning of the race, I noticed that someone had fallen, and then I noticed that it was Gracie! My heart sank. I felt sad for her and was concerned that she had stopped and was turned back towards the start line as if she was going to not run. I knew that would disappoint her if she didn't run. However, they started the race over (still not sure if it was because she fell or because someone else false started... not clear on that part.)
Well, Gracie ran & ran that whole mile and never stopped running. We were so proud of her! She didn't place well compared to the other runners. As a matter of fact, she came in last. BUT, she never stopped running AND achieved a personal best time of around 8:30. Her previous best time had been around 9:02, and her goal for the race that day had been 8:15, which wasn't much below what she ran.
After the race, I noticed her coach spending a lot of time with her and other people around her. They seemed to be looking at her knee and paying a lot of attention to her. I figured she had hurt her knee when she fell. Her coach kept rubbing her back, so I was thinking she must be upset. We were up near the stands while she was out in the middle of the track, so I couldn't see everything well. All of a sudden, we realized they had called the trainer over to see her, so we knew her knee must really be hurt at that point. He had her get on the back of the golf cart and sprayed it and wrapped it up for her. At that point, she pointed us out to her coach and then went to get her backpack and joined us to go home.
It was very sweet that Gracie's friend & dad stayed til her race (the 2nd to last one) to watch her and also, Kevin & Blake came to watch her. It's always nice to have support.
We went to Panera to get something to eat and were asking Gracie about what had happened, how her knee felt, how her wrist felt, looking at her scrapes, etc. Poor thing was pretty beaten up. She said when they first started the race, she got cut off as someone else was trying to get into Lane 1.
Even her face was scraped.
Her poor knee looked awful! Truth be told, it still doesn't look great, but it sure does look a lot better! Her coach took the picture of her sitting on the field right after she finished. I took the up close one after we got home. *ouch*
Well.......she complained of her wrist hurting but wasn't over the top complaining about it. She could move it pretty well, so we just thought we'd watch it and if it was still hurting this week, I'd take her in. Friday morning, she said it still hurt, but still got ready and went to school after Chris bandaged up her knee again.
She texted me from school during 2nd period, saying that it really hurt to write. She said she had to write really slowly or it hurt and wanted to know what she should do. Well, Gracie is NOT one to complain, so we decided I should call the doctor. I called and made an appointment for later in the day and picked her up (a bit earlier than necessary because we'd made plans to eat lunch at school with Katie for her birthday, so we just figured we'd take Gracie with us since her appt time was close to when we'd be at lunch.)
I took her in and the pediatrician wanted to get us in with an orthopedic doctor. She thought about just getting her an xray but with it being a Friday afternoon, she thought we might end up in the ER if it was broken, so she sent us somewhere she knew could do it all...xray and then any other care that might be needed.
I took her in and they x-rayed it. We waited to see the doctor and then he came in and looked at it and said it was a Buckle Fracture. I'm pretty sure he said, "It's broken" before continuing on with the rest of the explanation of the name of the fracture. He showed us the x ray which looked like nothing much to me! After reading more about it online, it appears it is really more of a small fracture rather than what you might think of a traditional break, but to me, a fracture IS a small break. Goodness, it's certainly not whole! It basically says that 2 bones compress against each other, causing a small fracture in one of the bones (or something like that!) It mentions one way it can happen is when someone puts their arm out to break a fall, which is likely what happened. It mainly happens to children or the elderly.
So.....she got a lovely cast & will keep it for about 4 weeks! She knew track practice was going on, so she wanted me to drop her off at school. I halfway jokingly mentioned taking her so she could see her coach, and she jumped at the chance! She had already told me that her coach had been telling other kids about her that day, how she had fallen and kept going in spite of being hurt. She had told at least one other coach about it, too. I think it was making her feel special, which I think is okay.
There wasn't much of practice left, but there was enough time left for her to come home with a cast full of signatures, which I think may have been the main reason she wanted to go in the first place! :) Her coach called me that night and was just dumbfounded that her wrist had gotten so hurt and that she'd completed the race and gotten a personal best, even with being hurt. She told me she'd used her as a life lesson all day and told the other girls she didn't ever want to have any of them fall down and cry and not want to finish after what Gracie had done, and I think all of that was before she even realized how hurt her wrist was! She told me that she hadn't seen Gracie fall but at some point during the race, she noticed her knee and asked her (while she was running) if she had fallen. Gracie told her yes, but when she asked her if she was okay, she said yes. She thinks that it probably didn't look that bad at first, but after running a mile on it, it started oozing. *gross* Her coach didn't know she'd hurt her wrist because she kept asking her if she was okay and if anything else hurt (after the race) and Gracie said she was okay. Gracie is NOT a complainer and is VERY low maintenance. That's how I knew it really was hurt when she DID complain. I'm not sure she herself even realized how much it hurt until after she'd had some time to kind of think about it. She took a test in 1st period that Friday morning, and I think doing some writing for that, and then working on some math later, also made her realize it was hurting to use it in "normal" ways.
We're just so proud of Gracie. She ran that race, hurt, and never stopped (except for the short moment when she first fell) and finished last BUT with her own personal best time. She is so determined and so dedicated to doing what she knows she's supposed to be doing. We give glory to God for blessing her with the strength to be who she is! She's pretty much our hero.
