Five years ago just before my little girl came into the world I had one fear and expressed my fear to those in charge.  You see, my first two children were born with the umbilical cord wrapped tightly around their necks.  I was very lucky to have a doctor who didn’t even flinch with them, a doctor who did not even make me aware of what could have been.

Things were different with my third child.  I expressed my fear and explained my concern that the odds seemed high to me having had the same problem with two previous pregnancies.  She didn’t seem to worry, so it put me at ease.  After all, she is the medical professional, not me.

My daughter was blue and not breathing when she was born.  The moment I heard call the NICU STAT, I realized something was not right.  It seems like a blurry nightmare.  After what seemed like hours, she thankfully stabilized and did well.

Today, five years later I finally had the courage to dig deeper into the records from that day.  Not much information was given to us at the hospital.  I now know on that day my daughter was intubated, crashed, had a collapsed lung, and then had her lung blown back up with a needle through her chest.  I am told she almost did not make it.  I am told if she were at a different hospital where they do not have round-the-clock staffing of pediatric doctors, she more than likely would not have made it.

I am very thankful for the doctors who saved her life that day; however what makes me angry is that it should have never happened in the first place.  Research says that more than 70 percent of all medical errors ending in death are a result of miscommunication. I have since learned that babies born with cords around their necks have a simple protocol to prevent situations like this.  Years ago babies died for this very reason.  Today, it should not happen.

Sorrell King’s story ended differently.  Her baby girl, Josie was just 18 months old in January of 2001 when she was admitted to the hospital after suffering first and second degree burns from climbing into a hot bath.  She healed well and within weeks was ready to be released.  Two days before she was to go home she died from dehydration and misused narcotics.

98,000 people die every year from medical mistakes.  This is equal to that of a large plane crashing every day.  The thought of this sickens me.  They tell us we should be more on top of the doctors, ask questions, and don’t think of them as the one with all the answers, the one to trust.  I do realize we are all human and mistakes happen, but why do they not listen?  Why do some doctors not take our concerns seriously and brush us off with vague answers?  Who can you trust with your family’s health, if you can’t trust the doctor taking care of you?

Look around, what have we become? Sure, we all love the finer things in life, but has it gone too far? Do we not appreciate what we have and always desire more? Go back a few, well maybe about 50 years. The majority of people didn’t have what we have today. The ‘rich’ person was few and far between. People thought of this person as someone out of reach and their material things as something that only ‘rich’ people have. Today everyone wants to be that person. So many people want everything. People feel they are entitled to have everything. They are not happy unless they do.

It is everywhere. Greed, desire, want. It is so easy to get caught up in the ‘want’ way of thinking. The word ‘want’ and the word ‘need’ have sort of meshed in the last 20 years. The desire for larger houses, better cars, Pottery Barn rooms, and everything under the sun. Who do we think we are?

Do we really ‘need’ these things. No. Do we ‘want’ these things. Yes. I hear people saying things like, ‘I need a new quilt for my bed because it doesn’t go with the color of the room’. Do you really ‘need’ a new quilt or do you ‘want’ a new quilt? Of course you don’t need a new one. Not unless you have no other blankets in the house to keep warm! When did we start thinking this way?

With the way the world is today I think a lot of people need to take a step back and rethink. Think about the difference between ‘need’ and ‘want’. This is hard thing for some people to come to terms with. I think the best way is to put yourself in a different place. What if the moneymaker in the family suddenly lost their job, you are running out of money to pay your bills, and you may have to give up your house. This is all too often the story of lots of people these days. Put yourself in that situation. Is that new patio set really that important anymore? Do you now look at your house differently? You now want more than ever to just have your house (the way it is) old cabinets and all. All of a sudden it is such a beautiful house full of memories, something you would do anything to keep. You now don’t care about the new furniture you want because it doesn’t match perfectly with the curtains or the redoing the kitchen because the cabinets are not the right color.

I believe more people need to start thinking about the important things in life and not the materialistic things. People say this all the time, but are they really doing it?

How do we teach our kids the value of a dollar and the important things in life if we are not doing this ourselves?  That necessary quilt you want for your bed in your child’s eyes is the same as the ‘want’ they have for the new generation iPod or the brand-name boots.

What happened to the simple life and will it ever be back?