In the case of Evy Richardson, it was her uncle's Pug.
THE FIRST ATTACK ON LITTLE EVY
It was a Sunday, March 31, 2013, Easter Sunday to be precise. We had woke up to the Easter bunny visiting and sharing in family Easter time. We went to church service and came home to change into Easter ‘fun’ clothes to go to grandmas home. We lost grandpa suddenly to cancer that last summer, so this served significant as the first Easter without LaLa physically around. We were excited that MoMo (grandma) decided to continue tradition with Easter dinner and the annual egg hunt for the children. Mom, Dad, Evy and her big brother Cohen headed to MoMo’s for an afternoon of fun.
We arrived to hundreds of eggs which instantly got the children excited. Little 2 year old Evy was old enough to put eggs in her own basket and began collecting. We were casually visiting as the children gathered eggs.
Evy’s uncle's dog was in a dog pen, also on a tie down since he said he had been escaping lately. We noticed Evy talking to the dog, however did not see the danger.
She approached the pen and placed her hands on the chain link, within seconds she began screaming and frozen in her steps. She was holding her cheek and we saw blood. I rushed and grabbed her and my husband rushed inside to grab a towel. We knew it was bad enough to go to the hospital. We put her in the car and drive 20 minutes to the nearby hospital. There they called in a plastic surgeon. We were all trying to figure out based on the injury what happened since the fence served as a barrier between the dog and Evy.
Animal Control came in and we filed the report that the injury was caused by a dog. Insurance classified it as an attack. The surgeon believes based on the injury, it was either a ‘fang’ tooth that snagged and tore her cheek or a dewclaw. Either way, she required plastic surgery the next morning and ended up with 10 dissovable stitches.
We kept our distance from the dog ever since. In fact my husband's job took us on a temporary move out of state. When we moved back home to Tennessee on October 3, 2014 everything that could have went wrong did. The truck was late, utility installation was late, etc. We foresaw a long night of unloading the truck through the night to get it unloaded without extra fees.
MoMo stopped by our new home on the way home from work. She had the next day off and asked if she could take the kids for an overnight stay at her house while we worked on our own home. We saw no danger in that. After my fathers passing, she also had a new smaller home and the grandchildren had not seen it yet. They were excited to stay at MoMo’s new home. Off they went for an awesome, sugar-filled, anything goes kind of night with MoMo.
My husband and I worked all night on getting things unloaded and setting up the kids bedrooms. I got a phone call around 11am from MoMo asking how things were going. She told me she was getting them lunch and they slept great. She said she would let us sleep a little bit, but would bring them back around 1-2pm. She said their uncle Sam was getting their shoes on to go play in her fenced in back yard. I was relieved that they were experiencing a little ‘normal’ while we were in chaos. I quickly went back to unpacking.
THE SECOND ATTACK ON LITTLE EVY
Within 30 minutes, I got a phone call and my mother, MoMo, was in complete distress and said that Cosby (unlce Brian's Dog) was kept in the backyard and he has bit Evy. All she would say, “Its bad, Emily. I am so sorry. It is bad.”
They were headed to their hospital. I was about 30 minutes or more away with a Dish network installation technician on my roof. I yelled to him I had to go. My husband heard me yell and asked what was going on. I was frantically searching for my keys and said ‘Evy has been bit by Cosby and it is bad. They are headed to the hospital with her.’ He had tools in hand and dropped, we left.
We made it in 20 minutes. We met her brother, Cohen, outside with Uncle Sam. Sam hugged me and said, “I am so sorry, its bad.”
Cohen said, “Mom, Evy has a bloody face and is in there with the doctors. The dog chewed her face.”
I ran through the ER to find my 4 year old lying in a gurney, gauze taped over her right Eye, sobbing, blood stained clothing on the ground, urine smell, and holding a huge amount of gauze over her left cheek.
I asked if I could see it and she removed the gauze to the horror of my eyes. This dog did not bite anything, this dog ripped my child’s face apart.
I was instantly ill to my stomach and light headed. I crawled on the gurney and held my baby. I thought, “I thought she was safe. How could this happen? Why did this happen?”
I began to listen to doctors guess what would happen, Animal Control coming in, MoMo telling me her story…all of it blurs. I just wanted to know how to fix my baby. We got her in light sedation and began discussing options, none of which could be completed at this hospital. We required transport to Children s Hospital.
They arranged ambulance transport to Vanderbilt Children s Hospital. They medic team prepared me for skin graphs and the lengthy hospital stays to come. Animal Control informed me they would send someone over to get the dog, but not until tomorrow (Why not now? They said the weekend they do not have the staffing).
We began the 1 hour trek to the Children's Hospital. I rode in the ambulance with my sedated child, face torn to pieces, bloody and bruised and just cried. How could this have happened? I felt like a failure of a mother. We have trained our children since the could speak that our job as parents is ‘To protect them and Get them what they need’. I failed….I failed our own household motto. I did not protect my child from this monster.
After they finished and she was in recovery the doctors & surgeons came to talk to me. They told me the pattern appeared with a clean bite over the eye which should heal nicely. There was 15-25 stitches there. They told me that the dog bit and ‘shook’ her cheek and ripped through 5 layers.
They found out the dog had no vaccines and it was a dirty bite. They did their best to clean it, but no guarantees. They explained based on the patterns if no one was there to stop it the next would have been her neck. My heart sank. I could not believe it, for whatever reason she was okay and I was going to take her home. Thank you God!! PTL – She was going to be okay.
We came home within 24 hours. Within the week we noticed healing was not so great. There were green pimples forming on the surface of the injury. Turns out that was bacteria and the body trying to fight the infection pushing it to the surface. This required another surgery.
She was in the hospital for 3 days monitoring the removal of the infectious pimple like things and the further infection.
We watched as the cheek healed. There was a moment when it began to separate and not come together. They required a slight sedation and gluing of the injury site on the cheek. This was considered the third surgery.
From that point we focused on the trauma portion. Evy had night terrors where she would wake up screaming and pee herself. This was the reaction when her attacked her and she lost bodily function. We underwent 3 months of therapy to be diagnosed PTSD. She was doing really well. We still deal with any upset she calls for MoMo as that is essentially who saved her life.
She had her first reconstruction on May 13, 2015 and it went amazingly well. She did regress into nightmares after that surgery so we are re-entering therapy which will likely come for the rest of her life. There will be many things that can trigger different things for her of that day.
4 surgeries later we have our daughter, she has a battle wound, but is still here. After each surgery, including the very first one, she woke up each time and asked the Recovery Nurse, ‘Am I still a princess?’. We try everyday to make sure she knows she is a princess and one of the bravest ones we know.
The Dog, what happened to it?
The dog was placed in a 10 day isolated quarantine where it was monitored for aggressive behavior. Since they did not find any, the dog was returned to Evy's uncle, the owner, and he was charged cost of stay and charge $150 fine. He is required to put up ‘Beware of Dog’ signs and the dog is county registered as a dangerous dog. If those signs are not up, he could get fined between $5-25.
We are fighting everyday to change this. We do not want dogs like these available to attack any other person and/or child.
Emily Richardson
(Daxton's Friends - May 27, 2015)
