Hey, everyone. 

I know I'm not a common poster, but I'm sending out a message for my nephew, and for my sister, Angela.

One of her youngest twins, Jacob, is in the hospital awaiting surgery.  They plan to operate tomorrow morning, at 8am.

A week ago, last Friday, Jacob was playing outside and cut his leg. He was bleeding profusely, and my sister rushed him to the hospital, where the doctors said he had cut a vein, but fortunately, missed the artery. They stapled his leg, prescribed some antibiotics, and sent him home.

The very next day, the wound opened up and started bleeding all over again, of course, and he was rushed back to the hospital, where they basically did the exact same thing, only using stitches, instead of staples.

By Thursday, he had dark hollows under his eyes, and the leg had swollen quite a bit, and he was taken back to the hospital, where they finally took some scans, before sending him back home.

Yesterday morning, the hospital called them back.

The resulting information is this.

The doctors at the first hospital were as wrong as wrong could be.  He DID in fact slice through the artery in his leg.  The staples closed the skin, but not the artery, and so the blood pooled into his thigh, which caused his leg to swell, until the blood began to seep through the staples.  How the doctors missed this "again" after so much bleeding is beyond my comprehension.  When they stitched the wound the second time around, the bleeding continued, and created a pocket inside of his leg that, amazingly, is what helped to save his life, because this huge pocket of blood put enough pressure on the artery to stop the bleeding, while the pooling blood became a clot.

According to the doctor, my nephew should have died 4 days ago.  He's already lost 10 percent of his blood and ... There are more details to the story, but the main point is this.  

He isn't out of danger, yet.  The blood clot could loosen at any time, and he could bleed to death, within minutes.  The surgery that he is scheduled for is a long one.  He's going to need transfusions, of course, because in order to close the artery, they are going to have to remove this clot, which will open it back up, first. 

I'm writing on behalf of myself and Angie, to ask that you pray for our Jacob, and for the physicians who are treating him.

Thank you so much.

-Nikki