He Didn’t Use a Toy Car to Help Me

Peter Mills is a late night security guard with American Fork hospital. Recently there was this story about how he gives cars to children brought into the ER late at night. It’s a great story and you should go read it. I’ll wait.

Welcome back.

My connection with Peter Mills goes back several years. It was late one night in 2009. We were at home and my son was recovering from surgery and was having a particular bad night. He was in terrible pain complaining especially that his legs were hurting. We were monitoring his temperature throughout the night. At 3:00am it spiked to 108.9. We rushed him to American Fork hospital as he went into shock.

It’s a horrifying feeling to watch your 9 year old son go from screaming in pain to completely catatonic. I honestly thought he had died in my arms. The doctors immediately went to work on him and after about 10 minutes he screamed. Nothing ever sounded so good to me.

Have you ever held your breath for 10 minutes? You can do it if the world is ending.

I started to breath again. And then I started to cry. I cried like I’d never cried before. . .or since.

Peter was working that night.

It was just him and me in the waiting area of the Emergency Room. Thirty minutes and an eternity later I’d pretty much cried myself out. Peter approached and looking for a common topic he noticed my masonic ring, and mentioned that he was also a Mason. I don’t really remember what we talked about that night. It wasn’t anything profound or noteworthy. But, it was important to me.

I’m not surprised that Peter Mills is being recognized for the great work he’s doing for children. He’s touched many lives, including mine.