Thank you MCFD for saving my daughter's life

Attn:           Mrs. Villagomez, Missouri City Fire Department

Subject:     Paramedical effort to save Dalena Locklear

I spoke to you Tuesday afternoon about my daughter and that I believed the first responders saved her life.   ( I believe it was the B-Shift of Station 5, but filling in for the C-Shift )

The first paramedic took her pulse on 01-05-17 at approximately 1 a.m.   I am certain she was still unconscious lying on the floor when he first entered the house.

I am still quiet emotional about it.    I can not get the image of my daughter's lifeless body in my arms out of my head.    My wife wants to erase the image and rub her rosary hoping it was just a bad dream, and that it won't ever happen again.    

I am very afraid since we do not know what happened to her and we have no idea what the best remedy is for a future incident of similar nature.  My family says my concerns are ludicrous.

The ER doctor and ER nurse and her pediatrician only saw her as a normal kid.   They said I should have let her sleep it off.    That is wacko crazy talk, based on no facts.

They did not see or touch her lifeless body seeing what I saw and the factors presented to me.

I had no earthly idea if my wife was calling 911 or where she disappeared to.

I only knew my daughter was in grave danger.        I lifted her immediately out her bed when I saw her ( she weighs about 99 pounds ).   I carried her to the hallway and had to bend over holding her to sat her on the floor.         That failed to wake her up.  My yelling at her failed to wake her up.        She felt like Jello and had no tension and I had to hold up her head.        I am fairly certain her eyes were wide open and remained that way for the next 30 minutes.        I slapped her across both facial cheeks yelling at her.         That all failed to get any living response from her.

She was NOT breathing and I had no idea how long she had been without oxygen.   I guessed an hour ( in that split second ).    But it was probably just a few minutes ( in hindsight ) when I started resuscitation.     Resuscitation failed.    

I then bent her over my knee and pounded on her back, ( to free her airway ).   A 1/2 cup of brown fluid poured out of her mouth.   There were no bubbles.   No air.  No vomiting and no coughing and I pounded  on her back yelling at her to wake up.  I shook her and rolled her back over.  

That all failed to get any living response from her.

I started chest compressions using 2 fingers on the sternum like I was taught 30+ years ago.

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At that point, I believe our neighbor to our left was awakened by noise. Had he known it was a real emergency, I am sure he would have come running, however, there was not enough time, and the ambulance was coming down the street.   All of our other neighbors heard nothing and slept through the entire incident and rescue.   In hindsight, I wish I had not placed my daughter on the

floor, but instead taken her outside.   But it was so cold, and we were both in pajamas, so I did not.

It all became fuzzy, as in my state-of-mind she had died.  My adrenalin was flowing.   I was beyond exhausted, as I was already exhausted before picking her up out of bed.  Blood and mucous spouted out of her nostrils as I blew into her lungs.   There were No bubbles and no sign of breathing   All the air escaped her rectum.         That all failed to get any response whatsoever.

I do not believe anybody has heard my story.    My wife was not there.    She was way too distraught to call 911 and had apparently gone beserko,

and drove to Station 5 to pound on the garage door.        It took some time ( I guess a few minutes for them to figure out what she wanted ??? )        I know

they sleep at that hour as I went there and tested the doorbell at the exact time.

Thankfully 911 called her back, but I am surprised she answered number

281-555-5555      ( at 12:41 a.m. ).     I am very concerned that conversation was not helpful to my daughter, and that my wife failed to maintain composer gravely jeopardizing my daughter's life.

I had no idea Station 5 even responded to people banging on the door or was staffed with paramedics, especially at 1 a.m.    I am very concerned that my wife's hysteria showed lack of common sense and that she gravely mishandled this real life-threatening emergency.

I am seldom home and was not planning on being home, but changed my mind.   I am 100% certain, had I not been there, that my daughter would be dead.    This worries me.   I can't sleep.        

I am afraid to go to places that I need to go to, as I work out of county at night.

I would like to hear what the first of the first responder's thought as he approached my daughter.    Did she look like a child needing a soft lullaby ?   If her situation was non-medical, then why was his first instinct to inject her with Diazepam ?

Did the first responder that brought the oxygen see a breathing girl taking a nap when he first glanced at her ?    I was too distraught at that point to see when she began to respond.

David Locklear

10219 Antelope Alley, Missouri City, 77459

tel.  281-995-8487, email:    dlocklear01@gmail.com

Aftermath and Reflection

I was only told by the ER doctor that her chest X-ray, CT-scan and vitals were normal, but that was at 5 a.m. ( about 3-1/2 hours after arriving to ER ) and also that she was not pregnant, which surprised us as she just turned 12 in October.

The ER staff rushed her out of the ER onto the curb.           That was so inconvenient, as we were exhausted beyond exhausted, and the hospital was way down at Tollway 99 and Hwy. 59, and we live at the back of Sienna Plantation.    We were too tired to drive home, but my wife insisted that

we had to.

In hindsight, we can only guess that she became unconscious around midnight and first paramedic took her pulse at roughly 1 a.m.   That is an eternity for a father who thinks their kid is dead.     The MCFD, arrived rapidly and saved her life.     I tried 3 times to thank them in

person, but they all claimed they had never heard of the incident, or I sensed they were not allowed to talk to me for legal reasons.

My theory as her father is that she drowned in her sleep ( from fluid in her esophagus ) in the minutes prior to my wife finding her unconscious.     I only have one real job in life and that is to protect my daughter, so I am not concerned with hurting the feelings of the doctor and my family.

Had my wife not checked on her, I am certain, my daughter would have died around 12:45 a.m.

I had kissed her good night at approximately 11:50, and she seemed normal and sound asleep,

not like what I saw when I lifted her out of the bed at around 12:35 a.m.