A Texas girl turned 16 in an ICU two days after being pinned under a car. Her grandmother says she is all Kari has left.

Kari Sims spent her 16th birthday in an intensive care unit in Austin — two days after a vehicle struck her and pinned her underneath it. Doctors say her recovery could mean learning to walk again.

Beside her through every surgery is her 66-year-old grandmother, Vicki.

“I’m all she has,” Vicki said.

Kari’s mother died of congestive heart failure in February. Six months later, Vicki is living at her granddaughter’s bedside at Dell Seton Medical Center in Austin. She has refused to leave while Kari fights injuries and infections that still threaten her recovery.

Kari was struck Aug. 11 during a disturbance in Lacy Lakeview, near Waco. Police confirmed that two teenage girls were hit by a vehicle and that the driver was identified and interviewed. Vicki said no charges have been filed yet — something she is struggling to understand as she watches what her granddaughter is enduring.

The injuries are severe. Vicki said Kari suffered two broken legs, a shattered pelvis, a broken hip and extensive burns from being trapped under the vehicle. She has undergone numerous surgeries and skin grafts, including treatment on the right side of her face. The damage there was so severe that part of her ear could not be saved.

The immediate fight is keeping her body strong enough to heal. Kari has battled treatment-resistant pneumonia, C. diff and another infection. She has needed a ventilator, feeding tubes and a tracheostomy. Doctors ordered another CT scan as they try to determine why her fever and infections have not cleared.

Because of the trach, Kari cannot speak. Before it was placed, she scribbled one question:

“Why?”

Her grandmother had to tell her she had been hit by a car and was now in a hospital in Austin.

“I kinda hope she don’t remember it,” Vicki said.

Vicki still puts on a gown and gloves to sit beside Kari, hold her hand and repeat the same words every day:

“Mimi is here. Mimi loves you. You are safe.”

She said she plans to keep saying it for as long as this takes.

Vicki asked people to pray that the pneumonia finally responds to treatment, that the infections clear, that the skin grafts keep healing and that Kari’s lungs grow stronger. She also asked for prayers for herself — a grandmother who buried her daughter earlier this year and is now fighting for her granddaughter with everything she has.

Source: Family account shared in a community update regarding Kari Sims and her grandmother Vicki; details as provided by the family. Police confirmation of the Aug. 11 Lacy Lakeview incident is limited to what the family said officers have stated publicly. The investigation and any charging decisions remain with local authorities.