I haven't posted here in a long time and I noticed a trend from the few posts I have done. They seem to all be around the time of Christmas.
I was a passenger in a fatal car accident what will be 4 years ago on January 6th. I am lucky to be alive and a child's car seat, and my laziness is what saved my life. We were driving to work and the driver was speeding when we hit black ice and swerved into the other lane and were t-boned by an oncoming van. The front seat passenger was killed, she saved her daughter's life, who happened to be the driver, by grabbing her arm so hard and shoving her back into the seat. Neither was wearing a seatbelt and it's very possible the driver could have been thrown through the windshield had her mother not done that. She grabbed her so hard there were bruises where her fingers were days later.
Coincidentally, they do not know for sure if I was wearing a seatbelt. The police and EMT's said I was not in one when they came to the window but my injuries support I had. I had a small puncture in my lung where the seatbelt would have pushed my sternum into my lung. I myself don't honestly remember, I usually did back then but occasually didn't. I also remember thinking when I came to that I needed to move my fingers and toes and get the seatbelt off incase the truck was on fire. I remember pushing at the buckle. In hindsight the van had caught fire and the snow plow behind us put it out and I probably heard them tell the driver the situation and that they had to get her out.
Anyway, I had relatively minor physical injuries, compared to the other survivors. The worst being I broke my femur under my knee cap and a concussion that lasted 2 months. People always talk about feeling guilty because they lived and someone else died, and I do feel that sometimes, but most of my guilt has come from the fact I was able to walk on crutches out of the hospital a few hours later while 2 women were hospitalized for months. I feel guilty that I am this way and pitying myself and too embarrassed and ashamed to ask for it because to others I seemed/seem fine. A few scratches and bruises to the face, a cut on her left hand and she is on crutches but all in all, she's fine.
What many people didn't know for the longest time was what happened in the truck. When the accident happened I thought we just spun off into the ditch. My last thought I remember before I blacked out was thinking, "There's a car coming, they will call for help." I didn't know we hit another car until a state trooper told me the car I thought was going to drive by was the car that hit us.
I woke up neither of the women in the truck would answer me. I couldn't see the driver but her mother I saw her and when I yelled at her and saw she wasn't stirring I watched her chest and saw she wasn't breathing. I knew she was dead and strangely accepted it. She was dead, I needed to focus on me and the driver. When the driver wasn't answering me I started to fear she was dead as well. I couldn't see her, the windshield was shattered, she wasn't answering me. I thought both were dead and I was going to alone in negative degree temperatures for a long time before help would come. When the driver came to I realized she would try to help her mother and move so I kept talking to her saying we couldn't help her and needed to wait until help arrived. I still don't know if she was crying from the pain or because she knew it right away too. Part of me started doubting that Suzanne was dead, maybe she was alive and I just couldn't tell.
I was relatively out of it, confusing a driver who was the first person I saw for the female state trooper, because she was nurse asking questions in an authoritative manner and my mind was trying to make sense during the shock.
When I heard voices I remember thinking I'm ok. They are going to take me to the hospital but just my head hurts, my ears are ringing and muffled, my leg hurts like it needs to stretch out but I'm alright. I was calm and alert. I started to tentatively move my feet and hands, still in survivor mode, wanting to make sure I had range of motion. I turned my hand over and I saw it covered in blood. I freaked out. I was hurt and didn't know it. I kept my composure though to others because, well I don't know why, I'm that kind of person I guess. Once they got me out of the truck I started to stop doubting Suzanne was dead. No one was in a rush to get her out. Aside from when they first reached in for a pulse no one went to that side of the truck.
Once I was in the ambulance I remember my guard starting to slip because I knew I was safe. I knew one of the EMT's from high school and we talked about his sister and how she was doing in Virginia. And I remember begging the other one when he was calling my parents to say first and for most I was safe so my mother would not freak out and become melodramatic. I kept having trouble remembering important things though when the other EMT was asking me questions. I couldn't remember how old I was, I struggled at first with my home phone number. I remember on the short 2-4 minute drive to the hospital having a brief conversation, more like a debate, with myself in my head wondering if I gave him the right number because he said it went to voicemail and my parents' don't list their name on the voicemail and being concerned they didn't get the message and he called someone else who now thinks their daughter had an accident. It didn't help when my parents didn't get the message for another 2 hours and it confirmed in my mind that they thought I was at work and weren't going to come. It's funny to me in a morbid way and I tell people that story in a humorous way. But it scared me deeply because I've always been very much in control of myself and I couldn't remember things like that.
A lot of things about the hospital I don't remember. I was awake the entire time. I don't remember leaving the ambulance, or the doctors cutting through my shirt or anything until I was upstairs on a table under several blankets, waiting for them to start x-rays. All I remember on the table was how so very cold I was and how I didn't know why I wasn't warming up despite several layers of blankets and being wrapped so tight in them I couldn't move. I remember getting sick constantly from the concussion. I remember the female state trooper coming in and asking me the names of the other people in the truck because I was the only one in a condition to talk. I remember her writing their names when I suddenly looked at her and said, "Suzanne is dead isn't she?" The look on her face. She didn't think I knew or was so aware of anything down at the scene. When she told me she was I didn't cry. I just told her I thought so. I can't describe her face except for the shock. I don't know if she was disturbed that I knew and was calm, or thought it was commendable that I could keep my head in crisis like that. I just know she was dumbfounded when she walked out.
By the time my parents came I was warming up and the shock was wearing off and my body started to feel the pain of the accident. Aside from the concussion that had me getting sick for 3 days, physically I seemed pretty ok. I went to Suzanne's wake but not the funeral and comforted her 6 year old granddaughter, who I lived with briefly when the driver and I were roommates. It was her carseat that saved my life. For months my emotions were everywhere. I lashed out, I pushed my boyfriend away hard even when he stuck by me. One minute I'd be laughing the next crying or raging or in a deep space out. I would see my body doing things before my mind was aware of it. I came back to work 2 months later but, because of the situation I was told I could not discuss the accident on my job's property because it was upsetting to a few people close to Suzanne. I left my job shortly after because I was the only one who came back and was treated like hell by the people who worked there who thought I shouldn't be there.
I know it was the disassociation but to be honest, I've never cried about her dying. In truth she was not my favorite person and really found her annoying when she was alive. That is where I am really guilty. Her death didn't affect me like everyone thought it should. I am sorry she is dead but aside from working with her I had little to do with her. I feel guilty that even now it doesn't faze me.
It was an accident, the driver was speeding and was investigated for criminal charges for going well over the speed limit for the driving conditions that day. I am still angry over that, but I knew then and now it was an accident and there was nothing I could have done.
For the most part I've coped with the accident and moved on. Intrusive thoughts for the most part have gone down considerably and aside from bad driving conditions, drivers being stupid and extensive traffic I'm ok in a car. I still don't drive much though. I do have trouble sleeping and have violent nightmares though with an occasional flashback.
My biggest concern is that I knew from the start I was not the same person and even though my boyfriend has stuck by me I disconnect quite frequently and am generally blasé about most things. I don't care so much and when I do it's because I am so frustrated with my life in general and snap at everyone because of it. I'm not so sure anymore of it's just reaction to my situation or if my emotional state is a response that I picked up from my PTSD.
I didn't mean to write so much and I'm sorry if it was overkill but it was the first time I could fully say what happened and how I feel about things. I try to talk to my boyfriend but he doesn't understand and brushes it off as "I'm worried about you. I want to make you feel better." or what is more concerning for me to hear. "I just feel like you don't want me around. You just are no longer fun to be around, you are so depressing sometimes baby." Thing is I am not doing anything. I am just minding my own business not saying or doing anything and he tells me this.
I was a passenger in a fatal car accident what will be 4 years ago on January 6th. I am lucky to be alive and a child's car seat, and my laziness is what saved my life. We were driving to work and the driver was speeding when we hit black ice and swerved into the other lane and were t-boned by an oncoming van. The front seat passenger was killed, she saved her daughter's life, who happened to be the driver, by grabbing her arm so hard and shoving her back into the seat. Neither was wearing a seatbelt and it's very possible the driver could have been thrown through the windshield had her mother not done that. She grabbed her so hard there were bruises where her fingers were days later.
Coincidentally, they do not know for sure if I was wearing a seatbelt. The police and EMT's said I was not in one when they came to the window but my injuries support I had. I had a small puncture in my lung where the seatbelt would have pushed my sternum into my lung. I myself don't honestly remember, I usually did back then but occasually didn't. I also remember thinking when I came to that I needed to move my fingers and toes and get the seatbelt off incase the truck was on fire. I remember pushing at the buckle. In hindsight the van had caught fire and the snow plow behind us put it out and I probably heard them tell the driver the situation and that they had to get her out.
Anyway, I had relatively minor physical injuries, compared to the other survivors. The worst being I broke my femur under my knee cap and a concussion that lasted 2 months. People always talk about feeling guilty because they lived and someone else died, and I do feel that sometimes, but most of my guilt has come from the fact I was able to walk on crutches out of the hospital a few hours later while 2 women were hospitalized for months. I feel guilty that I am this way and pitying myself and too embarrassed and ashamed to ask for it because to others I seemed/seem fine. A few scratches and bruises to the face, a cut on her left hand and she is on crutches but all in all, she's fine.
What many people didn't know for the longest time was what happened in the truck. When the accident happened I thought we just spun off into the ditch. My last thought I remember before I blacked out was thinking, "There's a car coming, they will call for help." I didn't know we hit another car until a state trooper told me the car I thought was going to drive by was the car that hit us.
I woke up neither of the women in the truck would answer me. I couldn't see the driver but her mother I saw her and when I yelled at her and saw she wasn't stirring I watched her chest and saw she wasn't breathing. I knew she was dead and strangely accepted it. She was dead, I needed to focus on me and the driver. When the driver wasn't answering me I started to fear she was dead as well. I couldn't see her, the windshield was shattered, she wasn't answering me. I thought both were dead and I was going to alone in negative degree temperatures for a long time before help would come. When the driver came to I realized she would try to help her mother and move so I kept talking to her saying we couldn't help her and needed to wait until help arrived. I still don't know if she was crying from the pain or because she knew it right away too. Part of me started doubting that Suzanne was dead, maybe she was alive and I just couldn't tell.
I was relatively out of it, confusing a driver who was the first person I saw for the female state trooper, because she was nurse asking questions in an authoritative manner and my mind was trying to make sense during the shock.
When I heard voices I remember thinking I'm ok. They are going to take me to the hospital but just my head hurts, my ears are ringing and muffled, my leg hurts like it needs to stretch out but I'm alright. I was calm and alert. I started to tentatively move my feet and hands, still in survivor mode, wanting to make sure I had range of motion. I turned my hand over and I saw it covered in blood. I freaked out. I was hurt and didn't know it. I kept my composure though to others because, well I don't know why, I'm that kind of person I guess. Once they got me out of the truck I started to stop doubting Suzanne was dead. No one was in a rush to get her out. Aside from when they first reached in for a pulse no one went to that side of the truck.
Once I was in the ambulance I remember my guard starting to slip because I knew I was safe. I knew one of the EMT's from high school and we talked about his sister and how she was doing in Virginia. And I remember begging the other one when he was calling my parents to say first and for most I was safe so my mother would not freak out and become melodramatic. I kept having trouble remembering important things though when the other EMT was asking me questions. I couldn't remember how old I was, I struggled at first with my home phone number. I remember on the short 2-4 minute drive to the hospital having a brief conversation, more like a debate, with myself in my head wondering if I gave him the right number because he said it went to voicemail and my parents' don't list their name on the voicemail and being concerned they didn't get the message and he called someone else who now thinks their daughter had an accident. It didn't help when my parents didn't get the message for another 2 hours and it confirmed in my mind that they thought I was at work and weren't going to come. It's funny to me in a morbid way and I tell people that story in a humorous way. But it scared me deeply because I've always been very much in control of myself and I couldn't remember things like that.
A lot of things about the hospital I don't remember. I was awake the entire time. I don't remember leaving the ambulance, or the doctors cutting through my shirt or anything until I was upstairs on a table under several blankets, waiting for them to start x-rays. All I remember on the table was how so very cold I was and how I didn't know why I wasn't warming up despite several layers of blankets and being wrapped so tight in them I couldn't move. I remember getting sick constantly from the concussion. I remember the female state trooper coming in and asking me the names of the other people in the truck because I was the only one in a condition to talk. I remember her writing their names when I suddenly looked at her and said, "Suzanne is dead isn't she?" The look on her face. She didn't think I knew or was so aware of anything down at the scene. When she told me she was I didn't cry. I just told her I thought so. I can't describe her face except for the shock. I don't know if she was disturbed that I knew and was calm, or thought it was commendable that I could keep my head in crisis like that. I just know she was dumbfounded when she walked out.
By the time my parents came I was warming up and the shock was wearing off and my body started to feel the pain of the accident. Aside from the concussion that had me getting sick for 3 days, physically I seemed pretty ok. I went to Suzanne's wake but not the funeral and comforted her 6 year old granddaughter, who I lived with briefly when the driver and I were roommates. It was her carseat that saved my life. For months my emotions were everywhere. I lashed out, I pushed my boyfriend away hard even when he stuck by me. One minute I'd be laughing the next crying or raging or in a deep space out. I would see my body doing things before my mind was aware of it. I came back to work 2 months later but, because of the situation I was told I could not discuss the accident on my job's property because it was upsetting to a few people close to Suzanne. I left my job shortly after because I was the only one who came back and was treated like hell by the people who worked there who thought I shouldn't be there.
I know it was the disassociation but to be honest, I've never cried about her dying. In truth she was not my favorite person and really found her annoying when she was alive. That is where I am really guilty. Her death didn't affect me like everyone thought it should. I am sorry she is dead but aside from working with her I had little to do with her. I feel guilty that even now it doesn't faze me.
It was an accident, the driver was speeding and was investigated for criminal charges for going well over the speed limit for the driving conditions that day. I am still angry over that, but I knew then and now it was an accident and there was nothing I could have done.
For the most part I've coped with the accident and moved on. Intrusive thoughts for the most part have gone down considerably and aside from bad driving conditions, drivers being stupid and extensive traffic I'm ok in a car. I still don't drive much though. I do have trouble sleeping and have violent nightmares though with an occasional flashback.
My biggest concern is that I knew from the start I was not the same person and even though my boyfriend has stuck by me I disconnect quite frequently and am generally blasé about most things. I don't care so much and when I do it's because I am so frustrated with my life in general and snap at everyone because of it. I'm not so sure anymore of it's just reaction to my situation or if my emotional state is a response that I picked up from my PTSD.
I didn't mean to write so much and I'm sorry if it was overkill but it was the first time I could fully say what happened and how I feel about things. I try to talk to my boyfriend but he doesn't understand and brushes it off as "I'm worried about you. I want to make you feel better." or what is more concerning for me to hear. "I just feel like you don't want me around. You just are no longer fun to be around, you are so depressing sometimes baby." Thing is I am not doing anything. I am just minding my own business not saying or doing anything and he tells me this.
