DreamStorm's blog: "Crazy Ramblings"

I copied this from my blog from another site, and thought those who know us would like to read what I wrote about the accident that we were in a little over a month ago (bout a month and a half ago now) 

Written on October 13th, 2014:

1 month ago today, on September 13th, me and my husband, and my best friend her fiance (now husband) were on a road trip to go see my BFF's mother in Florida. I remember having my phone in my hand because I was recording a thunderstorm (trying to catch lightning) from the passenger side front seat as we drove down the highway in Georgia. It had started to rain, and we weren't going very fast but we started to hydroplane and we started to go off the road but Hubby managed to pull us back onto the road but we kept spinning. We spun around 2 times before he could get us to come to a stop. We landed facing the middle of the road (so across, or blocking) in the fast lane. We were stopped for maybe enough time for us to almost take a sigh of relief, just as I looked up I seen an 18 wheeler tractor trailer truck barreling towards us at full highway speed. 

No one but me seen it coming at us. I remember thinking this is it...when I seen it, it smashed into us before I could even warn the others. It smashed into my husband and our friend Jason (who was sitting behind him)'s side of the car at full speed. I heard the explosion of glass, metal...I felt my body being thrown this way and that as we spun around, I seen a flash of white as I blacked out. I didn't even see or feel pain as my ribs were violently broken, as almost every part of my body was bruised in some way. I didn't feel the hundreds of cuts, and glass embedding itself all throughout my body. I waited to see what death was like, because I truly knew in that instant that nobody could possibly live through that. I remember thinking of how I would miss my family so much, and how I would never meet the nephew that I was so anxious to meet. 

After a moment, I FORCED myself back to my body, back to reality. I heard in my head, "not your time," whether it be my own thoughts or something from God, Jesus, or an angel, I honestly could not tell you. But I opened my eyes to see our car badly mangled around us. I couldn't breath. I could see a pool of blood all down the front of my brand new dress, and for a moment I thought I had been impaled by some object because I couldn't breath in more than a quarter of a breath at a time. I mustered up the courage to look at my husband, I was scared....and what I seen did not help that fear. He was pinned between the steering wheel and the door by his pelvis hip area but slumped forward (almost dangling) and his face was bleeding badly. I begged him (what seemed like screaming in my head, but wasn't much louder than a normal inside voice) to "WAKE UP! WAKE UP! PLEASE! PLEASE WAKE UP! PLEASE HUBBY DONT LEAVE ME!!" And after what seemed like an eternity, he woke up. 

He has had a previous brain injury from another terrible accident he was in 10 years ago and it has taken that long for us to cope with what happened in that one. And it all came back to me in that instant when I thought he had received yet another brain injury. He kept repeating the same sentences every 30 seconds. "Where is the rear view mirror?" (the window was fully shattered, the mirror was out on the highway) and then he'd say, "What the hell happened?" and then revert back to the rear view mirror. I thought, "Oh my God, I've lost him again."

I remember hearing my best friend crying in the back seat. I couldn't see her, but I did see Jason for an instant. I turned my head just enough to see a little bit and he was gurgling and bleeding profusely from what seemed like everywhere. Kathy (my BFF) was saying her arm hurt, and panicking because she couldn't move it. She said she was going to pass out. I remembered we had just filled the gas tank and I didn't know if we would catch on fire. So I shut the car off. I tried to pull the keys out of the ignition but it was so badly warped the keys are now embedded in the car. I unseatbelted myself and Hubby, not understanding how his seat belt could still be on him with him turned on his side being pinned like he was. I thought it would relieve some pressure, he was writhing in pain. A woman came to our car and she was going window to window trying her best to reassure us that help was coming. She prayed with us, she talked to us, kept us awake, and tried everything she could to be of any help she could be. She was our angel. I have always called her that, ever since the accident. 

Hubby started to choke on blood and I remembered there being dried up baby wipes that my mother left in the (now) mangled glove compartment. After what seemed like forever, and me begging Hubby to please stop asking those questions because they were making me panic...and to please stop dragging his face along my arm because glass was everywhere and he was cutting me and his own face, the paramedics finally arrived. I informed them that my best friend was on blood thinners and I couldn't see how badly she was bleeding. It took them forever to set up the "jaws of life" machine. They took Kathy first (due to her bleeding disorder), then Jason, and then finally they cracked open Hubby's side of the car and unpinned him. 

I seen my phone, at first it wouldn't turn on, but I took the battery out and put it back in and tried again. Success. I knew I needed to call my mother, she needed to know what was going on, because I had been talking to her just moments before and she would worry. I knew she was going to panic and cry, and I had already realized I couldn't hold enough air in my lungs to cry. And I knew if I heard her voice, I would break down and I was afraid that might just completely kill what little air supply I had or further damage my lung. I hit "call" and handed my phone to a man standing at my door. I said, "please, call my Mom," and he did. I remember him saying his name, and telling her...my heart ached for her because I know how she would panic and I couldn't tell her we were ok, because honestly I didn't know if we were. 

Finally they got me out. They broke my door and helped me out and onto the stretcher. It was pouring rain, lightning and thunder almost constantly. The rain stung my wounds, and the coats of the paramedics kept brushing up against my skin making me want to cry out in agony but I couldn't get enough air. They took Hubby and I in one ambulance on the longest drive I think of our lives, to a hospital that was a full half an hour away! We had neck braces which are seriously the most painful things ever especially when you already cant breath. I wasn't even positive that I was going to make it at that point. I was terrified. 

When we arrived they rushed me (I lost track of Hubby at that point, they took him somewhere else in the hospital) into a room where suddenly there was people buzzing all around me, asking me a billion questions, and performing all sorts of different tests and things. Suddenly I was naked laying Jesus style on a table, people working to get IV's and blood work in both arms. All I could see was peoples faces, bright lights, lots of pain, terror that I still couldn't breath and I was starting to feel the rest of my injuries. They rushed me off to have scans and xrays which were SO painful because they kept having to have me move. Still in a neck brace. I was so worried, I didn't know who lived, who died...where my husband was...basically a persons worst nightmare. 

They kept saying they were going to give me something for pain and I flat out refused any of it. And everyone that came in I said, "absolutely NO pain meds!" because I needed to be awake, I needed to pull what little bit of myself I had left back together to assess the situation, control what I could of the situation, be alert to somehow call my mother when I could, and find out what happened to my Hubby and best friend. And the horrible possibility that I may find out that one of them (or I) wasn't going to make it and I would take what opportunity I could to say goodbye to whoever I could get ahold of. Its a sad and sick truth but those things cross your mind at that point! So I decided to deal with the pain rather than take meds and pass out. I was shaking uncontrollably, when they asked me to sign my name...they got a scribble, I couldn't even write my own name!

After the tests were done, the doctor came and told me that my neck wasn't broken but I had broken multiple ribs, amongst my other injuries but he said the neck brace could come off. The relief of just that was indescribable. I was able to look around the room. Over on the side of the sink was my cell phone. I asked the nurse to hand it to me, and I mustered up the strength I could and I dialed my mother. She was crying and I was trying to be strong so I wouldn't cry and lose my breath. She said there had been a mix up and they had said that I had made it and they couldn't tell her about the other 3 (but the way they worded it was like that they had died) but they had put Kathy on the phone with Mom when they said they would transfer her to my room! So that made my Mom and family believe that they made a mistake and that I had infact died, especially since I wasn't able to talk on the phone at the scene! She was so glad to hear my voice! 

A few minutes later I heard a familiar voice crying in pain. And she heard mine as they were cleaning glass out of my wounds. I heard her calling my name from another room! I answered her in the loudest voice I could! We 'yelled' back and forth a short conversation, she told me she had completely shattered her shoulder and arm and was going to have surgery. Neither of us knew what happened to our men, but we soon learned that they were being taken to another hospital, which of course led us to believe that their injuries were horrible and that they might not make it. 

I was given a patient room and was admitted. I asked if Kathy and I could share a room, and they tried to make that happen but she needed to be in the orthapedic ward so that wasn't possible. The only person I knew, I couldn't even see. But I was able to get ahold of her on the phone, the nurses connected us, and later that night I was able to go and see her in her room. My nurse felt bad for us and wheeled me down to her room. She looked aweful. She had the worst seatbelt burn that I've ever seen on a person. She was cut up, her arm looked awful and she was so drugged up she barely knew I was there. 

I was able to connect with Hubby FINALLY on the phone, and I asked if he was him. He said he was, he sounded groggy, but it was good to hear him sound a little more like himself and not repeating himself. But he did ask again what happened to us. I told him, again. I told him I loved him so very much and that I would see him as soon as I could. I spoke with my mother, and many of my family members and finally I was so exausted and in so much pain...I finally accepted pain medication and went into a restless sleep. Every time I closed my eyes, in every single dream, I seen the front of that truck. Every time I drifted to sleep I would wake with a giant JOLT almost knocking me out of bed, just as in my dream, the memory of the truck hit us...again and again...I was afraid to sleep. 

To make a very long story short, I was released to my mother, sister, and brother in law who made the 7 hour trip to the hospital where we were, 2 days after the accident. Kathy was released 2 days (I think) later and the "angel" from the accident drove her the 2 hours to the hospital that both our men were taken to. I tried after being released, to visit Hubby, to see his face at least...but when I got to the other hospital he was in surgery and I was in rough shape and my brother in law was due at work the very next morning. So I dropped off a cell phone and a note to him, so that when he was well, he would be able to go online, and talk to me. I found out that he had a badly broken pelvis which had to be put together with lots of metal pins and things. I HATED going home without my rock, the one I depended on for support when I was down...and I needed him now more than ever :( It would be another 11 days before I was able to be reunited with him. The most lonely days of my entire life. 

That brings us back to why we had to make a quick move to the apartment we live in now. The hospital would not release my husband to an unsafe place to live. And us living in an upstairs apartment was considered unsafe because he couldn't walk. So in order to have him released, we would have to move, NOW. Luckily our apartment complex had an empty apartment and allowed us to switch. So me with broken ribs and my very pregnant sister, and brother in law (the only one of us who could really be of any help) had to move an entire apartment to a whole new building. I not only had broken ribs but also MANY painful injuries, one of which I found out days after the accident that I also had a seatbelt burn/bruise. My mother wanted to assess my body and see where I was injured so I showed her and her and my sisters mouths dropped when they seen my abdomen. I found out later that the reason for that kind of bruise is because I bruised several internal organs. I had about 40 bruises, 200 cuts, several broken ribs, PTSD in full swing, and on groggying pain killers. 

I had to be taken to the local emergency room several times (once was by ambulance!) because I was having trouble breathing, the pain was excruciating as well. But we managed to get us all moved, and very soon after, we made the trip back to GA (me trembling because of having to be on the highway yet again, but determined to go get my husband because I knew I would have to now take care of a disabled person, while I was myself, disabled). But we are fighters, we are strong, maybe not all the time. But we pick ourselves up and make due with what we have. 

I soon learned that I couldn't sleep in the bed with him because he kept moving around and hitting me in the ribs on accident, and he couldn't get comfortable with me in the bed because his legs have to be propped up so I started sleeping on the couch. I have to say, Stephen is pretty awesome to help Hubby get out and into the truck, putting his wheelchair in the back, then helping him get back into it at the destination. Things take a lot longer, nomatter what we do. Hubby can no longer do a LOT of the things that he normally could so I have to help with that but I love him and I will take care of him forever if I have to. So we have adjusted and we are lucky to be here, alive, and on the mend! 

------------------------------------------------------------------------

So yeah thats what happened from my perspective, and we are doing alot better now. My husband is now able to get around using just the walker and no longer uses his wheelchair although if he has to have more surgery (a very real possibility) he will have to go back to using the wheelchair most likely but we are taking things day by day and counting our blessings. 

I still suffer with some issues, some muscle spasms in my side, shoulder, and back. And have some problems with the muscles around my ribs and lung. I keep reinjuring myself, thinking I'm back to normal and when I go to do things I used to be able to do, I end up hurting myself again but I'm doing my best to take it easy so I dont reinjur again. I still have a lot of the bruises that just dont want to fade away, and they serve as a reminder of the most scary day of my whole life. But time does heal! 

Unfortunately time does not heal my teeth that I suffer with daily, the pain is mind blowing and so I've started a gofundme cause to hopefully raise some funds to help get these bad teeth out. If anyone out there reading this can help in any way, even just a few dollars, every cent helps! So far I've only managed to raise 5 dollars and though that does help and I very much appreciate that 5 dollars, it still isn't enough. Please consider a small donation to help end my constant suffering!