Setbacks

I suppose with any recovery, there is a set-back.

Mine came in the form of my very first car accident in 8 and a half years on Friday evening, the start of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. I lost control of my car on a country road, went into the gully, hit a tree stump, careened to the other side of the road and crashed into something. Not sure what, but the airbags exploded, and I felt my face burning from the fumes and I just got OUT as fast as I could (couldn't tell where the smoke was coming from).

I walked away from my car. THREE CARS passed me on the road and did not stop. THREE. All dressed up for a holiday dinner (I live in a very Jewish neighborhood, so it is a safe bet). There's irony for ya huh? "Quick, the sun is setting! We can't stop to help this girl standing alone next to her smoking car!"

Someone did stop, and stayed until my parents, paramedics got there. ER for hours, the whole works.

I am structurally "OK" as far as the basics (no fractured vertebrae, etc.) ... but in SO MUCH PAIN. I am better today, and I got in for an emergency appt. with the pain management MD who did my epidural shots in my spine. I do not have a good idea of the full extent of the damage, as the emergency MRI machine was VERY old (how funny that I know the difference!!). All I know is that I hurt. REALLY BADLY. RIGHT when I was starting to feel more sure on my feet. I had just managed to get my body back into "child's pose" in yoga last week: now, it is excruciating.

Percocet makes me SO depressed that it is not a candidate. Vicodin works, but not great ... works better with a muscle relaxant, which knocks me out ... BOTH of these medications make it impossible for me to live a normal life.

I am sure you all can imagine what I am feeling right now, so it seems silly to state the obvious.

My jaw survived the ordeal in tact! It hurts right at the joints where the cervical collar cut in (I was in it and on a backboard for 5 hrs).

There must be some kind of universe misalignment or something ... I'm not sure. But it makes me more than a little wary. A reminder of what I have been saying all along: a major injury affects your MIND as much as your body. To heal, you have to treat both.

And so, here I am. Alive, yet this strange feeling of fragmentation.

Until next time ...