Taken from my Journal

Today is not a SAD day. It’s just an emotional day. I’ve said before that if I could back and change it… I wouldn’t.

I love my husband and I love my boys.

I wouldn’t have them if things were different.

t thought someone gave this to me in the hospital and maybe they did? I’m not really sure now. I suppose I wrote this around week 3, when I started my rehab. I left out the names of those involved and I made a few slight changes and narrative additions. Those things are in italics, but otherwise I am typing this verbatim. As you read remember that I was an 18 year-old.

September 12, 1999 started out to be a normal enough day but little did I know it would be a day that changed my life forever. I woke that fall Sunday morning around 5:30 am and was at work around 6:45. It was a basic Sunday at the big box store, nothing unusual. I worked my 7-4 and went home. My roommate and best friend was gone so I decided to lie down. When I did I saw an overflowing closet that had a basket with about a week and half full of dirty clothes. Tired or not, laundry needed to be done. I called my brother’s house hoping to get my sister-in-law. My bother was there but leaving. I paged my SIL and she called back right away. She gave me permission to go wash my cloths and then decided she wanted me to come over to where she was.(I did not know the people she was with … they were STRANGERS to me.) My mistake was agreeing. I wish that when my BFF got home she would have suggested we go somewhere else. We both went over to my SIL’s friends house. We stayed a while and laughed and joked. (It’s funny but now, 15 years later I CLEARLY remember us 3 “women” all huddling in the bathroom together to pee during this time…. funny the details you remember huh? I also remember that I was wearing BRAND NEW shoes/shorts.)

Well, one of the guys left in one of the other’s car. He wanted to go find him. I suggested my BFF drive my SIL’s car because my SIL had been drinking. (and yes, I’d had a beer, too but that’s besides the point… I wasn’t driving.) MY SIL didn’t think my BFF Was driving fast enough so she took it upon herself to unbuckle my BFF while we were going around a curve and push her over so she could take over the wheel.

That was the final moment of life with legs and a good back. AT LEAST FOR NoW!

I remember hearing the crash and my body going to the right and hitting something (someone?, and then to the left. I then remember flying a little, hitting something else (the other car we assume), hitting something again (we assume a tree) and then rolling for what seemed like forever.

Finally I stopped.