Langreck: Life after car accident

As I am writing this blog, I have to keep taking deep breaths to calm down, while reminding myself to handle things one step at a time.

The reason for this is that on Nov. 22 I was headed to a country concert when the vehicle in which I was a passenger was struck by another driver who ran a red light and smashed into the side of the car I was on.

Much of the actual accident still is a blur to me, and I have no recollection of much of what happened. All I do remember is coming to and my head aching from four fairly large-sized bumps I received on the very front, top, middle and back of the right side of my head.

When talking with police and paramedics that showed up to the scene, I had trouble remembering how to spell my name or my address, and I was having trouble talking coherently.

Luckily, some people nearby that had seen the accident happen stopped to check on us and told police how the other car slammed into us after running the red light.

To make a long story short, as the saying goes, after the police were done getting information and finding out what happened, we were able to head home.

I’m not going to lie, even though I was having trouble remembering simple things about my life and my entire head felt like it was pounding, I was crushed that I didn’t get to go to the concert because I had been waiting months watch Russell Dickerson perform.

However, as it turns out, it’s a good thing I didn’t go because when the pain in my head didn’t go away a few days later and I was still having trouble with memory issues and completing simple tasks, I went to the emergency room, where it turned out I had suffered from a pretty severe concussion.

If I hadn’t agreed to complete bed rest, including no reading, watching screens or doing literally anything, they would have made me stay in the hospital as I recovered.

When people say concussions are no joke, I can say from experience that is true.

I was expecting to only be off work and on bed rest for one week. However, due to the pain I was having and the lack of short-term memory problems I was experiencing, doctors had me stay on bed rest for close to six weeks.

Over that time period, I had to rely heavily on my family, loved ones and friends as my support system and to help with my kids, including driving them to school and appointments, taking me to the doctors and caring for me.

I will be the first to admit that I wasn’t the easiest patient and I always tried to get around the doctor’s strict “do nothing” rules, but I finally realized if I didn’t take them seriously that some of the memory loss issues I had been experiencing could become permanent.

So, over the course of the past several weeks, I have been adjusting to doing things a bit differently than I’m used to and trying to learn to be patient with myself when it takes me longer than I’m used to when trying to complete a simple task.

I am beyond thrilled to be back at work and covering important aspects of the agriculture industry.