The Adrenaline Wears Off...

So as the journey continues...

Having never had a car accident before or a concussion or lived in the Denver area (where I was now located), I was at a loss. Friends from all over gathered resources. Other than incredibly emotional, exhausted, and shaking a lot, I felt pretty good, considering the circumstances. People kept telling me when the adrenaline wore off I might feel differently. Eventually they were so right on.  Four days after the accident, after my totaled-car had been cleaned out, and left behind, and I had been driven from my post-accident-stranded-in-a-hotel-room site to a friend's in Lakewood, I started to feel really beat up. Random pains began to appear all over my body. They came and went. My neck ached. My right arm throbbed. It didn't work very well. I could hardly sleep on my head. The pressure from lying on it was nauseating.  A constant pressure seemed to be building inside. Then my head felt like it was going to explode out through my skull.


I walked out of the bedroom and straight to my girlfriend who had come to stay with me post accident. "I need to go to the hospital," I blurted.  I'm not sure I have ever known and communicated something I needed so directly.  We did a little online research of area trauma centers and emergency rooms and headed to St. Anthony Hospital. It was close and had a Level 1 Shock Trauma Center.


Mind you, I am not good in hospitals, ER's,  Dr's offices, dentists, physical therapy, etc. Stepping into one of these places is always a huge challenge. But my bruised brain was about to explode. It was radiating so much heat that my friend could feel it with her hand about 8 inches from my head. I had constant vertigo. It was time to step inside the hospital walls.  


As we waited to be seen, I breathed through an old panic response. I had fainted in ER's before. I didn't really want to faint this time. (What if I fell and hit my head?) Luckily the ER was slow that Thursday night. When the Dr heard what happened he immediately braced my neck. Now in addition to the exploding head I was practically choking. My friend was alternately cracking jokes and checking to be sure I was conscious. A CT scan was ordered. 


OK. A bit on the CT scan. That thing is weird. I could feel the waves of whatever it was they were using to scan my brain. Literally like I was sitting inside of some concentrated radio waves that were all aimed at me. It took all of 6 minutes and I was wheeled back to my exam room.  In a bit someone came along to remove my new collar. Then left. This seemed like a good sign.

Soon it was revealed that I had a severe concussion, (whiplash) strained neck and shoulder, and something not good with my 'brachial plexus'. Good news! No bleeding in my brain. No fractures. It was a powerful moment of gratitude. 

I returned home with the RX to rest, a prescription for muscle relaxants (what are they?) and strict instructions to my friend to keep on eye on me and see if I began acting strange. For anyone who knows me, I think you will appreciate the humor in this last instruction.


Clearly, I would need resources.  The first help would be from a distance, my shamanic practitioner and energy healing friends. Michaela McGivern, Amy Priest, Bonnie Serratore and all the Contemporary Shamanism folks, my hometown Healing Drum Circle, people I didn't know who were friends of friends. They  started doing healing on me from afar. Next I would need, PT, Chiropractors, SE, Dr's, Massage, Energy Healers, who and what else?

How did I begin to decide? First, friends and I gathered a list of possibilities. (THANK YOU ALL!)  Then I did the logical thing (much to my girl friend's horror).  I muscle tested to determine who to go see. After a number of Yes, No, Yes, Yes, No's, the lucky winners emerged.  More on each of these as we go along.

It made a better hat, plus I felt more like a queen this way.
But get that thing off my head too! It's just not comfortable anywhere....

 

...and so the journey of transformation and healing continues...

As my friend Kristen just said, "life continues..." She is the inspiration for this post and probably for getting me back to posting in general again.  As it never occurred to me to blog about what has been happening in the last year. Way to go Kristen. You're inspiring people to write just by being you! 

 So here's a quick catch up. I'll start on Feb 19th of this year, the year of great changes, the year of transformation, 2012.

On that life changing day, Feb 19th, I 'came to" (as in I had been knocked out and came back to consciousness) hanging upside down in the drivers seat of my CR-V. I was securely strapped in by the seat belt. Just previous to this, I had been driving through the beloved Colorado mountains on my way towards Denver to house sit for a friend.  It was a lovely evening, rather late, some snow on the roads and a bit still falling. I wasn't worried, had on my brand new studded snows. I'd made this drive a million times, and in worse weather than that.  

OK. To the details. Quick and simple. As I meandered along, I came across black ice. Some fishtailing ensued. Then my car 'did a 180', crossed over the mid-line and broadsided the rock mountain. At that moment, I was relieved, because the alternative was a 100+ foot drop off the edge of the mountain pass, no guardrails to stop me. The relief lasted milliseconds. As my car hit the wall, it bounced and veered straight for that cliff edge. 

In slow motion (it really does happen that way!), I realized I was about to die. My car was now headed for a head-first plunge down a steep mountain cliff, at 10:30 at night, on a not so traveled road. I was about to die. On top of that, I was about to die in the one way I have been afraid my whole life that I would die (YUP! by plunging to my death in a car that went off the side of a mountain.)

As the car began to tip over the edge something in me relaxed. There was nothing else to struggle against. It was now done. My last thought was a wish that I could be the one to tell my dearest I died in a car accident.

Then there was darkness, two huge bumps, nothing, then the weird sensation of coming back into my body and feeling something really tight against my belly and shoulder. Then the sensation of hanging upside down. I was hanging upside down in my car seat. The car had stopped. I was alive. How very weird!

And so begins another journey of transformation.....