I couldn't move when I got hurt and I was in shock, even laughed with the firefighters, but there was a lady who lived in the area that saw the accident who came running. She went up one side and down the other of the guy who hit me. At that moment, even though I did not know her, I loved her. The shock wore off when I got to the hospital, I started hyperventilating, just couldn't catch my breath.

I will never forget the ambulance driver. He stayed, spoke with me, calmed me down. I was in the hospital for 8 days, in rehab for 3 months. Weaned myself off pain meds, replaced them with alcohol. I hit bottom before I went to therapy 2 years later. My lawyer recomended her. She literally saved my life, I stopped looking for reasons to live, I had lost my hope. Gradually, she worked with me, helped me handle the anger, identify it and grief; it's ugly cousin. About once a week I used to think of ways to die (thought, never tried) I was drunk every day, in pain all the time. But I had no choice but to go on.

As warped as this may sound, I thought that if I didn't go on, the guy that hit me would have won. I would have let this man I didn't know, a stranger, steal my life from me. And he didn't have that much meaning for me. But now, I go on for me. And in my learning about PTSD, I hope to help someone else someday.