On toward a diagnosis

In August, 2004, my husband picked me up from work and as we were turning into the driveway of our house, we were rear-ended. I was, of course, being somewhat stupid when it happened.



He picked me up at the office where I worked and I had some files I was bringing home and only a couple miles to get home, so I did not buckle up. Bad choice!



Then as he bagen to slow down to turn into the driveway, my husband looked into the reaerview mirror and said, "Oh, don't hit me!" I, of course, looked over my left shoulder to try to see who or what should not hit us. That's when we got hit.

The speed limit in front of my house is 30 miles per hour, but it is a three-lane highway and people often speed. The college student who hit us was new to town and doing about 45 mph. My husband hit our brakes so hard, to keep us from hitting the retaining wall around our yard, that he popped the brake lines.

The initial inspection didn't look too bad for my car, the rear bumper just looked seriously caved in. We filed the police report and the hubby ran off to class. I called the insurance company while he was gone and filed a report. They recommended going to the emergency room. I scoffed. I was in pain by the time my husbandgot home from class.

Now, accidents are bad at anytime, but I had plans to fly out 36 hours later to Michigan to visit my family there. I most certainly did not have time to be in pain. Too bad I didn't get a choice in the matter.

When I saw the chiropractor they determined that I had ripped every muscle in my neck and stretch many of the tendons....ahhh, the joy of serious whiplash. And, they told me it would feel the worst about 3 days after the accident. I was instructed to take anti-inflammatories like ibuprofen, wear a neck brace whenever I was in a car, and come back after my weekend vacation.

I lived on over the counter pain meds for the next week and then started a course of massage, physical therapy and chiropractic care that lasted almost six months to restore full mobility to my neck. It also reduced the "sciatica" symptoms I had been having, so I figured the accident ended up being a boon.

Nine months later, my husband and I planned the first real vacation we had taken in years. We planned to take a week in New Orleans and see everything. We had been there a decade earlier when we were first dating, but hadn't been back.

October, 2005, had been our original target date for the vacation, but we ended up having to go five months early because of our work and class schedules. Thankfully, again, this was a boon, because it means we made it to New Orleans before Katrina.