We are handicapped from ever REALLY understanding what someone with PTSD is battling within their brain daily. The compassion and empathy we we try our best to provide resembles trying to feel your way through someone else’s house in the dark trying to help them. You might help a bit, but you’ll probably move some stuff out of place, and even break some other stuff, with neither party left entirely sure that you actually helped at all.
After over two years of waiting for a message to present itself that may be helpful to others, I’m writing this post to share my own realizations with my Post Traumatic Stress. I hope that, although we may never know the details of what someone like our treasured veterans, or a civilian survivor of a traumatic event have seen, faced, or what irreparable decisions they had to make with too little time, that we may come to understand WHY they’re different now. This is how I came to understand my own PTSD, and how I came to accept that mine was a normal reaction to abnormal events.
For me, my healing started when I accepted that the following jammed 40 minutes of tragic results and impossible-to-predict situations………….. into a 4 minute event.
DISCLOSURE: This may be difficult to read for some. If it is, you can scroll down to the paragraph starting with “*******************************************”
I’m driving Southbound in the fast lane, in pouring rain, fog, on the downhill stretch of the freeway. It’s 11:27pm.
Two headlights pop out of the fog just left of my path of travel, from the shoulder of the freeway. I’m in the fastlane, expecting only taillights. Suddenly I see two MORE headlights also in the shoulder about 50-60 yards further down, also in the fastlane shoulder.. TWO cars facing backwards in the fastlane shoulder….Those people are in trouble .
No police, no one outside their cars; this must’ve JUST happened seconds earlier. They can’t stay in their cars.
If they get hit sitting in those cars, they’ll surely get killed. I would’ve had no time to avoid them if they would’ve been in my direct path.
If they get out of the car, and the car gets hit, they’ll get killed by their own car. There’s nowhere for these people to go. Fastlane traffic on one side, and a steep muddy hill on other,rising up to the shoulder of the northbound fastlanes. Can’t leave their cars, and they can’t stay in their cars. I don’t know why I see this so clearly in this moment but I do, and I can’t ignore it.
Should I pull over?
If I can pull over ahead of both cars, and get both parties from their respective cars into my car, BOTH cars will be there to absorb the impact of another out-of-control car, before my car gets hit….. I hope.
I’m pulling over.
( All of that right there took place over two seconds)
I pull as far left as I can on the left shoulder, negotiating maybe another 6 inches to get my car as far away from fastlane traffic as I can, while still being able to open my driver door against the hill. I step out of my car into REALLY heavy rain; I’m drenched immediately.
I run north up the shoulder to the second car I passed, so it’s the first car I reach while running northbound against traffic. I usher a young guy into my car. He’s shaken but physically ok. He explains that his car literally flew over the first car I passed. Didn’t make sense in the moment, but it would shortly be confirmed that the people in the first car I passed were sitting in their disabled car trying to figure out who to call (they’d spun out first) , and his car flew over their hood,grazing it with it’s tires, before landing, spinning 180 degrees, and settling backwards in the shoulder.
Oh wait,the first car. What about those people?
Man, I don’t want to walk toward that car. It was JUST out of the path of fastlane traffic, which is still spraying water on us at 70mph. Rain from above and spray from the traffic.
If their car gets hit, whether they’re in it or not, there’s nowhere for me to go. It’ll get thrown right down the shoulder into me if I’m too close when it gets hit. Those people can’t stay in that car though.
I can’t step into the fast lane traffic, and this shoulder is at the base of a steep, soft muddy hill. Standing in this shoulder is like standing in a gutter hoping there’s no bowling ball coming, and you’re three inches tall.
Looking north back up the shoulder all I see are silhouettes of the car…hundreds of headlights in my face…..AND two people walking!. Are they walking toward me?! Away from me? God, don’t let them go back to their car. I need to get them to walk towards me, NOT back to their car.
I’m reluctant, but nevertheless I sprint to the young couple in their early 20s who meet me halfway. They’re moving toward me,away from their car. I’m not yet relieved because we all need to get into my car, to safety, even if that means driving away and getting off this freeway. We can always wait somewhere nearby off the freeway until police/fire arrive, IF they’d even want us to come back; they may prefer to come to us where it’s safer for all of us. I usher them into my car. Now ALL three people from both cars are going to be safe(r) in my car. I’m still outside my car; the boyfriend in the couple is about to get into my car, which would make that all three in my car. I called 911 while I was guiding them to my car, moving stuff into my trunk to make room for them in the back seat, etc. The young woman gets back out standing in between the right side of my car and fastlane, uninterrupted traffic three feet over. She just put herself back in danger; I react quickly mostly out of fear. “PLEASE just get back in my car!!!!”…and she does.
(That part took 35 seconds).
I have 911 on the phone. I can’t identify where we are though . It’s dark, foggy, pouring rain, visibility is poor. I’m 100+ miles from home, and all I know is which freeway I’m on. I ask her (911 operator) if I can give her latitude and longitude from my smartphone app. Answer is no. I almost panic ( time is ticking and I’m so aware that we are all still in danger remaining on this shoulder). Then I see an exit sign through the fog straight across all five lanes; Kenwood Ave exit! 911 operator acknowledges. All three people in my car assure me they’re fine, so I call off medical resources when asked if we need them.
I’m still assuming they collided with one another, but at this moment, I’m still unaware that actually they each spun out independently in the same spot up the freeway, seconds apart, got launched onto the shoulder, bounced off the hill, and spun around before they each came to rest just feet apart. I don’t yet realize entirely that my biggest fear has already happened; multiple accidents coming one after another, and these people represent already two separate, unrelated accidents. 911 assures me resources are coming. That’s what I want to hear. My adrenaline starts to subside. Everything is going to be okay. Help is coming. We can drive away if we need to and get all 4 of us to safety and leave the cars.
(Maybe that was 20 seconds).
At that same moment that I feel somewhat relieved, ready to get back in my car, I now hear a NEW loud noise. I look back north and see a NEW car sliding on its roof down the same freeway shoulder I’m standing on, crashing into the young couple’s empty car, 80 yards behind me…………. Exactly what I was so worried about just happened. I don’t feel relieved anymore; now there’s people in that upside down car……………
(That was about 4 seconds).
“Oh my God another car crashed. You should probably send medical now!” Still had 911 on the phone. She acknowledged……and hung up………………………………………………………………………………..What do I do now?……………………………………………………… I sprint back up the freeway shoulder past the young guy’s car to now two cars (the young couple’s newly wrecked empty car and the new upside down car that crashed into it) with someone inside. Not looking forward to approaching those cars but I am. About 30 yards out, I see three people running out of the upside down car.
They’re okay enough to run! I get a little excited, and relieved again. They’re running up the muddy hill on the shoulder. For one second, the hundreds of headlights aren’t muting everything into a silhouette, and as one of the three guys runs into the shadow of one of the wrecked cars, I catch a vivid glimpse of him running up the muddy hill in a white T shirt and red shorts, then back to a silhouette.
They’ll be ok. I stop running toward them. If I keep advancing on them , I’ll only increase my risk and it will no longer decrease theirs. They just ran EXACTLY where I’m sprinting to tell them to go. Traffic and rain are too loud. They won’t hear me if I yell to them. 911 is sending help. I called them even before these guys flipped! Everything is going to be ok ( THIS time).
(That was another 20 seconds).
I look at them on the hill, decompress with relief, turn my back to the them, and quickly start moving towards where my car is parked. After all, those three guys on the hill are ok ( enough to run anyway) , and the three in my car are ok. Police are coming..Now I’m the only person standing in this shoulder that is quickly proving my greatest fears correct. Now I can get myself to safety.
(That was 2 seconds).
10 steps into walking , and I hear ANOTHER loud crash. My head is on a swivel now. I whip around looking north. There’s a silouette of a human body launched into the air and now a third car settling after impacting the couple’s car, and the upside down car. My brain explodes. They were on the hill. How could- I only started running to safety because…………….. I KNEW they’d be……
This is the first time I knew something just changed in my head. I’ve been crystal clear on what I’m seeing, what everyone’s risk is as best I can, what I can do to try to help, etc. I’m trying to make trades as best I can so everyone can be ok, and while I have no perception of control over the situation, I am trying SO hard to help people to safety, and everytime I think it’ll be ok, it gets worse. My brain and eyes aren’t communicating like they were a moment ago. I’m in disbelief but I know what I saw, and it was EXACTLY the opposite of what I expected, hoped, convinced myself would happen.
I try to call 911 again.
(That was about 5 seconds).
Phone , clothes are drenched. Rain is just relentless. Can’t swipe open a smart phone when the face is wet. I stow it away. Now I’m sprinting back towards 3 wrecked cars, praying that another car isn’t about to slide into these people, into these cars, into me.
I feel punished for thinking of my own safety. Everytime I do, things get worse. I don’t have a lot of time to think about this, but I see it that way in the moment, and move on.
Now someone is dead ( I’m nearly positive), there are two others somewhere nearby, and this freeway has unfortunately proven me right twice more. I have to get up to these three cars to help who I can, however I can. This could go from 4 cars to 14 in an instant. I have no illusion of control; I just know that we’re all running out of time, and I don’t know how much time is left before the next car slides out of control onto the shoulder………. but that person who I saw flying and the two others……..
I get around the cars hoping to aid the three guys although I’m preparing myself that at least one is dead. There’s only one young man left though, standing in his muddy white T shirt, and red shorts, right in the shoulder closer to fastlane traffic than the hill, in visible disbelief. It was clear his friend was dead looking at his eyes. He naturally took a few steps back from the wreckage, but each step backwards put him closer to the path of the fastlane traffic. He’s staring at three cars smashed together. They must be on top of his friend.
(That was another 10 seconds).
He looks at me. He and I are standing in the most dangerous place I can imagine at that moment.
He looks at me and calmly says “My best friend just died”.
“I know,I am so sorry. But you have to get back on that hill”.
He repeats himself….”My best friend, my homie”……
I realize at this time he doesn’t understand the danger we are both in standing there…. I repeat myself calmly. ” I know….so sorry… you have to get back on the hill…” ( I’m speaking calmly, but I don’t feel calm.)
“He was my best friend.”……….
“I know.. I am SO sorry… You HAVE to get back onto the hill..”
That conversation happens about three times. I’m getting anxious. His brain has shut down to protect him , but did so before he could find physical safety (his shock left him with no memory of any of this, yet I literally can’t forget any of it 2.5 years later) and he isn’t able to see the danger he’s in. He’s not responding to me. I know that from the moment I see the next pair of headlights sliding onto the shoulder I can’t get both of us up the hill to safety. I don’t want to be there, but I can’t leave without him.
(That was about 15 seconds).
I don’t. know.what.else.to. do. If I advance to grab him he may step back into fast lane traffic and get killed. It’d be like rushing in on a person whose heels are backed up to the edge of a cliff.
I pray. “God, I don’t know what to do. Please give me 15 seconds without another accident to figure this out.”……………………………………………………………….”Hug him” is the message that comes more clearly to me than any message I’ve ever gotten without words being spoken.
I’m now accepting that I really have no control over whether either one of us live or not. I have tried SO hard to help, and I feel punished for trying.
I need him to step towards me. I put out my arms, I stop looking up the freeway shoulder for the next car. I can’t force us both to safety; I have to get him to walk to me. I stop rushing/ forcing the situation and he takes 6-7 steps into my arms . We hug for 10 long seconds……………….. and I’m already forgiving the driver of the next car to slide down the shoulder and hit us. The last thing they’ll see will be us hugging before they hit us. “How awful for that driver”, I think. I just accept everything. We both get up the hill together, or we both stand right here until his brain can tell his body to move.
After 10 (long) seconds, I grab his shoulders and MAKE him make eye contact with me. Very calmly ( I feel anything but calm though) I said “You HAVE to get back up the hill. ” that thankfully broke the moment. He runs up the hill.
Now I have a decision; do I dare turn my back on traffic and try once again to make it to my car further South down the freeway, or sprint North against traffic into the path of the potential next car spinning out of control, and get up the hill .? I don’t know why I didn’t consider running right up the hill where I was; I think I was so conditioned now that I need to get as far away from that location as possible. I can’t imagine turning my back on traffic at this point, so I choose the latter, sprinting about 40 yards north of the wreckage. EMS ( Emergency Services) will likely stop before the accident, not after.. and I get up the rainy muddy hill. My feet are heavy in the mud, and I can only traverse straight up the hill. Going sideways while on the hill offers almost no traction. I dial 911 once more.
(That was probably 25 seconds).
911 said “We’ve gotten several calls. Units are enroute”.
“You probably heard from me. I called a few minutes ago………… but…….. there’s a fatality now.”
“Sir , units are coming but you need to get to a safe place; Sir you need to get to safety. Sir it’s REALLY important that”……..
“Look I’m not ignoring you . I’m in the safest place I can be given the circumstances but there are people ( I thought) standing around a car with their friend under it. I know you’ll get here as quickly as you can but this is just all so sad”..( I start crying)
(That was another minute…………)
This all took four minutes to get to this point.
………….and then I waited on that hill in the rain and mud and fog for 25 minutes before EMS could arrive.
Cars on the freeway are skidding as the wrecked cars pop out of the fog, JUST barely out of the path of fast lane traffic. The three cars are piled up even closer to the travel path of the fastlane traffic, but thankfully, not yet IN the path. I lament that somehow all three cars have no head or taillights on; virtually invisible to oncoming traffic. If the next wreck sends cars into the lanes, I don’t know what I will do. Cars are skidding, no one is stopping, and there are thousands of cars coming from up the hill, and there’s no way to slow them down. I try to wave my cellphone flashlight from the hill to alert traffic, but it’s futile; visibility is poor, and I’m up on the hill; not on the shoulder. I’m not going back on the shoulder
A tow truck driver shows up first, and is casually walking up and down the shoulder RIGHT where all four cars traveled out of control 30 min before. I beg him to get off the shoulder, and he blows me off, casually picks up car parts from the shoulder. I run back up the hill to safety unable to watch another person die.
All five lanes get shut down once Emergency Services arrive.
I pray with the boy ( David,age 17) who I hugged earlier, while we sat in a tow truck.
The boy (Jorge, also age 17) who got thrown in the air had critical injuries but amazingly survived. I was certain what I saw was fatal, but it wasn’t. I pray with him.
I pray with both of them that God will welcome their friend (also named Brian) into heaven, and that he didn’t suffer.
Jorge and Brian, (age 17) had left the safety of the muddy hill to run to their upside down car to get something the split second I turned my back on them and considered my own safety. I never saw that coming…. ever.
In that moment a minivan lost control up the freeway, slid down the shoulder, and hit the upside down car, catapulting Jorge in the air, and crushing Brian in between their upside down car and the empty car of the couple who were in my car.
I drove the couple in my car to a gas station 15 miles south to rendevouz with a friend, who would bring them to her home. That made me feel good. They spun out, got whisked into my car, next heard their car got totaled, next someone was dead. That’s a lot to handle. I liked the thought of seeing them step out of this situation and into a friend’s car. I convinced myself that’s all I need to ” be OK” with this. Watch these two ( 20 year old man and his 21 year old girlfriend) walk away from me in tact. I WANTED that to be all I need, but it’s wasn’t…………………………………………………
*******************************************************************40 minutes of memories into a 4 minute event. When I thought of it that way, I was able to start releasing myself of my shame for not being able to resolve all of this as quickly as I told myself I should be able to.
I’m careful not to compare one PTSD story to another. Rather, I just try to accept that someone else’s story that I don’t think would’ve affected me the same way obviously affected them in the same way this event affected me.
PTSD forces it’s way in, and stays. For me it abruptly made room in my brain by pushing out the ability to feel much of anything. It can arise when you aren’t expecting anything, and something awful happens. For me it happened when I was expecting things to get better, or maybe help MAKE things better, and the exact opposite happens. In my case, I took three rapid emotional and physical roundtrips from high consequence scenarios, to relief/hope, and back again. Everytime I started to feel relief, I was forced into an even more high consequence situation, to try even harder, and ultimately found myself IN the same danger I was so hoping to help others avoid. I found it nearly impossible to acknowledge any impact I may have made on the six people, despite some of those people and others logically pointing out something good. I could not connect with anything other than the fatality for……too long..
The other observation I’ve noticed is that PTSD events aren’t the kind that always have clear resolution or great lesson. I have very few lessons to pass on on how to navigate actual situations like this; only a bit of experience on how traumatic events change the path our brains must take to feel safe, resolve the sadness, shame, and guilt of not being able to have helped more.
David’s brain protected him by going into shock; I don’t know what his longtime residual effects are. I’m told he doesn’t remember that moment following Brian’s death when we hugged. Witnessing the same event from a different perspective, I can’t forget ANY of it. I spent over one year focusing on Brian’s death, not realizing that as traumatic as that was, that my greatest source of trauma was standing in that shoulder seconds later committed to getting David and me to safety together. Seemingly opposite affects on our brains from the same.exact.event. His emotional connection to Brian was enough to protect ( or try to protect) him from having to process what he just saw. My empathy for stranded motorists two accidents prior and the two that followed set me up for 100% recall, second guessing myself for months, and almost no feelings to help me gauge whether I was healing or not. I couldn’t find my way through my PTSD without feelings, and I was left with little to none, following the accident, so it took almost two years to start making progress.
The two people who I sheepishly shared my experience with, hopeful they wouldn’t judge me or think I was comparing my little car accident to what they’d seen , were decorated army officers. Charles H. and Ben Brown; both heros in my book, compassionate heros; the best kind. No judgments; “you’ve got PTSD dude. That’s what this is and you’ve got it”.
Two years later I’m way better with some great support and therapy. There is no PTSD graduation certificate. It comes back on occasion when you least expect it, and it’s just as uncomfortable as it is familiar. Something will stir up the flashback, and I’ll be looking through that flashback while I’m speaking with someone. It’s like looking at your life through a dirty window; it’s not a perfect view, but I can still make things out enough that someone wouldn’t feel like I can’t see them.
Thankfully most of the time, it’s where it belongs; on a shelf, in my brain, and I usually get to decide when to revisit it, and when to put it away. The scariest part of the recovery for me was when I started returning to normal daily functionality, while looking through that dirty window day and night, with endless replays of that event, wondering ” Is this as good as this is going to get? Am I going to see THIS in the foreground forever, and my life in the background?” Thankfully I continue to make progress.
I’ve got 40 minutes of memories packed into a 4 minute event, and my brain doesn’t work that way.
If 22 vets are committing suicide daily, they need the compassion that therapists , family and military vets can provide. Yet none of us (including me) can ever truly understand what is happening in someone else’s mind.
I hope the best use of my story ( it’s taken over two years for me to see this), is that it MIGHT help others to understand what someone with PTSD is dealing with, and to support them.
As civilians, we may not understand the high consequence events of combat, and I’m not suggesting that I know either. We’ve all driven cars though, and hopefully this story bridges the gap a bit. We rarely ask a vet what happened, and we really can’t understand what combat is like, so we try to be supportive at arms length of the returning vet who is living each day living their life, looking through a dirty window.
I never contemplated suicide, which isn’t to say I ” nailed it” when managing my own PTSD. I did it entirely wrong; back to work after one week, total mess, ultimately lost my job after a VERY patient employer just had to cut me.. Sought therapy but not therapy for PTSD specifically. If I ever write a book about this it’ll be titled ” PTSD; You’re Doing It Wrong.” (-:
I guess my point is, if we want to support someone with PTSD, without ever really knowing what happened, what it was /is like for them, what the memories of this event are doing to them, I hope some of us can now approach a veteran, or a civilian survivor of a personal attack, or auto accident, and say ” I’m here for you. I get that you’ve got 40 minutes jammed into a 4 minute event. Your brain doesn’t work that way.”
That’s what works for me, and I hope it helps us understand our treasured combat veterans, and anyone who is navigating PTSD.
Civilian PTSD Dad 