Trauma and the concept of self acceptance
Yesterday my bf and I were at the site of an accident where a taxi hit a girl on a very busy road in the middle of the Sydney CBD. It happened to be a day when my bf was free in the morning to walk me to work, and we had been delayed in getting to our ultimate destination because we ended up *just* missing all of the traffic lights!
What happened was this - we didn't witness the accident, but we heard the awful "crash" from behind us. It was one of those noises that your brain immediately associates with "this is not good". In the moment both of us spun around instantly, saw the body on the road and ran to her. The initial thoughts running through our minds were "omg omg omg" and adrenaline was kicking in - the typical fight or flight (or perhaps even known as the frozen) response. In that moment both of us froze. For my bf his mind was running at a million miles per hour figuring out what next to do whereas my initial utterance was "is she ok" when she obviously wasn't and then the "I don't want to touch her in case something else gets injured but I need to know she's conscious". Lucky for us some other people got there as well and then the realisation came through that the girl was indeed conscious when we started hearing her cries of pain. At that point I was fumbling around for my phone to dial the ambulance and after that waited for what seemed like eternity for the police and ambulance guys to arrive.
I stood there pretty helpless - what else can I do? I'm supposed to help people but what can I do? We were lucky that synchronicity had it that one of the next vehicles to pull up in the other direction was a patient transport vehicle so the driver jumped out and started to assess the situation and the girl on the road. Another passerby had found the girl's phone and was trying to unlock it to notify the girl's mother (the girl was shouting out the code but because of the head injury she was getting her numbers mixed up although we managed to get it unlocked). I just stood there praying and sending as much healing energy to her as possible and asking for thousands and thousands of angels to come down and surround the girl and not to let her die. Afterwards I was directing the traffic around the scene so that the police and ambulance could get through and then was sifting through the girl's bag to try to find some sort of identification.
In the midst of that somehow I knew that someone had to be with the cab driver to help him deal with the trauma, and also with one of the passersby who had actually witnessed the event. She was sitting on the pavement looking shell shocked and in my mind I had the thought that I needed to go to her to see if she was OK but I couldn't find my legs to get over there. Anyway, at the end of the day the cops and ambulance arrived and took over, we gave our statement to the police and continued towards work (having stopped to at least check if one of the witnesses was OK before going).
Afterwards we just kept replaying what happened in our minds. For both of us as we are healers, all we want to do is help people. A feeling of frustration and helplessness crept up on us because we couldn't do anything. This was a situation that needed quick thinking and we couldn't do it - we froze. I knew that it would be important for both of us to process the trauma but how - I don't know. I also knew I didn't want to fall into the trap of blaming myself for not being able to do something because from all of my spiritual work I knew that I did the best that I could given what I knew and that there was also some reason why my bf and I were there at that point in time.
A few hours later I managed to get through to the hospital who told me that the girl was stable and being looked after but they couldn't divulge any more information to me. I was absolutely OK with that - to me the most important thing was knowing that she was ok. As soon as that happened I felt like a weight had lifted off my shoulders. For my bf, he ended up heading to uni to chat to one of his lecturers who used to work in hospital and was used to dealing with trauma and I think after having that chat, he felt better with the way that he reacted. At the end of the day we were told this - we did the right thing, our brains were going through the right process even though from an action standpoint it was difficult to follow through, and that we managed to do what some other people wouldn't have been able to do - run straight to her aid without thinking about anything else. Obviously this was a whole learning experience so if something was to happen next time (God forbid), we would be reacting differently.
Now that I look back at it, I broke one of the most important rules when it comes to being at the site of an accident - make sure that you yourself are safe. When we ran towards the girl, neither of us thought about our own safety.. we ran straight onto the road into incoming traffic! At least I hope I will be remember that for next time!
In any case, I think we're both ok. The most important thing out of all of this is to process it. There's more harm in trying to ignore it and get on with life as opposed to allowing yourself to process through all that happened, and to talk to someone. Also know that you did your best and not to dwell on what you could have done because if you could have done it, you would've already. In that moment, you only did what you could and that is OK. Never try to deal with this thing by yourself - you will be able to find a number of skilled and qualified people to help you through it.
The other lesson is this - be more in the present when you're walking and crossing roads! Get off technology - don't walk and text and please be aware of your surroundings! Taking quick shortcuts just so that you can shave some minutes in your commute isn't worth your life. Just slow down and take each moment as it comes.
What happened was this - we didn't witness the accident, but we heard the awful "crash" from behind us. It was one of those noises that your brain immediately associates with "this is not good". In the moment both of us spun around instantly, saw the body on the road and ran to her. The initial thoughts running through our minds were "omg omg omg" and adrenaline was kicking in - the typical fight or flight (or perhaps even known as the frozen) response. In that moment both of us froze. For my bf his mind was running at a million miles per hour figuring out what next to do whereas my initial utterance was "is she ok" when she obviously wasn't and then the "I don't want to touch her in case something else gets injured but I need to know she's conscious". Lucky for us some other people got there as well and then the realisation came through that the girl was indeed conscious when we started hearing her cries of pain. At that point I was fumbling around for my phone to dial the ambulance and after that waited for what seemed like eternity for the police and ambulance guys to arrive.
I stood there pretty helpless - what else can I do? I'm supposed to help people but what can I do? We were lucky that synchronicity had it that one of the next vehicles to pull up in the other direction was a patient transport vehicle so the driver jumped out and started to assess the situation and the girl on the road. Another passerby had found the girl's phone and was trying to unlock it to notify the girl's mother (the girl was shouting out the code but because of the head injury she was getting her numbers mixed up although we managed to get it unlocked). I just stood there praying and sending as much healing energy to her as possible and asking for thousands and thousands of angels to come down and surround the girl and not to let her die. Afterwards I was directing the traffic around the scene so that the police and ambulance could get through and then was sifting through the girl's bag to try to find some sort of identification.
In the midst of that somehow I knew that someone had to be with the cab driver to help him deal with the trauma, and also with one of the passersby who had actually witnessed the event. She was sitting on the pavement looking shell shocked and in my mind I had the thought that I needed to go to her to see if she was OK but I couldn't find my legs to get over there. Anyway, at the end of the day the cops and ambulance arrived and took over, we gave our statement to the police and continued towards work (having stopped to at least check if one of the witnesses was OK before going).
Afterwards we just kept replaying what happened in our minds. For both of us as we are healers, all we want to do is help people. A feeling of frustration and helplessness crept up on us because we couldn't do anything. This was a situation that needed quick thinking and we couldn't do it - we froze. I knew that it would be important for both of us to process the trauma but how - I don't know. I also knew I didn't want to fall into the trap of blaming myself for not being able to do something because from all of my spiritual work I knew that I did the best that I could given what I knew and that there was also some reason why my bf and I were there at that point in time.
A few hours later I managed to get through to the hospital who told me that the girl was stable and being looked after but they couldn't divulge any more information to me. I was absolutely OK with that - to me the most important thing was knowing that she was ok. As soon as that happened I felt like a weight had lifted off my shoulders. For my bf, he ended up heading to uni to chat to one of his lecturers who used to work in hospital and was used to dealing with trauma and I think after having that chat, he felt better with the way that he reacted. At the end of the day we were told this - we did the right thing, our brains were going through the right process even though from an action standpoint it was difficult to follow through, and that we managed to do what some other people wouldn't have been able to do - run straight to her aid without thinking about anything else. Obviously this was a whole learning experience so if something was to happen next time (God forbid), we would be reacting differently.
Now that I look back at it, I broke one of the most important rules when it comes to being at the site of an accident - make sure that you yourself are safe. When we ran towards the girl, neither of us thought about our own safety.. we ran straight onto the road into incoming traffic! At least I hope I will be remember that for next time!
In any case, I think we're both ok. The most important thing out of all of this is to process it. There's more harm in trying to ignore it and get on with life as opposed to allowing yourself to process through all that happened, and to talk to someone. Also know that you did your best and not to dwell on what you could have done because if you could have done it, you would've already. In that moment, you only did what you could and that is OK. Never try to deal with this thing by yourself - you will be able to find a number of skilled and qualified people to help you through it.
The other lesson is this - be more in the present when you're walking and crossing roads! Get off technology - don't walk and text and please be aware of your surroundings! Taking quick shortcuts just so that you can shave some minutes in your commute isn't worth your life. Just slow down and take each moment as it comes.