When you get hit by a car, it doesn’t hurt at first.
You barely even have time to register the vehicle coming toward you. If the car is moving at just 25 mph, that’s 37 feet per second. And if the car is turning left across Blossom and Main, the lane is 10 feet wide, which means you have less than half a second to react. At top speed, Usain Bolt travels 20 feet in half a second, but you’re just walking across the street, so you probably only manage to turn your head.
I think I remember exactly when the car hit me, though I only know that it was a white SUV from looking at the police report. But I don’t remember any pain from the impact, just suddenly being on the ground about 8 feet away from where I had been standing. I know that the front bumper of the car hit my left hip and launched me into the air because a giant yellow mottled bruise formed there. I started to feel the whiplash hours later.
Your body goes into shock. All of your blood vessels constrict in an effort to prevent loss of blood. Your heart pumps blood only to your vital organs — the organs that you need to fight back. Then, your pituitary gland signals for a release of adrenaline. Your body knows that if you start to feel the pain, you won’t be able to run away from whatever caused you harm.
I don’t know how I landed when I hit the pavement. I just remember getting up and walking over to the curb. I didn’t really think about anything, my senses flooding with input that wasn’t really getting processed. A woman appeared out of the haze. When I run it through in my head, I assume that she was driving, saw the collision and stopped. She was middle-aged, with dark skin and a trim bob. She’s the one who called 911. There will be a person like that for you, too.
Because you’re in shock, you probably won’t know where your injuries are. You might even think that you aren’t hurt at all, at least until you see the blood. You should check over your entire body, especially your knees, elbows and hands. That’s how you’ll catch yourself from the fall. There might be pieces of pavement stuck in the wounds. Don’t worry. They’ll take care of that at Palmetto Health.
Your first instinct will probably be to call your mom. Mine was. Make sure that you take the headphones out of your phone. I didn’t. I tried to call my mom, boyfriend and dad. They all thought they were getting butt-dials because they couldn’t hear anything. I just thought my phone wasn’t working, or maybe I didn’t think anything at all. It’s important to remember that you’re in shock, so simple things won’t seem obvious.
The girl who hit me was small and blonde. I know that she’s from Tega Cay, South Carolina, or at least that’s what her insurance says. I learned later that I was incredibly lucky because she swerved out of the way after she hit me. If she would have run me over, my injuries would have been much more serious. Tires with the weight of a car can crush bones. Hope that whoever hits you is able to stop before that happens. The girl pulled over immediately after she hit me. The person who hits you might react differently — they might not even stop.
She had a complete meltdown, tears and all. I remember telling her to calm down. When the paramedics arrived, they thought she was the one who was hit. I was just sitting calmly on the curb, blood trickling down both my legs. I waved at them to say, “Yes, it’s me you’re here for.”
I never saw the girl again.
The paramedics won’t listen to anything you say. They put a collar on me, like a dog, even though I said I didn’t need it. It made it impossible for me to look around. I don’t really know what all happened next. They called my roommate because I didn’t have my emergency medical card on me – I was just walking home from the gym and had only my phone and CarolinaCard.
Make sure to always have your medical card on you. You might not get hit right next to your dorm, and then hospitals might give you different service if they aren’t sure you’ll pay.
And then they took my phone. I felt an irrational sense of separation anxiety — you know the feeling. I didn’t get it back for 30 minutes, and in those 30 minutes my mom got a call from the police saying that I’d been hit by an SUV and was being rushed to the hospital. Like mothers do, she assumed the worst – that when I had tried to call her I was bleeding out on the side of the road, unable to speak.
If you’ve never been in one before, you’ll realize that ambulances feel surprisingly rickety. I bet the poor guy assigned to the back will tell you the exact same thing he told me: how brave you are, how almost everyone cries so he’s surprised you aren’t. You won’t really be listening because it might finally start to be sinking in what happened. He might have to roll you over to check for injuries. That was when I learned that I had a huge gash on my butt I hadn’t noticed. It had left a giant red smear on the curb.
If you’ve ever spent time in an emergency room, you know the next part. The doctor that comes in for 30 seconds. The random X-ray technician who talks too much and doesn’t seem to understand when they’re being insensitive. You’ll get to hear them use a bunch of fancy words to describe bruises and road rash, and you’ll also get a full run-down of your injuries for the first time.
For me: right knee — missing a significant chunk; left knee — medium rash; left shin — miscellaneous cuts; left elbow — almost scraped to the bone; left bum — very large but shallow rash; hands — minor cuts and abrasions. But no broken bones. The nurse will clean and wrap everything, and put topical painkillers on the worst.
Hopefully, you’ll have your phone with you so you can finally have some time to call everyone important. If you haven’t cried yet, those phone calls will be when you do.
I’d been in the room for about 30 minutes when my roommate finally showed up. Apparently I hadn’t been entered into the system correctly, so they’d been telling her I wasn’t there. And she had what I’d been waiting for — my phone. I only started to cry the first time I actually had to say the words: “I got hit by a car.”
My mom asked for a picture so she could know I was OK, or at least all in one piece. I posed for the camera, making sure to show all my bloody injuries to make her more concerned, and flashed a giant smile. Make sure that someone takes pictures of all the open wounds before they are bandaged. You’ll need them later, but you probably shouldn’t smile. It looks bad to the insurance company.
At this point, you might be starting to feel the pain. The shock will wear off. The nurse will test you to see what hurts, pushing small, prodding fingers into your torn flesh. Just say “ow” to everything — that way they’ll give you stronger meds, which you’ll want.
I was surprised when a representative from USC showed up. I don’t remember his name, but he seemed nice. I know you’re wondering — no, they don’t give you free tuition if you get hit on campus. He was just there for a few minutes, but gave me a business card. I appreciated the university putting on an appearance of caring.
I was back to the Honors dorm and in bed less than five hours after being hit. Not too bad. After a few confusing minutes figuring out how I could possibly lie down without touching something that hurts (conclusion: it’s impossible), I completely passed out.
When you wake up in the morning, you may or may not remember what happened. I did, but for some reason I thought it was still a good idea to go to breakfast. Maybe shock lasts longer than they say. It was a Saturday, so I had to walk from the Honors dorm to Russell for somewhere that was open. I had to problem-solve a little in order to come up with an outfit, and I looked a bit like a ragamuffin with my assorted bandages, mismatched dress and oversized jacket. It was cold and raining, and I didn’t realize that when I walked, it broke open the forming scabs. By the time I got to Russell, there was blood dripping down my shins once again. But I was already there, so I got my five breakfast items and hobbled back to bed.
You’ll struggle with clothing, too. It’ll be better if you’re hit when the weather is warm. I was stuck wearing dresses that didn’t cover my knees or elbows for much of November.
Be careful about what products you use. When I ran out of the ointment from the hospital, I bought Neosporin cream. I had an allergic reaction to it that caused all of my open wounds to break out in boils. I don’t think I need to explain why you should avoid that at all costs. And take all of your pain meds, even if they make you sleep 18 hours a day. You’ll have some embarrassing moments, like the building director walking in on you in your underwear because you needed to air out a wound.
But eventually all your wounds will heal, at least to the point where they’re scars. You might need to have reconstructive surgery, which I don’t recommend if you don’t like needles. And the memory will fade and you’ll feel like yourself again, just with some new scars to bear. The bills will start to flow in. Expect that to last a few months.
Life moves on, and the specter of the accident will fade. You’ll shower for the first time in two weeks. You’ll be afraid of crossing streets for a while longer. My heart still beats a little faster every time, especially because I walk through the intersection where it happened — Blossom and Main — every day. For the first month or so after, I could almost see my bloodstain on the road.
Now, you need to be prepared to always be the person that got hit by a car. If you don’t tell people in the first week or so after meeting them, they’ll act shocked when they find out, like getting hit is a critical part of your identity. It'll be your fun fact on the first day of class each semester. People will randomly notice your scars and ask what happened, and you’ll give them a prepared response. You’ll have multiple versions of different lengths. But be careful what you say, at least until the settlement is over.
The statute of limitations in South Carolina is three years, so you can take your time getting everything organized. You’ll have to meet with a lawyer and negotiate what percentage they’ll get. They’ll get the hospital and university to send over all their records, pages and pages of reports and prescriptions.
And then they'll make an offer. You’ll learn that not everyone is equal before the law, or at least when it comes to insurance. Because I’m a young girl, I got much more than someone would who's male or middle-aged. “If only you’d ever modeled before,” my lawyer said. “Don’t tell them that you don’t care about your scars.”
You’ll feel objectified, like you’re being told that your worth is diminished by the appearance of your knees.
The insurance company wanted an impartial person to take pictures of my scars and sent a friendly woman who took pictures on her cell phone in a bathroom in Russell. I dressed up for the occasion – my lawyer told me to. I put on lipstick and wore short-shorts, like dressing up for a pageant. After that, they doubled their offer. I didn’t know what that meant. Was it a compliment, or were my scars really that bad? I didn’t think so.
You’ll wonder how this blatant discriminatory system is OK, but it’s OK because no one will ever care when they’re being handed money. It will feel unfair, especially because the accident will now be distant past, and it’s faded into really just a memory. I don’t deserve this, you’ll want to say. But money is money, after all, and lawyers know what they’re doing, right?
So I didn’t say anything.
Once all the legal loose ends are dealt with, then the ordeal is officially over. There’s no real finality to the process, just a slow trickling-off. You learn what hurts your scars — I can’t lean on my left elbow or kneel for extended periods of time.
And when it’s two years to the day later and you step off the curb, you’ll check to make sure there isn’t anyone in the left turn lane. There’ll be a small twinge deep inside your brain when the ball of your foot hits the dark pavement, but nothing more. The scars fade.