REAL TALK WITH DANIELLE - Accidents Happen

I was in a car accident on Friday. I’m fine and no one got hurt, but it shook me. At first, I felt like I handled it a lot better than the accident I was in early on this year. During the first one, I immediately started sobbing and couldn’t drive home. This one I felt more prepared for. As soon as I felt the collision, I recalled back to February when the car insurance guy said, “Oh, you live in Boston? This will definitely happen again.”

I was driving north and changed into the right lane on a street just before an intersection. This intersection is where drivers exiting the highway turn right onto the street going north. The other driver, “A”, began to merge before I had completely passed. I felt the hit on the back side of the car. I stayed calm. “A” and I pulled into a nearby parking lot and we exchanged information. The police came to watch the exchange and we were able to go straight home.

The rest of the day I thought that I felt better after getting support from Terrance and my dad. But the minute my head hit the pillow my thoughts were swimming with re-runs of the accident, and one thought was on replay, “I should have been able to prevent this.” I was flooded and I couldn’t think about anything else. I turned on my go-to show, Gilmore Girls, to distract me and watched until I couldn’t keep my eyes open anymore.

In the morning, the thoughts quickly appeared again. Even while trying to distract myself with chores, I just kept visualizing the accident in my head and hearing the bang of metal. I felt this overwhelming shame that getting into this accident meant that I’m a bad driver. Luckily, this time I had enough mental energy to put my therapist hat on.

“These are intrusive thoughts. You are having a normal reaction to a traumatic event.”

Oh, trauma. I have tools for that! So I went straight for the strategies I learned from Brené Brown’s book Rising Strong. The method is called “The Story I’m Making Up”. This is helpful when I realize I’m having a response that is not typical of my everyday thoughts and behaviors. I first reflect on thoughts, feelings, behaviors, and bodily sensations to identify what’s really going on. For me, “The Story I’m Making Up” tends to be in the thoughts section. Here is the work I did at first.

Feelings: Scared, anxious, nervous, shame, relief that I’m not hurt, gratitude, panic

Body Sensations: Tense, hard to catch my breath, left leg is sore

Thoughts: “I should have been able to prevent this” “What else could I have done?” “Maybe I’m a bad driver” “Fuck, now I have to deal with all the steps involved with car insurance.”

Behaviors: Going for a walk, watching Gilmore Girls, making music

It’s not always obvious, but this one was. Clearly “The Story I’m Making Up” is “I should have been able to prevent this”. Once I identify the story, I write with the intent of deconstructing what I am making up. I ask myself questions like, “When did I start making up this story?” and “What else could be going on here?” I also just write about what happened from beginning to end. Breaking down each moment helps to identify where those intrusive thoughts began and how I am justifying them to myself. Here is what I wrote:

“The story I’m making up is that I should have been able to prevent this accident. I’m making up that I changed lanes too late because I’m having a need to put the blame somewhere. Because having someone or something to blame helps me feel in control. But I remember clearly looking behind me, seeing it was clear, and changing lanes, and there were a few seconds that I was in the right lane before the collision happened. I think that “A” is technically “at fault”, but it bothers me so much that we live in a society where someone has to be “at fault”, because it’s simply just not that black and white.

Driving in Boston is TERRIBLE. People make terrifying, risky, illegal moves ALL THE TIME and it’s almost impossible to stay aware every second you drive. Furthermore, I drive through Boston a lot more than the average individual, so by sheer numbers, I am more likely to get into an accident than most people. This isn’t “A’s” fault or my fault. I had to change lanes quickly before the intersection because there was a fast approaching right turn. I was in “A’s” blind spot and he likely didn’t realize I had just changed lanes because he already checked that he was clear. We both were trying to make the best judgment calls we could based on the information we had.

The “at fault” thing is a construct of corporate America. If his insurance company and mine want to use this socially constructed bullshit as a way to induce fear and shame, and profit at the same time, well, maybe that’s the world we’re living in. But that has nothing to do with the very real truth that accidents are just a scary thing because, frankly, we are inundated with horror stories of accidents that result in death. The fact that my monthly insurance may go up is just a red marker on my record which is supposed to strike fear, claiming “she’s a bAdDdD driver.”

But accidents are not about bad or good. The reality is that driving in Boston is fucking hard. And if insurance companies want to promote their services with phrases like “Accidents happen,” then it’s completely backwards to immediately change from a perspective of an external locus of control to an internal one as soon as an accident happens. The main thing is that I am okay and “A” is okay. I’m shaken up and I’m a little sore, but I’ll calm down, and my body will heal.

I need to focus on accepting the grey area that nobody is actually at fault and that any inconveniences that are going to arise as a result of this are completely worth being safe and okay. Replaying the accident in my mind over and over again while thinking “What could I have done?” is trying to change something that has already happened and is completely out of my control. The main things I will probably lose due to the accident are money and time, and that is just a grim reality of living in a country that profits off of traumatic events. If we want to get into the gritty details, I will probably lose the deductible and likely a few hours for the inspection plus about a week’s worth of travel time without use of the car.

I think the important thing now is to dive into the other things I love in life and really turn that gratitude practice into high gear to stop the intrusive thoughts about how I could have done better to prevent the accident. My brain has learned from repeated practice that if I beat myself up and take the blame other people won’t have to feel ashamed. Well, that worked when I was a kid, but there’s no point in trying that now because it just doesn’t work.” 

Friends, I wrote that “Story” only 24 hours prior to writing this blog, and I can feel the intrusive thoughts decreasing already. It took me about a half hour to write. Yes, it’s work to do this, but it’s the kind of work that I always find worth doing because this is not the type of thing that would have gone away on it’s own. The thoughts are still there in small doses, but I’m identifying them a lot faster and I’m tapping myself back into the present by asking myself to focus on who I’m with, where I am, what I’m doing, etc. If you’ve been in situations similar to this one, I highly recommend checking out Brené Brown and her strategies for working through these difficult moments. And if you have your own tools, please share in the comments! I’m always interested in what works for other people.

See you next week!

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