Facing the Freak Accident at Age 16

I had just turned 16. I made a big decision to cut my long hair 2inches above my shoulders. To me, at the time, that was the biggest decision I had at that time in my life. Little did I know, two days later I was going to be trapped under the motor of a running car and almost killed. Two days after I turned 16, I was waiting up on my boyfriend at the time to call me back. He was on the track team and girls at my school had been telling me that he would flirt with a girl on the team all the time. So it was about 10pm, I was very on edge. I called my friend Sam. She is just like me and makes me laugh and get things off of my mind. So I stayed on the phone with her for about 2hrs. Now, at the time when I lived with my mom, I would always lay in the driveway because it went straight down. It sounds stupid, I know. But it's just one of those places you can just relax and look at the stars. Also, I should back up by saying that I was Barrowing my sisters phone while she was on a college trip to Spain. She is older than me. A guy txtd her phone while I had it and he started flirting with me when I told him I was not Rachel (my sister). I however, liked the attention because I have always been over weight and thought low of myself. His name was Corey. He started txtn me more trough out the night and telling me he was going to come by and see me. So while I was laying in my driveway talking to my friend Sam, I happened to look up and see head lights coming down the road. At the time, my other sister,angel lived at my moms too. She was 8mnths pregnant and never got out of the house. My mother always parked her car in the garage so I was assuming everyone was home and it was just a car passing by or perhaps a guy coming to see me. Having the low self confidence as I did, I thought it could have been Corey, so I played cool and stayed on the phone and pretended to not see the go by, incase it was him. I don't remember why I didn't hear or see the car come down the driveway, all I remember was opening my eyes and realizing I was under a car. I was so in shock I remember just thinking "I'm dead this is it". As soon as I saw a flip flop step out of the car, I realize it is my sister, angel. After she stepped out of the car, she looked down at me, I could see the terror in her face. This is when I started screaming. I told her to help me. I remember seeing her flip flops from under the car, running to the house screaming. I can't imagine the fear my sister felt. She ran inside the house Telling our mom she had ran over me. The first thing that came to my head was,"this isn't really happening to me." it felt so surreal, yet in my head I was for sure it was my time to go. I look down the driveway and saw my blood just flowing down it. I started to hear my mother scream like I have never heard before. I could hear the terror in her scream. My head was right beside the front tire of the driver side and my feet were sticking out of the passenger side of the car. It was a ford Taurus. I was trying so hard to catch my breathe. The car motor was pressed up against my back as it burned my skin and melted it down nearly to the core. I didn't know what all had happened to me or what was broken or anything. All I know is I could not breath. It was getting harder and harder. It was like someone was hugging me as tight as they could and wouldn't let go. My neighbor came up to me, she happened to be a physical therapist. I didn't know who she was or why she was there. She asked me what my name was. I replied, "Scarlett". Then I asked in fear "am I going to be ok?!". I don't remember what she replied. But I do remember yelling, "PrAy for me!!". I know I yelled that at least 6 different times. The lady proceeded to ask me questions. She asked where I went to school, what I did, and how old I was. I replied with the answers. I didn't understand why she was asking me such irrelevant questions why this was goin on. I told her it was hard to talk because I couldn't breathe. And after she asked me those questions and I replied, I remember telling her that it was getting harder to breath and gasping for air. My stomache was so pressed up against the concrete I could move my stomache enough to catch my breathe. Imagine trying to breath without being able to move your stomache.. The ambulance arrived. It seemed like forever that I was trapped on the motor of that car with my skin just burning away. They had to jack the car up to get it off of me. My mother told me later on, it took them 45mins!! Also, from what my mom said, the firemen that arrived were just there talkin and laughin and joking around. When my mom told me that, I felt so hurt for her. I can't grasp how hard it was for my own mother to watch her child go through this. They gave me a breathing mask to give me more oxygen.. But what is that going to do when your insides are literally being smoothed right? They gave me pain meds while they were trying to get the car off of me. But my body had became numb to everything by then. I remember asking everyone that came to where my head was if I was going to be ok. No one gave me a promising answer. Life force showed up. I was still under the car. After they finally lifted the car off of me enough so I could breath better, I then realize how much pain I was in. It turns out, my sister ran over my left ankle, the bone of it was sticking out. The worst part was my broken pelvis. They jacked the car up some more to where they could actually get me out from under it. They slid something like a big skateboard under the car. They told me I had to lift myself up with my leg and put myself on there. I told them there was no way I could move. They then told me it was the only way they could get me out since the car was over me. I tried so hard. It was the worst pain to do that with everything I had fractured and broke, and my back that had been melting. I got myself on it though. They had to cut my clothes off of me. I remember being in so much pain and feeling emberraced at the same time. I'm 16 and all those young firemen were standing around. So they covered me up, and rolled me to the helicopter. They were so unsteady carrying me and every move they made hurt so bad. I don't remember the helicopter ride after they put a mask back on my face. I was out of it, up until we arrived at the hospital. I remember waking up to being rushed in the building from out side and my mom running along asking if I was ok. I then was out of it after that but woke back up for the cat scan, I'm not even sure if that's what it was. I just remember waking up in a bright room with lights everywhere and my mom holding my hand. I was shivering uncotrolably. I was freezing. And everytime I shivered it would hurt so bad to move with everything I had broke and done. And whatever it was I was laying on was so uncomfortable and painful. I could my mom yelling out of fear, "she's cold!! She is cold!!". And I kept telling her it hurts so bad!!! And she was just praying out loud "oh god please be with her,please be with her dear god!!!". Before I left with life force, I was telling my mom "I love you. Tell angel it's my her fault!" I don't know what came over me then, I think now, that before you die you want people to accept things and be ok. You just all the sudden become selfless.i didn't know what was going to happen to me. I just wanted my family to know, it was ok. Because either that's how I was going to die anyways and I didn't want them to take fault for it, or just to get that extra opportunity before death to tell someone you love them. I stayed in the ICU for about 10 days I want to say...wll I remember was having toNs of visitors and waking up on and off to different people being there. But one thing that gets me is I do specifically remember one of the first few nights I was in the iCU I woke up and felt my face. I felt nothing but crusty skin all over the side of it. I freaked out and asked my mom to see a mirror but she did not allow it. I think it was probably for the better. I was so worried my face was burnt off. Switching rooms from the iCU to a normal room was nice. They put me in the biggest room due to how young I was with all the visitors and what not. My close friends made me posters and they let me hang them up in the room. I was in band in high school and they made a big sign with everyone's signature. These things cheered me up the most. As the days went by and I started becoming more aware and alert,my mom bought me chick fil a from the hospital cafeteria which I loved. However, the more aware I became, the more depressed I started to get. I couldn't do anything but lay in the hospital bed in only one position due to my back. I had to have skin removed from both of my thighs for my back to have skin on it. So my thighs were nothing but opened wombs on both sides. They would stick to the sheets on the bed and it was do awful when the nurse would come in to change the sheets. When they would have to peel the sheets off of my thighs where they had stuck to the oozing wombs it felt like they were just ripping my skin right off of my leg all over again. My mom said she could hear me all the way down the hallway screaming,"it hurts so bad!! Stop! Stop it". My mom wasn't allowed in the room when this happend. She could not handle it. It was time for me to start trying to sit up on my own and learning to use a wheel chair at the hospital to prepare me for rehab. They told me I had to stay sitting in the wheel chair for 5mins straight. I couldn't do it. I had no muscle. I had done nothing but lay in the same position for weeks! I couldn't believe it that I couldn't even sit up on my own. I felt like a useless ragdoll. My mom encouraged me to stay in the wheelchair but I just couldn't. When it was time for rehab, I still couldn't do what they needed me to, but they sent me anyways. I was going to be sent to a rehab center about 3hrs away from home, away from my friends. I only had to stay 17 days. But it depressed me to think about being away from the only people who cheered me up. It was time to go to rehab. My mother and I rode in the ambulance to the rehab center. When we got there, I'm not sure what had gotten into me. But I went crazy. Yelling, screaming at the top of my lungs how much I hated the place.I caused such a huge scene. I am ashamed looking back now on how I acted. I'm not sure what it was.My mom strolled me around in my wheel chair for a bit so I could see my new surroundings. The guy in the room next to me had a picture outside of his door of him. He was a very attractive guy. At the rehab center I had to go to physical therapy at 9am every morning. It was nothing but kids in wheel chairs. Half of them were unable to even hold their heads up. I wondered why I never saw the boy in the room next to me. But about two weeks of being in rehab I found our that I had actually been in physical therapy this whole time. He had a car accident and had a blood clot that went to his head. In his picture, he looked so normal. But when I realized who was him, and what he was like now, that's when the depression really sunk in. I started thinking about myself and how messed up my body was and how emberracing my back looked and how ruined it was. (when I should have been thanking god because it could have been worse.) being around other kids with as much problems as me was just flat out depressing. Closer to the end of rehab, my grandfather was in the hospital, he basically became a vegetable. He lived I'm Louisville,ky. So my mom left me at rehab by myself to be with him for a few weekends. I had no body with me and I wanted to see my grandfather before he passed and all I could do was cry. It got to the point my physical therapist wouldn't even work with me. She said I would just have to talk to the preacher there. I was unable to do anything due to depression. My sister came back from Spain though, and she was able to stay with me for a few nights. But mostly I was just alone. To add to everything, my sister was supposed to be induced to go into labor the day before I would get to be release from rehab. My mom came to see me at rehab. She told me my grandpa was still alive, but not doing well. I wanted to get out of rehab so badly. My mother asked the nurses if there was anyway I could leave early with all the events going on in my life I was missing. They wouldn't allow it. My mom had to leave me again. It got closer to time for me to get to be released from rehab, but it was too late. The day before I was released, my sister had her baby. Leaving rehab was such a great day for me. My mom stopped at crystals and I had not had anything other than hospital food since I got hospitalized! I was hospitalized 46 days total. I haven't been in the real world or seen outside since I got ran over. It made me truely appreciate life so much more. Being in the car felt so good! On the way back, as we got closer.. My stomache started getting nervous. I thought to myself. What is it going to be like when I see the driveway I got ran over on? What am I going to be like when I see the car that ran me over? Will I freak out?! .. As we pulled up to the driveway, I was nervous going down it and my stomache did turn and the car, I wouldn't go near it for a long time. My mom later took me to see my new neice in the hospital where my sister angel was. She didn't say much about the wreck, I know she had to of felt guilty, but we just aren't close like that I guess to tell each other how much we love each other but we both know it. I got to hold my neice. Even though I missed the Birth of her, it was still very special to me. Her name is faith. When my mom took me back home, she cooked a frozen pizza for me and my friend who came to see me after school was out. Everything was going good I was so glad to be back home and with friends and family. But that's when we got the called. The one I'll never forget. My grandpa had passed away. I dropped the peice of pizza in my hand and just started crying. When will this all end? When it rains, it pours. My friend couldn't believe what had happened. She cried with me. The doctors told me I couldnt ride 6hrs to Louisville, ky. But I begged my mom to take me to his funeral. I just didn't think it was any fair I didn't get to say my goodbyes to him, I could have saw him and talked to him and held him before he passed. My mom finally decided to let me go. After months of heeling, I still have 1/3 of my back burn. I've gone through 9 surgeries total. And the crazy part is now, I look like nothing even happened to me. Several days, and weeks of depression after my grandfather's funeral, my mother called me. She told me she had talked to the neighbor across the street. She said she had heard everything. But then she told my mom she had a dream the night before I got ran over. Now what she told my mom gave me cold chills all over when I first heard my mom say this. The lady said that in her dream something terrible had happened to a teenage girl in the neighborhood and that she saw my guardian angel helping the girl. When I heard this I was shocked, freaked out and very thankful. I believe this dream is for sure about me. I know god gave me a second chance. My mom always told me when I was little, " if your ever in trouble, cry out for Jesus." that is exactly what I did and I know my guardian angel protected me. To this day. Not one person can figure out how my body got completely flipped around under the car and how my head didn't get ran over with it being right behind the drivers side tire! This is my miracle. My back is the only thing not healed, I look at it as a battle scar. I actually have a tattoo above it of a tree that means uniqueness. Looking at me now, not one person I met after the accident could tell anything had happened to me. When I tell people, or show them my back, they are in shock. Anyone who has ever had a burn, whether it be from a fire, a car motor,anything, dont look at it of your body is ruined. Think of it as battle scar you have earned from fighting for your life and getting through it! Burns are the slowest heeling, the doctors even told me mine would never heel. But when I wear a two peice swin suit and my back shows, I know people stare. I stare right back at them and know that I made it through something most people couldnt imagine! A car cant keep me down, and neither can anyone's glare.