Cycling while traumatised

I’ve told myself a million time that I’ve dealt with “the accident”.

But then something happens and I find myself stopped on the of the road, the front wheel of my bike nosed in hard against the curb so I don’t fall off while having something that resembles a panic attack, ugly-crying and struggling to breathe.

Sigh.

Trauma.

Even when you think you’ve got it sorted out, it still manages to pop out of nowhere and punch you right in the face.

I can tell the story of “the accident” in about five minutes these days. I’ve got it down pat and I think I tell it really well. I know where to pause for dramatic effect, where to pause so that the listener can react.

So, without further ado…

On September 17 2014, a women drove the wrong way out of a one-way street and through a red light at a bike/pedestrian crossing. Unfortunately for me, I just happened to be on the crossing at that very moment, riding to work.

We collided and I flew across her bonnet to end up on the other side of the road. I can vaguely remember the moment I hit her car and I can sorta remember landing on the road with my arm screaming in pain.

I think I remember asking where my bike was and if it was okay.

I can definitely remember whispering to the guy who was holding my hand while we waited for the ambulance that I was nine weeks pregnant.

I thought I’d managed to unpack and deal with all this. After all, it’s been seven years since this happened. I’ve done therapy — both physical and mental. I thought I’d worked through the trauma of spending a week not knowing if the fetus inside me had survived.

But no. Apparently there’s still some trauma to be had.

This morning I was out for a ride before work. This is a weekly thing for me. I ride the same road every week as it’s close to my house. It’s familiar territory and I feel pretty safe there.

Today was a little different because I was out on the bike from the collision (it was completely undamaged in the accident — one of the shifters got moved which was put back into the correct position) because my new bike is with my mechanic for some tweaking.

I’d done the bulk of my ride and in the process of turning around to go home when I found myself confronted with a car coming down a one-way street the wrong way.

After initially being rooted to the spot, I managed to get moving again but about 50 metres down the road, I had to stop because I was shaking so much.

Cue the ugly-crying and struggling to breathe for about five minutes.

I hate feeling this way. I hate what that idiot in a car has done to me.

I hate the fact that I didn’t get a have a “normal” pregnancy because of her. I had one that was full of pain and fear. I hate the fact that I thought I’d worked all this out and was at peace with it but one little incident like this just throws it all back in my face.

I’m not over it. I don’t think I ever will be. But I had hoped I’d gotten distance on it and could look at it more objectively without it provoking such strong emotions.

It’s hard when you discover that the progress you thought you’d made was so flimsy. One scary moment where nothing really happened — the car didn’t come anywhere near me, I was already riding quite slowly in preparation to stop at a stop sign — is enough to bring it all crashing down.

It feels like my reaction is way, way out of proportion to what actually happened. It feels so excessive but that’s trauma for you I guess. You never know when it’s going to rear its ugly head again.

It’s frustrating when such a small thing can provoke such an extreme reaction. I suppose it’s a reminder that the work of recovery is never really done.

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