Thoughts on The Crash Reel now published

     I found this unpublished thought from this summer. I'm not sure why I never published it. Perhaps, I was still processing it then forgot to come back?? I'm sure I had more thoughts than I ended up writing about but they might just be lost forever!

     "The hubs" and I recently watched The Crash Reel. It was a really, really well done documentary on the crash and ongoing recovery of 2010 Olympic snowboarding favorite Kevin Pearce! Kevin spoke at a Brain Injury conference in 2011, not long after his injury. I actually got to talk with him the next day as he sat on a bench waiting for his mom to pick him up. We talked about our struggles and I offered my coping strategies. I tried to encourage him that it would get better, SLOWLY! We talked about our families and what an important role they play in recovery and acceptance of what happened!  I knew he would never remember that conversation but I hope at the moment it was what he needed to hear.

     In one scene of his documentary, the camera caught when somebody woke Kevin up from sleeping.  His eyes popped open and he just stared at the camera. "Hubs" looked over at me very solemnly and says something like, "That was the exact same face you used to have;  that blank, panic, I'm trapped stare." Later they show him out of the hospital and he is talking to people but I recognize the look of feeling completely detached from the world as it spins on. I looked at Nate and said "he has no idea what is going on around him even though he probably fooled everyone in that room!" I still have these moments 10 years later but not as often as I used to!