Many don’t know that I sustained a traumatic brain injury on May 30, 2005—the day my life radically changed.

As a 26-year-old in the spring of 2005, I was in training to manage a Hollister store while applying to transfer to a law school in the Philadelphia area. I had completed one year of law school in San Diego but bailed on living in Southern California and moved back to the Least Coast in October 2004. On the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend in May 2005, I worked a 10-hour day. I then drove two hours to the beach in New Jersey to party with buds from Penn State for the remainder of the weekend.

When I arrived in Sea Isle City, I began boozing. After about 2 hrs of pre-gaming, my crew and I headed to the bars. I continued to drink hard, downing shots and beers. At some point, I separated from my boys with whom I had gone out. It was no worries. I was friendly with different crowds at the bar because I had lifeguarded for five years in Sea Isle while I was in college.

When the bar closed, I began to walk alone back to my buddy’s house. An ex-girlfriend called, saying that she wanted to hang out. The problem was that she was in Philadelphia. So, like a complete freaking kook, I told her that I’d drive the 2 hours back to Philly. I was smashed but got into my Honda Accord.

I drove for nearly an hour and a half without incident. But when I was about 20 minutes away from my parents’ house, I fell asleep at the wheel. I was on I-95 near the Philadelphia Airport when my car slammed into the left guardrail. The vehicle was totaled, though I was not badly injured.

I stood atop an overpass, next to my wrecked ride. A significant space at that location separates the northbound and southbound lanes of the highway. Another car lost control and drove directly towards me. So I leapt the guardrail and, I guess, tried to jump to the other side of the highway. I did not successfully soar through the air and safely land on the opposite side of the road. Instead, I fell 30 feet onto the street below the overpass.

I sustained a traumatic brain injury, a fractured orbital bone, two broken arms, a fractured rib, a cracked pelvis, and a fractured left tibial plateau. I was in a coma for 13 days. I remained hospitalized for 2 months and completed outpatient rehab after another 8 months.

The injury’s long-term physical effects can be annoying but aren’t too severe. I do not have vision in my right eye and have desensitization throughout the left side of my body. I cannot run because of some lingering ataxia and other issues with my left knee.

The mental and emotional pain that resulted was less obvious and more difficult. I felt like a shell of my pre-accident self, despising the way I walked, talked, and looked. I wanted to kill myself about a year after the accident. I didn’t attempt suicide because my parents were not gun owners. (And, since I’d recently done it, I was not going to jump off a bridge.)

Through activities like therapy, reading, consistent exercise, and meditation, I have accepted and embraced my post-accident self. I am happy.

Feel free to ask any questions. I am not shy.