Posted on 08/12/2015 4:45:02 AM PDT by rickmichaels
For Bethany Benson, 22, it should have been an uneventful drive back from her aunt’s house in Michigan to her own in Oshawa. It was August 2, 2010, around 5 p.m. With her boyfriend at the time behind the wheel, they crossed the border and she decided to stretch out as best she could in the confines of her mom’s 2002 Sunfire. She reclined the seat a little and propped her feet up on the dashboard, soon sleeping as the farmlands that lined Highway 402 outside of Strathroy, Ont., slipped past.
Bethany knows what happened next only through the accounts of other people. A small car and a motorcycle were involved in a collision that would eventually cost the motorcyclist his life; coming upon that crash, a transport truck driver would hit his brakes to avoid it; the Sunfire was travelling behind the transport with Bethany asleep in the passenger seat. As the brake lights flashed, her boyfriend desperately tried to avoid the suddenly stopping rig. He couldn’t.
Looking at photos of the Sunfire it’s hard to believe Bethany and her boyfriend survived. He would require 100 stitches, but Bethany would have her life altered forever because of one chance decision she made before nodding off.
She had put her feet on the dash.
A deployed airbag inflates at about 320 km/h. That’s a little faster than most Formula One cars race. This is what hit Bethany’s hamstrings, driving her knees into her face. Her left eye socket and cheekbone were broken, as was her nose. Her jaw was dislocated, a tooth cut through her lower lip and she would lose her spleen. Both feet were broken and compressed, and would eventually end up nearly 2 sizes smaller than they were before the crash. Her left pupil would remain permanently dilated affecting her vision, her hearing would remain altered and her memory would be wiped and rebooted like a faulty computer program. But perhaps the most dangerous injury would be the one her mother was told at the time not to worry about: a brain bleed.
Before August 2, 2010, Bethany Benson had been on her way to becoming a teacher. In September, she would be heading back to Trent University to finish her degrees in French and History, then on to a B. Ed in Teacher’s College. Instead, after a day on life support following the crash, she awoke no longer bilingual; she would have to relearn French, and even much of her English.
Four years later, the young woman sitting before me appears to be like any other 26-year-old. She matter-of-factly lists off the injuries she suffered, though sometimes coming back to things she’s left out. She was slated to have her first amateur boxing match that fall, proving herself to be more than a casual athlete. Kayaking, rollerblading, skating, snowboarding; she tells me surrendering her various gear in the year after the crash was difficult, a tangible acceptance of changes that would be permanent.
“Any shoes I wear have to have these special orthotics in them. They cost $450, and the shoes they fit cost $180. I had to get rid of my high heels, I know it sounds dumb…”
No, it doesn’t sound dumb. Along with losing so much of what many of us take for granted, she also lost most of her friends. That boyfriend who was driving is gone, and Bethany is still angry that he wasn’t charged. I tell her four years is a long time to carry around something she can’t change; when I ask her mother later how she feels towards the boy, she smiles and says she has no hard feelings at all.
That brain bleed? Bethany was no longer the Bethany she was before the crash. She says she could no longer do what her friends were doing; bars and clubs are physically draining, her hearing now ultra sensitive. Her mother adds more nuance.
“I got back a different daughter. I lost a sweet 22-year-old who worked full-time and put herself through university. She was on a great path. I got a 13-year-old with anger issues.” In the months immediately following the crash, Bethany would text people in the middle of the night. Texts that were angry and inappropriate, texts she doesn’t remember sending, but texts that many couldn’t see as a product of a damaged, changed brain. With fits of rage interspersed with understandable depressions, this Bethany is no longer that Bethany.
Mary Lachapelle is a housing co-ordinator with Durham Region. Brunette like her oldest daughter, she has a lovely smile that she uses often, though her words are tinged with a kind of resignation. Where Bethany has told me she realizes she will no longer be able to teach or do most of the sports she once loved, Mary has been forced to take a longer view.
“I have had to realize that my child will always live with me. We’ll have to find a house that affords us both some privacy and separation, but she is essentially a 13-year-old.”
’ve asked to speak with Mary for some perspective on Bethany’s life since the crash, and what the future may hold. It quickly becomes clear that everything Bethany must deal with in turn becomes something Mary must.
“There will be no early retirement. Bethany only has medical benefits through my work, and there’s no way I can let that go.” In the years since the crash, their days have been filled with lawyers and lawsuits and insurance companies as well as the medical fallout of a daughter who has suffered a major brain injury. Within that legal labyrinth, Bethany is actually suing her own mother. Mary shrugs with a wry smile; Bethany flinches as she tells me this. Insurance companies work in twisted ways sometimes.
In an odd footnote, Bethany had been involved in a collision on August 2, 2009 – exactly one year before this crash. A cab she was riding in in Toronto was t-boned. The legal fallout from that event has been folded into this one as lawyers and insurance adjustors argue over who will pay what to whom.
“They said the brain bleed would be absorbed back into her body. It seemed her physical injuries were the biggest problems,” says her mother. In retrospect, there are questions about what opportunities or treatments might have been lost because of this line of reasoning.
“My daughter is 26. I’m not legally able to know what meds she might be taking, or when. And yet, she is basically a 13-year-old, with all the immaturity and impulsiveness you would associate with that. She’s naive.” As we speak Bethany is sitting nearby texting madly on her phone, their 14-year-old Lhasa Apso, Max, at her feet. It is clear mother and daughter are close; it is also clear that Mary has had to support these myriad new problems and challenges while simultaneously grieving the loss of the child she once had.
In all of our exchanges and throughout our meeting, Bethany is adamant about getting out the message: everything she had, everything she was, changed because she put her feet up on that dash. Airbags and seatbelts are designed to save you, but you compromise that with something as mundane as improper and reclined seating positions. Bethany wants to be an advocate, be able to pass along the message to others who could benefit from all she has suffered.
Speaking with her mother, I sense an even broader message. With insurance companies putting a two-year cap on progress – a benchmark passed 2 years ago – Mary wonders if her daughter has reached her peak recovery.
“I don’t know if she’s improving, or if I’m just getting better at managing.”
The 402 is one of the most dangerous highways in North America. That’s a very unforgiving highway. The handful of times I have driven onit I can recall at least one serious or fatal accident.
CC
According to Bethany’s mother “There will be no early retirement. Bethany only has medical benefits through my work, and there’s no way I can let that go.”
I don’t understand. She lived in Oshawa Canada. The accident happened in Canada. Why is she not covered by the glorious Canadian universal free health care?
Tragic accident, very sad.
Another contributing factor: driver probably following too closely.
I see drivers tailgating constantly on the interstate. Distance between cars should be one car length per every 10 mph, or at least 10 car lengths at 60 mph.
Which means he wasn't allowing himself enough stopping distance. By definition.
But that's ok, people don't like it when the car ahead of them is going 73mpg and they want to go 75mph, so they get 5 inches behind that car ahead of them to psychologically "nudge them forward or out of the way". Because after all, every car you pass shaves 1.5 seconds off your arrival time and those 1.5 seconds can really add up.
It's worth risking your life, your feet, your face, your knees, your eyes to shave off a few seconds from your arrival time. Totally worth it. I get it. I absolutely do.
My wife tries to tell me that tail-gaters are demonstrating effective IQ levels lower than body lice but I explain to her that those 1.5 seconds are really monumental achievements in peoples lives and have to be respected.
I want to know too.
“Which means he wasn’t allowing himself enough stopping distance. By definition.”
I had a car directly in front of me get clipped by a car pulling out. Spun him 90 degrees and then into a barrier. Pretty decent crunch. Even though the car in front of me was going sideways for a bit, I had no problem stopping - my only concern was stopping slow enough to not get rear-ended (thankfully I didn’t).
Needless to say, I always have and always will make a point of not following too closely. No matter how fast one’s reflexes are or how good their brakes are, it simply is not possible to slow down a car quickly enough to handle a car going sideways in front of you - they will slow down 10 times faster.
Why is it so bad? It looks like a straight shot on the map!
While that is true, don’t put your feet on the dashboard, the real issue here was the boyfriend following to close to the truck he ran into. Had he followed a safe distance behind, none of this would have occurred.
When you consider how much farther a semi takes to stop compared to a car, the young man should have been able to stop. Along with following too close, he probably wasn’t paying attention.
I tell my daughter not to do this often.
It looks like a modern interstate, too, not some two-laner with a lot of trucks on it.
It’s a major artery into Michigan for the auto industry, so that means a lot of trucks. Plus, two of Ontario’s biggest towns (Hamilton and Toronto) are on the 402 and in both it transitions from rolling farmland to big city rather quickly. Thirdly, the 402 via the Queen Elizabeth Way (QEW) is a popular “shortcut” for trucks transiting from the northeast US to the midwest. All the above translates into fairly heavy traffic volumes as well.
CC
Yup. And judging by the crush damage -- going pretty darn fast.
I see this constantly. Just from personal observation, I would say 85-90% of all drivers follow too closely. It is a bad habit. Doesn't anyone know the 2 second rule? Watch the rear tires of the car in front of you cross a shadow or mark on the highway. Count "one thousand one, one thousand two". If you cross the shadow before the count is over...you are too close.
I have avoided many fender benders and more serious accidents simply by being able to brake in time.
It is very difficult if not impossible to maintain those appropriate car lengths. I live in Atlanta and have to drive interstate highways everyday where the "normal" flow is going 10 miles over the speed limit (75 to 80 MPH). If I leave those appropriate car lengths between me and the car ahead, then immediately other cars will fill in the gap, furthermore I will be considered a dangerous driver for not maintaining the flow.
I don't know what the answer is, if anyone can tell me, please do, I am listening. Thank goodness we will be leaving Atlanta as soon as our new home in the mountains is ready to move into.
Hamilton and Toronto are nowhere near the 402.
That’s always a possibility as well.
Now, whenever I have passengers in the back seat, and I’m on the highway, I insist they wear their seatbelts. Studies have shown that in accidents involving sudden deceleration crashes, front seat passengers, despite wearing seatbelts and having airbags around them, are often killed ( broken necks) by the bodies of unsecured rear seat passengers coming over the tops of the front seats.
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