These photos of me were taken the day before I came home from the hospital.
I didn't see myself until a week after the accident, and I didn't look at these pictures for a few weeks after that. I'm told that this isn't the worst of it. After I got out of the ICU and went to a regular room the swelling in my face started going down considerably. My mom tells me that for the first twenty four hours I was unrecognizable. I'm ok not knowing what that looked like because I still have enough trouble looking at these. Some of the doctors took pictures for their records and as far as I'm concerned they can keep them to themselves.
Posting these isn't so much about the people that will see them. I'm not trying to be brave. It's helping me close a chapter on this whole process. These photos remind me how far I've come even though there is so much further to travel.
I'm still not quite ready to show a more recent picture of myself. I have them, but there aren't many and they aren't very good. In the past couple of weeks the swelling in my chin has finally gone down enough that I recognize my whole face. But there are still a few things not quite right and my vanity just won't allow me to show the world my crooked smile. I'll get there eventually.
