Post accident mental recovery experiences

[DrKnow65]

You lost me at riding at 95% of your ability on the street.

Yep, figured there would be at least three of you guys...

1st is the "I never speed, but when I do I am safe about it (insert acceptable percentage here)" guy
2nd is the "I never ride alone" guy
3rd is the "I don't even ride street anymore, track days ONLY" guy

There may be more, those are just the three I accepted to deal with when I decided to start this thread.

Thanks for helping out Mother Goose, one down, two to go.

[Kim-n-Dean]

...Thanks for helping out Mother Goose, one down, two to go.

Which one of the three did he take care of for ya?

[DrKnow65]

Which one of the three did he take care of for ya?

Alright, I concede.

I thought I could throw this kind of thing up here and have a conversation about what it takes to recuperate from an accident on a mental front.
I guess it was a miscalculation on my part.

Have at it guys, break down all the points where you wouldn't make this mistake, how safe you ride, blah blah blah.

Ignore the bit where I wasn't actually riding hard when the accident happened.

Posting this up was a mistake too.

Whatever.

[Drano]

I thought I could throw this kind of thing up here and have a conversation about what it takes to recuperate from an accident on a mental front.

It really depends on the severity of the injury. When I crashed I suffered a mild concussion, but due to the severity of my other injuries I had serious trouble retrieving names of places and people. It was almost 9 months to a year before I regained the majority of ability, but at times I still struggle with it. If you are concerned I would suggest contacting a sports psychologist for some evaluation and treatment. It can't hurt.

Also, if you haven't tried it yet, go to the track. Most of us can recount people who have been hurt, or died, riding on the street to get their speed fix. The track can be dangerous, but honestly you won't have crazy traffic causing you problems.

[mdub]

Alright, I concede.

I thought I could throw this kind of thing up here and have a conversation about what it takes to recuperate from an accident on a mental front.
I guess it was a miscalculation on my part.

Have at it guys, break down all the points where you wouldn't make this mistake, how safe you ride, blah blah blah.

Ignore the bit where I wasn't actually riding hard when the accident happened.

Posting this up was a mistake too.

Whatever.

Good write up. Sucks that you had to shell out over 400.00 to get bike back. Yeah take a break for sure. Re- evaluate if riding is for you. Some people take a break for years and return.

[bulldog]

I've gotten some sh*t over this before too man as I decided to take a break after just seeing way too many wrecks and friends hurt/died. The final draw was I rode to work for years and had my gear on, but for for some weird reason I decided to take my car at last minute. Less than a mile from my house a person ran a red light and hit a car that slammed into me.


Long story short it made me see that not all wrecks can be avoided; I had less than a milli second to realize I was being hit, no way I could have gotten away....I truly thought my 20+ years of riding would always save me and also having great gear.....yeah right. Then seeing my car totaled I really started to think how my leg would have been hit instead of the steel of my car....would I ever have walked normal again? What about lift on it like I do? I'm sure the leg would have been shattered. If I died I'd leave my wife and mother devastated and this started to cloud my mind and when I rode after I was just not the confident rider I once was. Honestly if it was just me I would not care that much, but doing that to the few people who love me is in end what really got to me. Sucks as still on a break, but those thoughts are not good for riding on a sportbike,


P.S. Don't worry, Wicky was one guy I used to tell not to wheelie in the street as not worth it (as he said); him and his buddies would tease me for not doing them on the street (Hoopty, BigJ, and him) . So he is not innocent and doubt many people are on this site as we've all broken a law at one point. 95% is way to high to ride on street and hopefully if anything that was the lesson learned.....

Honestly when Wicky wrecked and I saw his skin graft, that really made me slow down...among some other instances......Spiderman's wreck (our president), Gene and Jessica passing, watching my buddy break his back convulsing on side of road...this list goes on and on....

[Mother Goose]

P.S. Don't worry, Wicky was one guy I used to tell not to wheelie in the street as not worth it (as he said); him and his buddies would tease me for not doing them on the street (Hoopty, BigJ, and him) . So he is not innocent and doubt many people are on this site as we've all broken a law at one point. 95% is way to high to ride on street and hopefully if anything that was the lesson learned.....

Honestly when Wicky wrecked and I saw his skin graft, that really made me slow down...among some other instances......Spiderman's wreck (our president), Gene and Jessica passing, watching my buddy break his back convulsing on side of road...this list goes on and on....

[j0ker]

Which one of the three did he take care of for ya?

WTF, MotherGoose is a dude?! Learn something new everyday.

[Mother Goose]

WTF, MotherGoose is a dude?! Learn something new everyday.

Last time I checked! It's the pink on the race bike, isn't it....

[j0ker]

Last time I checked! It's the pink on the race bike, isn't it....

I guess it is. I always thought you were just a badass chick rider. This changes my grand scheme to eventually get with you.

[Kim-n-Dean]

... I always thought you were just a badass chick rider...

That's a biiiig bitch!

[Mother Goose]

I guess it is. I always thought you were just a badass chick rider. This changes my grand scheme to eventually get with you.

Maybe now you'll stop sending me those dick pics through PM.

[Sully]

For the record, I'll tell my crash on the street story, which most of the OG CSC people know about.

My first bike was a 2001 Honda F4i and I learned how to wheelie it, and wheelie it well. I was doing a wheelie down 6th Ave. from Sheridan to Wadsworth (I'd only do it on the highway when there was no one around, and back in 2003, that was easy to find), and the rear tire started to shake back and forth. It was actually going up and down the tire ruts on the road, so I set it down and got a mean tank slapper. I couldn't stop it and I started heading towards the median and I decided to bail off the back of the bike instead of hitting the median and possibly being thrown over it into oncoming traffic and endangering other motorists. I was in the hospital for 5 days, skin graft on my left knee, road rash on my legs and stomach, jacked up my right ankle and separated some things in my right elbow, oh, and a concussion. If you're wondering, I was wearing a helmet, jeans, basketball shoes, a mesh jacket where the armor in the elbow shifted causing the elbow damage and motocross gloves.

As soon as I was able to bend my knee, I was back on a bike. I didn't have any second thoughts about it, I just did it. Some people can't live without a motorcycle and that's their life, I'm one of those people, so I didn't let an accident keep me from it. Both of our accidents were our own faults from the sound of it. Mine was, I was riding like an idiot and I deserved what happened to me. Yours was you lost concentration on what YOU needed to do in the situation. Instead of staring back at the other rider, you should have kept focus on where you were going what your motorcycle was doing. I know I learned from my mistake, will you?

I remember

WTF, MotherGoose is a dude?! Learn something new everyday.

... and when people thought Bertha was a chick... lmao!! Dick pics for errrryone!!

[The Black Knight]

Yep, figured there would be at least three of you guys...

1st is the "I never speed, but when I do I am safe about it (insert acceptable percentage here)" guy
2nd is the "I never ride alone" guy
3rd is the "I don't even ride street anymore, track days ONLY" guy

There may be more, those are just the three I accepted to deal with when I decided to start this thread.

Thanks for helping out Mother Goose, one down, two to go.

That was me up until April when I finally sold my 03 GSX-R1000. I gave up riding street back in 2013 and did track days only, been riding track since 2006. Now, I have no bike and if I do get back into it, I'm going with a cruiser. Already owned a 1999 Sportster 1200 and loved that thing when it came to riding to work. But with as bad as people drive these days, it really doesn't hurt my feelings to not ride the street anymore.

As far as picking on you for riding the street fast. I can't really do that, as I've done just about everything bad under the sun when it comes to street riding.

I've had two bad crashes in my time, one at the track and one on the street. Luckily, I walked away with mainly just bad headaches from both of them, due to get slammed on the ground.

[Mother Goose]

For the record, I'll tell my crash on the street story, which most of the OG CSC people know about.

My first bike was a 2001 Honda F4i and I learned how to wheelie it, and wheelie it well. I was doing a wheelie down 6th Ave. from Sheridan to Wadsworth (I'd only do it on the highway when there was no one around, and back in 2003, that was easy to find), and the rear tire started to shake back and forth. It was actually going up and down the tire ruts on the road, so I set it down and got a mean tank slapper. I couldn't stop it and I started heading towards the median and I decided to bail off the back of the bike instead of hitting the median and possibly being thrown over it into oncoming traffic and endangering other motorists. I was in the hospital for 5 days, skin graft on my left knee, road rash on my legs and stomach, jacked up my right ankle and separated some things in my right elbow, oh, and a concussion. If you're wondering, I was wearing a helmet, jeans, basketball shoes, a mesh jacket where the armor in the elbow shifted causing the elbow damage and motocross gloves.

As soon as I was able to bend my knee, I was back on a bike. I didn't have any second thoughts about it, I just did it. Some people can't live without a motorcycle and that's their life, I'm one of those people, so I didn't let an accident keep me from it. Both of our accidents were our own faults from the sound of it. Mine was, I was riding like an idiot and I deserved what happened to me. Yours was you lost concentration on what YOU needed to do in the situation. Instead of staring back at the other rider, you should have kept focus on where you were going what your motorcycle was doing. I know I learned from my mistake, will you?

[j0ker]

As soon as I was able to bend my knee, I was back on a bike. I didn't have any second thoughts about it, I just did it. Some people can't live without a motorcycle and that's their life, I'm one of those people, so I didn't let an accident keep me from it.

I am also one of those people. A month after my right leg spiral tib/fib shatter, 18 screws and 2 titanium plates, I was riding with one leg propped up on the highway pegs, around my neighborhood. Front breaks right! I can't say I understand the impossible to ignore attraction of motorcycles for me, but it's there for sure.

[Mother Goose]

Yep, figured there would be at least three of you guys...

1st is the "I never speed, but when I do I am safe about it (insert acceptable percentage here)" guy
2nd is the "I never ride alone" guy
3rd is the "I don't even ride street anymore, track days ONLY" guy

There may be more, those are just the three I accepted to deal with when I decided to start this thread.

Thanks for helping out Mother Goose, one down, two to go.

Anytime. But I'm not sure which one I am. I do only have a track bike at the moment, but I didn't say anything about the rest.

You could have led with what happened with the actual accident instead of telling us you were timing your runs and riding at 95% of your riding ability on the street. But you didn't, so here we are.