He(22) and I(20f) were jogging when we saw a kid hit by a car. My boyfriend asked me to wave over a taxi, wanting to lift the boy up and get him to the hospital. But I told him ‘No. If you move him you could injure his spine.’ So he called our country’s equivalent of 911. Waited for an ambulance.
Unfortunately the kid didn’t make it. It’s been five months now. My boyfriend has started smiling again but it always feels forced. He’s still kind and polite to people but is much more withdrawn, and I don’t know how to help him deal with it.
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I’m sorry you guys went through this. There was no right choice here as you couldn’t have known he was going to die and he couldn’t have known moving him wouldn’t do more damage.
All I can say is I hope you can both heal soon.
You guys did the right thing by not moving him unless you are specifically trained to. I get that he may feel he could have done more but you guys did exactly what you should have.
Maybe looking into some basic lifesaving courses wherever you are will help better prepare him in the future and also allow him to see what you guys did was the right thing.
I highly recommend that you encourage him to get therapy. You made the right choice calling emergency services rather than putting him in a taxi. The kid could’ve died quicker due to the delay of professional help. I understand why your boyfriend would feel bad, but I encourage you to say in every type of way that it is not his fault that the kid died. It’s a really unfortunate situation and there was nothing different that either one of you could do. It’s still fresh in his mind and it wasn’t that long ago, so I would give him a little bit more time, but make sure that you tell him that you’re there for him and that he doesn’t have to feel guilty. You both are entitled to feel the sadness of the traumatic event, it’s completely valid emotional responses. Even with the outcome being fatal, you both are heroes anyway.
Hi, I’m honestly only responding to this because something similar happened to me about a month ago, and I’m 23f. I saw a train wreck, an avoidable accident, that could’ve very well killed my sister and myself. In the car was a man and his teenage daughter. The man died instantly. His daughter is still fighting for her life. I am feeling a lot of the same feelings of survivors guilt, questioning what we could’ve done differently, and forcing myself to look on the bright side of life, though of course more fresh than what you guys experienced. I’m currently sorting through life with PTSD in therapy but progress is slow.
First off, you did the right thing, and it’s not either of your faults that senseless accidents happen, sometimes they just happen in front of us. Second, what I would say to you, and especially your boyfriend, is exactly what I’ve been telling myself. As horrific as it is to see tragic death, we can choose to let it teach us many lessons. We can choose to be thankful and thoughtful every single day, because we have seen firsthand how quickly and randomly life can be taken away from us. We can also use the person we saw die as a motivator. We can to live for them, or try to be worthy of being a person who outlived them. We can put double the amount of love and kindness out into the world…but also towards yourself. You don’t need to be a perfect person, sincerely, you both are already the kind of people who helped a dying child, regardless of disagreements on how it was handled. Questioning the past isn’t going to change what happened, and no set of different actions could guarantee this child lived, which is something I’ve been telling myself regarding the train wreck.
Finally, I hope you both are well and would be available to chat more privately if either of you ever feel y’all want to seek support from others who have experienced the same things. No pressure, just felt like it should be offered.
Your boyfriend isn’t the one who hit this kid. The driver is the only one to blame.
Did the driver stop too? Or was it a hit and run?
Both of you did everything you could for the boy, it was the right choice not to move him, please keep in mind that he wasn’t alone when he passed away. He had two people who cared deeply to be beside him and stay there with him, even if he wasn’t conscious. The only person to blame is the driver, and I imagine it was a hit and run too.
It takes time to process this sort of traumatic experience. I worked with a guy who witnessed the car in front of him hitting and killing a child who then drove off. It stays with you, the senselessness. I’d recommend therapy for both of you.