I screamed, as the car I was driving crashed, head on with the car that bolted over the center line. My daughter! All I could think of was my daughter. She was in the back seat when we crashed. Then everything went dark. As I fluttered in and out of consciousness I remembered asking the emergency personel where my daughter was and if she was ok. No one wanted to answer me. They just kept saying “keep still and try not to talk”. The next time I awoke I was in the hospital. I couldn’t remember anything. I had no idea why I was here. I reached up and felt the top of my head, which was throbbing with pain, and discovered some of my hair had been shaved and there was a huge bandage covering that area. I wanted to cry. What was going on. What were these people doing to me. I wanted desperately to go home. Home? I had no idea where home was. I realized then that I didn’t even know my name.

I screamed! A nurse came rushing in calling for a doctor, STAT. “She’s awake”, I heard the nurse call down the hallway to someone. What did she mean “she’s awake”? Of course I’m awake. These people must be crazy. Why are they doing all this to me and Why can’t I remember anything. Several nurses and a doctor that looked like he was about 12 came in and started asking me all sorts of questions, none of which I could answer, and running all sorts of tests. “What is this all about”, I shouted. I was scared and no one was giving me any answers.

Finally they were done with the tests and one of the younger nurses said to me “I’m going to call your daughter, and have her come up here now”. Daughter? I had a daughter? What was this nurse talking about? I didn’t remember having a daughter. Then again I didn’t remember anything. After the young nurse left, one of the surgeons came in to talk to me. At least he said he was a surgeon. He told me that I had short term memory loss.

He told me that my name was Laura Hennison and that I had one daughter. We had been in a car accident and my daughter had suffered minor injuries and was released from the hospital a week later. “A week”, I cried. “How long have I been here”? I asked. “You’ve been in and out of consciousness for about a month now”, he said. I almost fainted. I’d been here for a month. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “Where is my daughter now”? I asked. “She’s with your ex-husband”, he replied. I was divorced. I had a lot of information to remember. Would I ever be able to remember?

About an hour later a girl about 10 years old came into my room. “Mommy”, she cried. “I missed you so much”,she said. We talked for a while. I mostly asked all the questions because I didn’t know anything. I could tell she was becoming frustrated. I think she was more hurt than anything. Especially when I asked what her name was. “It’s Ellie”, she said, holding back the tears. “I’m so sorry honey”, I said with as much remorse as I could. After we visited for a while my ex-husband came in. We talked for a while. He told me that Ellie was going to stay with him until I was released and fully had my memory back. I must have gotten custody of our daughter in the divorce. How could this have happened. I started to cry.