Two families from the tragedy on the Taconic reach out, may meet
For both survivors of trauma injury where the mechanism of trauma is a car accident, and indeed for those that survive tragic death by trauma, for some a big part of the struggle is “do they make contact”. It’s very important to many, and some do, and some do not. It’s a challenge of expectations hoped for or dashed. There in lies the problem. There are so many possible scenarios especially in traffic crashes. Someone made a bad decision, it may be you, or your life may be forever altered because of it. The easy part in this story is the two families coming together share a common tragic and immense grief because of a very bad and incredibly tragic decision. That person is dead, so the one responsible for the 6 deaths in this instance isn’t a part of the picture. The picture is less complex because of that.
In this instance where there are two families who’s lives were equally changed through the loss of three loved ones each at the hands of Diane Schuler, the decision to meet is a lot easier. In general from their appearances on the news, the Bastardi family seems to be coping well and have a very good and logical grasp of where fault lies, and don’t seem to be placing blame where it seems not to belong. Without that, clear understanding on their part, a meeting like this would probably never occur.
As quoted from the New York Daily News:
The lawyer for the Hance family, whose three girls died when their aunt Diane Schuler crashed her minivan, phoned to pass on condolences to the relatives of Michael and Guy Bastardi, whose SUV was struck head-on.
“Both families are going through unimaginable grief and is still in a great deal of trauma as anyone could understand,” said James McCorie, the Hances’ lawyer.
The idea of a future meeting got a thumbs up from the Bastardis’ relatives.
“The Bastardi family thinks it would be a great idea to grieve together,” said Irving Anolik, their lawyer.
We on the sidelines can scarcely imagine what immense emotions and emotional trials these two families are going through. In this particular case, it seems only right that these two families would meet.
Often though in the aftermath of car accidents especially, it can be far more complicated. In the case where people survive their trauma injury we often have victims and those that made a really bad decision while driving at a most inopportune time. There are often cases where the guilt on the part of the one that caused the injury; they often want to reach out but rarely do. It eats at them. Others in that situation just simply deny their role and think that others are just plain wrong to place blame. The former often seek forgiveness, but that can be a really difficult expectation to have happen. Often it takes years for victim/survivors to get to a point where they would so much as consider giving it, even more often, there is no place for or chance of forgiveness from the people who were the victim of this bad decision.
There are occasions where those who have been on the short end of the stick with the bad decision maker who have chosen to forgive the one who caused the accident and struggle with whether they should let that person know. Again even that is a difficult decision.
Anyone who finds the courage to move forward with making contact in situations like these needs to know that they simply can’t tie large expectations to the event. Even in the case where a victim contacts the person at fault with a message of forgiveness, it can be met with “How DARE you”.
So for those survivors that want to reach out, whether it’s to give forgiveness, to seek it or for other purposes altogether, you need to balance your needs and your expectations so that you aren’t hurt by the reaching out. Those that do so with no expectations at all in terms of outcome are the ones least likely to be hurt by it.
This is one of so very many reasons why survivors with these needs have someone to bounce them off of that has experience either as a counselor or within a group of survivors.
Unfortunately at this time, the ability to join a group environment as a trauma survivor is highly unlikely because for the most part they simply don’t exist. Our goal, our mission is to change that, but just like Rome, we can’t build it in a day. In the meantime an awesome resource where you can join a virtual community is the Trauma Survivors Network. It’s a program we often mention on this site, and holds promise of being a full orbed resource for survivors within reach of a trauma center, once that trauma center in your area actually decides that survival means more than healing physical wounds. That is going to be a long hard road. The online resource is there now though, available for ANY trauma survivor injured in any way through any mechanism in any situation as well as for family members and friends who have lost a loved one due to trauma injury or who is coping with survivors in the family. Anyone that feels like they have an unresolved issue like this is encouraged to discuss it in the community forum. I myself will make sure you get perspective, even if it’s just me offering it.
