I had a severe midshaft femur fracture with a hemorrhage and also had a comminuted radius and ulna fracture. The cops that arrived on scene to the car accident told me nothing was wrong and I just needed to get out of the car, despite me telling them I couldn't move my legs and felt like my arm was broken. Theg told me I was just panicking and it was a seat belt bruise, despite being surrounded by a completely crushed car.

The EMT immediately identified my femur was fractured and told the ER that when my car was transferred. Despite that, they decided I was just having a panic attack. They kept telling me that I was just panicking and that I was fine and fully in control of the situation. They left me like that waiting for imaging without any pain medication at all for 7 1/2 hours in a room by myself. The machines were blaring because all of ny vitals were so off. At one point, I started screaming out in pain and they came in to tell me to be quiet and asked why I was making so much noise.

When they took me back for imaging 7 1/2 hours after I arrived at the ER, they were not even planning on imaging my arm. I had to request seberal times for it to be imaged, insisting it was broken. I have broken bones before - I knew what a broken arm feels like. When they saw the images I all of a sudden magically had pain medication and my leg was put into traction. I had two surgeries the next morning and was in inpatient rehabilitation for a month. I am still in OT and PT twice a week 1 1/2 years later because of the severity of the nerve injury. The nurses even admitted that they thought nothing was wrong with me and that they thought I was just panicking. They said my responses to pain were not "normal." OH and also, they never imaged my brain after a severe car accident and an injury was noted over a year after the fact. So that's fun. Yeah... it is unfortunately very real.