*I* should know better…I had a nephew from my first marriage die from fatigue driving 3 months before our wedding. He was supposed to be our groomsmen. Driving home after a long shift at work, and visiting his girlfriend, at 5 am, he fell alseep. Just like that… Gone.
*I* SHOULD know better…In our rural area, last year a well respected, well known business man, driving in the wee hours of the morning along a straight stretch, getting close to home, fell asleep, and hit a tree. Just like that…Gone.
I have family who are long haul truckers, who have to follow rules to stop and rest….I’ve driven from Nova Scotia to Ontario straight through MANY times, sharing shifts at the wheel when we each got tired…so if anybody should….*I* SHOULD KNOW BETTER.
I would never dream of drinking and driving…but when you’re tired…eh, who’s NOT tired this day and age right?
It’s been 3 busy days for me…during a very hot spell this summer, and I’ve had a terrible time going to sleep, and getting terrible sleep at best of the 6 to 7 hours I’ve gotten the last 2 nights. I could give you all the reasons WHY I’m tired, but we all have them. I’m on my period, so I’m more scatter brained, the joys of ADD to add to the whole situation.
But, even when you are tired you do what you need to do, and we needed bread,milk and eggs,some other essentials, and a new door for our house that we need to install before winter.
Home Depot had a door on sale, and we new it was ‘now or never” purchase opportunity. I was tired before we left around supper time. I was cranky, and hot…the kids were driving me nuts all day, being tired and cranky and hot too.
The city is about 35 minute drive from where we live. Due to my husband’s illness, I’m the driver in our family. Shopping under the stress of tired whiny kids, while I am tired just wears me out more. But this is usual, and we knew this ahead of time, but we went, because we had to. We did what we needed to do hopping at 4 different stores over a 4 hour time period or so. On the way out of the city we grabbed some fast food to eat on the way home.
We sat in the van to eat it, and then I started our 35 or so minute drive home on dark two lane rural roads on a Friday night after 11 pm
My husband mentions to me that he hates driving home at this hour because you never know what kind of idiot is out trying to drive home drunk. This is a fact I’d considered based on the fact that the drive into the city during daylight hours didn’t inspire any confidence by the way the oncoming traffic was being reckless trying to pass in badly chosen places, tail gating and speeding etc.
Traffic is not heavy, but for a Friday night in a rural/tourist area, it is steady enough with oncoming cars.
Some people are forgetting to turn off their high beams at the right time and are practically blinding me, making my already exhausted brain need to concentrate more to not be drawn to their lights like a moth to a flame. That really aggravates me, too, it’ is not like they don’t know I’m coming.
So, I pay attention to the corner of the pavement I’m driving on in my lane to avoid looking right at the headlights, to ensure I pass safely. I’m aware than I move a little to the right each time an oncoming car passes me. I’m trying to be safe.
I drive half way home sipping warm coke from a can, eating sweets and talking to my husband, shifting positions, doing what I need to to stay alert and awake. He hardly drives these days due to his disability, and he’s in a lot of pain today. I don’t want to ask him to drive. He’s tweeting on his Black Berry to a friend and telling me about the conversation to keep me alert.
We were not far from our destination. which is “just going home from grocery and home repair supply shopping”. He’s tweeting on his cell phone. Just another shopping trip. I’m always tired anyway.
He mentions I’m swerving a bit on the road. I say “I’m fine hon, just a bit tired”. It’s a reminder for me to pay closer attention. He says, its starting to freak him out a bit.
I decide half way home to stop & try to jar some adrenaline into my system, even though adrenalin is short lived, it’s worked before, and we are closer to home. I did jumping jacks, breathed fresh air, stretched, jogged a bit back and forth, drank more caffeine…just like countless other times that always work.
I get back in the van, and it’s ok, though I still am needing to concentrate more then I usually need to.
We make it to the little town just a few more minutes from where we live rurally, and I tell myself, it’s not far now…I think my brain starts to let it’s guard down now due to this knowledge.
We drive through the one main street of our town, checking out the lack of action going on in our little town at almost midnight.
I don’t even realize I’m having a micro dose until i “wake” from one. It feels like I’m not even really ever NOT aware of what’s going on, and no one else notices. A little more adrenaline makes my heart pump a bit, and makes me more alert, and I drive past the Tim Horton’s.
When I dozed this time Just a few feet up the street, my husband screamed my name and grabbed the wheel to jerk the wheel to the left miss a parked car in front of the flower shop I just about plowed into going 50 KLM, with no ability to brake for impact because I don;t see it coming.
He tells me to pull over now.
I do.
I’m in such a mental state of shock that I dozed that long or bad, that my heart is not even pounding. I notice my state of tired, and wonder how it got to that point.
I apologize, and we take a moment for HIM to slow his heart rate. I’m grateful he’s not freaking out on me. I mean we just avoided an accident. a very serious accident.What if he had been asleep like sometimes he does on the way home. What if that had of happened while we were on the road doing 70 to 80 KLM with oncoming traffic!
I’m too tired to even have adrenaline over that jar and have my heart pound so hard I can hear my heart beat in my head.
We switch and he drives home the last 10 klm. I’m grateful he does, I’m so exhausted I doze on and off on the way home, now suddenly jarring awake here and there worrying about HIM being awake enough to drive home. He’s fine, not sleepy, just in pain from his illness. I feel out of my element in the passenger side of our van, where I rarely sit but am releived to be right then.
When we get home, I bring in everything that we bought, door included, the kids go to bed and then crash…I have sleep to catch up on and I suck much! and don’t tell me I don’t.
When I woke up this morning, the slider door on the van was open, because I’d forgotten and left i open when taking our sleeping son up to bed.
The sobering effects of this event have not Left me, and I won’t allow them to.
And I wrote this, so hopefully YOU won’t either.
Stop depriving yourself of sleep. And Don’t Drive if you are feeling that tired.
To Husband and the kids…I’m sorry.
To my husband… thankyou.
Some fatigue Driving facts
A report produced by the Highway Safety Roundtable, compiles some of the latest available research on the consequences of driver fatigue. It linked to the deaths of some 400 Canadians every year to driver fatigue.
“The message is very clear that a lot more Canadians are driving tired on our roads than anyone has ever thought before, or ever wanted to admit before, and it is a very serious road safety issue. We really have to be a lot more aware of the dangers of fatigue than we have been up until now.”
-Mark Yakabuski, president of the Insurance Bureau of Canada.
Research based on Ontario traffic data suggests a long day at work could be triggering collisions, since most accidents involving fatigue occur between 3 p.m. and 6 p.m. and on Fridays.
The most fatal fatigue-related crashes occur between 1 a.m. and 7 a.m.
“Fatigue is likely being under-reported, because police don’t have a good way to determine when it is a factor in a crash – unless drivers admit they were fatigued” – Yoassry Elzohairy, senior safety research adviser for the Ontario Ministry of Transportation.
A 2005 study also found one in five drivers admitted to falling asleep behind the wheel during the previous 12 months.
