A head-on collision nearly took my life and my friends' lives. Rocky helped us take our lives back.
I was traveling in an SUV with six other ladies in Smyrna, Tennessee. We were going about 30mph when we were hit head on by a drunk driver going 60mph. That man lost his life in the wreck. All I remember was remember was rolling through the air and then waking up and hearing the emergency personne...l say “They’re all DOA.” That’s when I remember coming to for a second and screaming “I’m not dead! We’re not dead!” Miraculously, all my sisters survived but we all paid a very big price physically.
The woman that was sitting behind me in the vehicle had broken her leg and hip in wreck and her leg pushed the metal on the head rest into the back of my head near my brain stem. That caused a host of long-term brain injury symptoms. I had 12 hours of visual blindness. I suffered from chronic emotionally triggered-vertigo which looked and acted like narcolepsy when I got excited, sad or angry. I had uncontrollable nausea, vomiting and chronic dizziness.
Worst of all, I lost 15 years of my memory with amnesia of which is something I’m still coping with. I have 22 foster kids and 6 adopted kids and I can’t remember their names. I can’t remember how to do many basic things that used to come second nature. For a long time I thought that I actually carried my adopted daughter and gave birth to her until she told me that it wasn’t true. That whole chunk of my life was just gone. I lost my ability to sew, crochet and cook. Not just the ability, but the passion to do those things as well. Though I am very thankful that my injuries weren’t worse, it has been emotionally trying. Before the wreck everyone thought of me as a great chef and home cook and looked forward to my cooking. Now I stare at the stove for a half hour trying to figure out how to fry an egg.
I am a Jehovah's Witness and so are the other ladies that were in the car with me. The Jehovah’s Witness community is like family. Dena, who has been with Rocky’s office for over 10 years is a Jehovah’s Witness and so we naturally connected looking for help with our claims for damages in the wreck. In a injury claim involving six people and many different insurance companies things can get complicated and tension can build quickly and put a strain on relationships. Though only four of the six ladies hired Rocky as their lawyer, Rocky never pushed or made tried to pit us against one another. He explained every possible way we could seek financial recoveries in our cases. He laid it all out for us in an understandable way. Most importantly, he never forced us one way or the other. He respected our decision, even when it meant lesser recovery.
I think most lawyers out there would put more pressure on us to fight each other for more money, because the more we get the more the lawyer gets paid but Rocky wasn’t like that at all. I really feel like out of all of the lawyers out there, that Rocky and his team are really genuine about helping people and doing whatever it takes to make them happy and get them to a better place. Though I know Rocky may not have always understood us, he respected us, he listened and he fought for a fair settlement which we were very happy with. Collectively, our main concern was just to make sure that the older sisters were taken care of and the rest of us were just praying to get back to zero. My husband and I were praying for a certain number and wouldn’t you believe, He delivered in the form of Rocky McElhaney Law Firm. I not only was able to pay off my medical bills but I was able to pay a the final $50K on my home loan and pay off my house. He and Dena and his firm have helped my family to become debt free.
Even though I’m still grappling with some amnesia and other chronic symptoms from the accident, I am thankful for the journey and thankful for the Rocky Law Firm coming into my life. They did an honest job for honest pay and helped me to get my groove back.