Can You Hear Me Now?

Last year, while on a mini-break with my sister I read an article in a magazine that really stuck with me. In fact, I still think about it all the time, so I figured I would deviate on the blog and write about something equally important as food. Staying alive.

The magazine was March's Women's Health, from last year. Aside from the standard lasting energy and tests every woman needs info, I read an article that was really more of a PSA. It was called Driven to Distraction. The intro said “Multitasking behind the wheel is the deadliest thing you can do”. Your brain activity decreases by a 50% when you are driving distracted. In the very first paragraph the author made a great point which is most people don't think twice of operating a 4000 pound vehicle; one of the most complex things we do all day. Yet in the past five years the number of accidents caused by distracted driving has risen 21% (remember, these are figures stated in 2010), and worse is that more people are dying in these accidents. I have copied verbatim the sidebar in the magazine entitled "Your Body in a Car Crash".

“When your car suddenly stops, your body continues to move at the speed you were driving until it hits something. Here's what happens to you during a high-speed front-end impact:

Your Head –Your brain crashes against the front of the inside of your skull and then rebounds and smacks into the back. At a minimum, you have a head-ache. At worse, brain swelling and death.

Your Neck – The weight of your head whipping around pulls all the muscles in your neck (whiplash). That is, if your neck doesn't break.

Your Heart – If your heart swings too violently into the breastbone, it tears off the aorta (the largest artery in your body), killing you. Or you can suffer a partially ruptured aorta or a bruised heart. My dad bruised his heart earlier this year in an accident where he was hit by a car. It's not a fun injury, and the recovery time is not like a regular bruise. The doctors told him this bruising was the equivalent of him having had a heart attack.

Your Lungs – Many people gasp just before impact, filling their lungs and making lung rupture more likely.

Your Ribs – Probably broken. Also a lung-puncture risk.

Your Abdomen – Your internal organs smash into the front of your body. Doctors are first concerned with your liver and spleen, because damage to these blood rich organs can cause massive internal bleeding that can be fatal.

Your Legs – If there's enough force to drive the front end of your car into your knees, your thigh bones snap.”

Well there you have it. Please, stop texting and put the phone down. And the donut. And the eye-liner and try to stop fussing with the radio. It's just not worth it, nor important enough to do while you drive. Die or send a text....die or send a text. Your text can wait, the phone call can wait, and the donut will still be there, unless you also have a very hungry passenger, in which case I recommend pulling over and eating it almost immediately, but really, you should have brought enough for everyone.

Inattentive blindness is becoming more of a problem, and if you are one of the better ones out there, who pay complete attention, watch out for all the others. Isn't that what our parents always told us? “It's not you I'm worried about, it's everyone else.”

Got it?