It’s not been an easy three months for Rain. On February 14, she was involved in a car crash where the other driver ran a stop sign and hit her, causing her car to wind up in a ditch and hitting a tree. Considering the damage of the vehicle’s interior and exterior, it could easily have been fatal.
The former SHINE Champion has given us her permission to repost excerpts of her blog detailing the entire incident and her recovery, so here’s her account of what happened immediately after the collision.
They get me to the hospital and I am having SEVERE pain in my abdomen… [t]he nursing team comes and takes me away for scans, x-rays, and for the doc to examine me. They FINALLY give me pain meds, followed by the results. They said I had a tear in my large intestine and internal bleeding. They said they’d have to make small incisions and clean up my insides. I agree and say let’s get this done.
I woke up in SO much pain, but I remember also being really high, thanks morphine. The doctor came in and said things went well and I should be out in a few days… [t]he next morning the doctors were trying to discharge me. One of the doctors thought I was there for pain drugs, but Dr. Tapper was VERY concerned about the pain in my abdomen. He says to me, “I don’t feel comfortable discharging you when you’re in this much pain.” I agreed! He then said, “I’m going to have to cut you wide open to see what’s going on.” My response was, “Well, I’m in pain and you have to do what you have to do.” So, I go in soon after for my second surgery.
The second surgery was so drastic that Rain was left with two gaping holes in her stomach – though she was informed that had she been discharged, she would have been dead within two days due to a blood clot which went septic, so either the infection would have killed her or the clot would have broken loose and travelled to her heart or her brain.
It was weeks before the feeding tubes were removed from her nose, and it was 20 days before she was allowed home. However, the pain continued as she had a wound vacuum attached to her stomach and it needed to be changed three times a week, though Rain described it as “one of the most painful thing I’ve ever been through”. Instead, she packed gauze into the open wound and changed it herself – which while it was the lesser of two evils, it still doesn’t sound at all pleasant.
However, it’s not doom and gloom. The 32-year old had $5,000 raised for her thanks to a fundraiser set up by her friends, she is back at the gym doing light workouts, and as of yesterday, she has received confirmation that the exterior of her wound has fully healed. It will be another year until the interior is back to normal, but she is experiencing small victories along the way.
The 12 month time frame is also affecting other portions of her life. It will be a year until she and her husband can try for a baby, and it will also be that long until she is allowed to wrestle again. Granted, she retired after SHINE 16 in late January but you can imagine that it would be a great personal victory to have another match after what she has been through. This would not be about proving something to someone else, and is more to do with her own mindset – so more power to her.
The next milestone for Rain will be this Friday:
That’s right – it appears that the first SHINE Champion will be in Ybor City, FL for SHINE 19, headlined by the new Valkyrie of Serena Deeb, Allysin Kay, Taylor Made, April Hunter & Su Yung against SHINE Champion Ivelisse Velez, Tag Team Champions Leva Bates and Mia Yim, Jessicka Havok & Tracy Taylor. It is unclear if Rain will be featured on camera, in an angle or doing an interview, though actual physical interaction is totally out for now.
You can order the event by clicking here, and if you want to read Rain’s blog in full, you can do so here. Be warned, some of the photos and descriptions are pretty graphic – but at least you’re only looking at them and not experiencing it like Rain did.
– Lee Burton
– Photo by Rain
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Wow!! Gorgeous 😀 God Bless & Happy to know your better
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