Sustaining a spinal cord injury at work will undoubtedly have a significant effect on your life.
Spinal cord injuries are among the worst injuries you can sustain while on the job. The reason is that this part of your body connects your brain to your limbs. When it gets severely damaged, the physical and mental consequences can be dire. Here is how a spinal cord injury can change your life.
Trouble With Day to Day Tasks
The most obvious way in which a spinal cord injury could change your life is having issues with day to day task. This assertion makes sense when you realize that damage to this area often paralyzes people from the neck or waist down, making nearly every task much harder than it used to be. You can make it out of a spinal cord injury without long-term damage, but many do not.
Increased Dependency
The logical outcome of having trouble with day to day tasks is an increased dependency on outside help. Whether that is from family members, friends, or professionals, you will need to lean on others for the foreseeable future. Fortunately, most victims have an excellent support system and handle this transition.
Not Being Able to Work
Another result of decreased physical ability is not being able to work like you used to. Though this assertion may not apply to some white collar workers, it does for the majority of employees. The good news is that you have a variety of options in these situations. They include coming back to work with restrictions, getting workers’ compensation, and applying for disability.
Giving Up Hobbies
You will likely need to adjust how you live your personal life, too. As you might imagine, people who love playing pickup basketball will not be able to continue with that hobby after losing function in their legs. That being said, there are plenty of activities that you can engage in that should eventually become as rewarding as your old favorites.
Emotional Consequences
All of these changes in your life will inevitably lead to negative emotional consequences. In these cases, it is best to ask for help right away. One of the best ways to do so is by talking to a mental health professional.
Financial Issues
Between medical expenses and decreased income, a spinal cord injury can cost you quite a bit of money. The silver lining is that, with the help of the workers’ compensation system, you should be able to make your financial situation work.
Sustaining a spinal cord injury at work will undoubtedly have a significant effect on your life, but it won’t be the end of the world. Those that suffer these damages often live happy, productive lives once some time passes. While much of that process takes place in the mind of the injury victim, there are also logistical matters that they must tend to. Among the most important of them is hiring a St. Louis workers compensation lawyer to help with the variety of expenses they will incur. Give us a call 24/7 at (314) 361-4300 for a FREE workers compensation evaluation.