__ Opps! it fell.

Saturday, January 07, 2006

1:35 PM

In wedding portraits on the walls of their Las Vegas, New Mexico, living room, Kim and Krickitt Carpenter look like any young newly-weds deeply in love and filled with hope for their new life together. But Krickitt admits it causes her some pain now to look at the pictures or to see herself in the wedding video, walking down the aisle in her lacy white gown. “I would almost rather not watch it,” she says. “It makes me miss the girl in the picture more and more.”
In a sense, that Krickitt is gone, lost forever. Less than 10 weeks after the September, 1993, ceremony, the Carpenters were in a nightmarish auto accident that badly injured them both and left Krickitt comatose. Though doctors initially doubted she would survive, she rallied, regaining consciousness and, eventually, most of her physical abilities. But the trauma to her brain caused retrograde amnesia, erasing virtually her entire memory of the previous 18 months including any recollection of the man she had fallen in love with and married. “The last 2½ years have been based on a story I’m told,” says Krickitt, 26, “because I don’t remember any of it” (Fields-Meyer & Haederle, 1996, p. 48)
For Krickitt Carpenter, the road to recovery has been a slow one. Although she retained most of her long-term memories after the accident, she had no recent recollections of her marriage or her husband, Initially, when she returned to living with Kim, it was like being with a stranger toward whom she felt no emotion, and the marriage faltered. However, by retracing the origins of their relationship – the Carpenters began by having “dates” – they were able to reforge the bonds that had been shattered. On Valentine’s Day three years after the accident, Kim proposed to Krickitt again, and she accepted. A short time later, the couple exchanged rings and recited new vows.
This is a short story from my Psychology textbook. After reading this, I feel that I rather be the wife who lost her memory, than the husband who lost his wife who forgets that she ever loved him before because I really can't take it when my loved one forgets how to love me....

- opps! it fell.