Sometimes I think the accident did not only split my life in two physically.
It also changed the way I exist in the world.

It was not an immediate or clean change.
It was not like I woke up one day as “a different person.”
Over time, I started noticing that many things that used to define me were no longer there,
and that other things had appeared that did not carry as much weight in me before.

Before

Before the accident, I loved going out and partying.
I was always reaching out to my friends to see if anything was happening:
a gathering, a night out, a party, any plan that would keep me from staying at home.

I was very social.
I liked being around people, moving from one place to another, feeling like something was always going on.
I was studying architecture and, honestly, school did not interest me that much.

I did what I had to do, but my attention was somewhere else:
on my friends, on going out, on seeing what plans would come up that weekend or even that same day.

I do not say this with shame or as criticism.
That was simply who I was.
My energy was directed outward.

After

After the accident, that changed a lot.

I stopped being social in the same way.
I no longer felt the urge to look for people all the time.
I no longer had that need to constantly see what plan was out there,
or that same ease moving through gatherings, parties, or large groups.

Part of it had to do with everything that happened.
Part of it had to do with exhaustion.
And part of it, I think, had to do with the fact that I was no longer the same person.

While that was happening, I started applying myself much more in school.
It feels strange to think about now, because it was almost the opposite movement from who I had been before.
What used to matter little to me started mattering a lot.

I also changed careers.
I left architecture and moved into programming.
It was not a minor change.
It was a major decision, and at the time it felt like starting over,
but also like moving closer to something I could truly sustain.

I became extremely focused.
I studied with a discipline I had never had before.
I took my degree seriously.
In the end, I graduated with high academic performance, so I did not even have to present a thesis.

From the outside, that sounds good.
And yes, it was a real achievement.
I am glad I did it.

But at the same time, I also went through a period of depression.

I say this because stories of change are often told in a way that feels too neat:
as if someone goes through something hard, matures, becomes disciplined, and that is the end of it.
In my case, it was not like that.

Yes, I became more disciplined.
Yes, I changed careers.
Yes, I got good results.
But that did not erase the difficult part.
It did not erase the isolation.
It did not erase the sadness.
It did not erase the period when I simply felt bad.

I think both things existed at once:
on one side, a version of me that was much more focused and disciplined;
on the other, a period of depression and distance from other people.

I do not know which version was “more me”

I do not know if the accident turned me into a different person
or if it only revealed parts of me that had been hidden before by noise, partying, and inertia.

Sometimes I miss things about who I was before:
the ease of being around people,
the lightness,
that way of living without thinking so much.

But I also recognize that afterward I developed things I probably would not have developed otherwise:
discipline,
focus,
consistency,
and a much more serious relationship with my work and with what I want to do.

I am not writing this to say that one version was better than the other.
Only to make one thing clear:
there are events that do not only change your life on the outside,
they also reorganize you on the inside.

And then you have to learn how to live with that new mixture.