A little late to the thread, but anyways. When I was nearing the end of my 7th grade year, my father was riding a recumbent bike down a bridge on a nearby trail. He still does not know to this day why, but he was wearing just a hat rather than his normal helmet. He is the type of person that always wear his seat belt, always make my brother and I wear our helmets, and he would always try to set the example to wear them as well. While he was going down a bridge his hat flew off and he remembers turning to catch it, being the heavyset guy that he was and still is today he tipped over in the bike and landed head first, luckily there had been a person he was riding with that saw this all happen and was able to call for help immediately. After being flown to the hospital he had very little signs of possible recovery. He was in a coma and after a week to two weeks the doctors were telling us that there is very little chance of him making it out of the coma, and that even if he made it out that he would most likely have very little memory of who we were or how to do basic functions. He woke up after about two to three weeks of being in his coma. He was unable to walk, eat solids, and many more things. He changed drastically after the coma, which is expected from a person that was bipolar having serious head trauma. He recovered after a few months of different types of therapy. After "recovery" his only recollections of his coma was that he said that he could actually hear us and be able to tell that we were there visiting him and that he had no control over getting up. We remember still that if we would squeeze his hand he would squeeze back, not hard but it was always nice to know he was there somewhere. He's a completely different person now after the brain injury. It's hard to realize someone you knew so well could change just from one decision. He recognizes it too, and he truly regrets not wearing a helmet. Prior to the bike accident he was in a car crash and he states he would not be alive if it weren't for him wearing his seat belt.