July 23, 2023, was the day I woke up and decided to finally grapple with a difficult decision: Whether to continue with my emergency medicine education.
I've struggled with mental health issues my entire life. And 2 weeks earlier, I had been diagnosed with PTSD due to a sexual assault.
My symptoms had been affecting my performance in my EMT certification class. In the span of a few weeks, I'd gone from one of the most engaged and knowledgeable students in the class to one of the most distracted. It was incredibly frustrating to receive yet another diagnosis that was making it more difficult for me to succeed.
The Barbie movie had just come out, and I decided to go see it with my mom. I wanted to have some fun, so I dressed up in a hot pink, fluffy, tulle dress for the occasion.
On the way to the theater, I had another of my PTSD-triggered panic attacks, and it felt like my decision was being made for me. By the time we left the movie, I was sure I had no choice but to give up on my EMT certification.
We were driving home on I-95 when right in front of us a car in the right lane crashed into a vehicle that had been abandoned on the side of the road. The car spun out, hitting the cement border of the highway. I saw the airbags deploy. It came to a stop diagonally across the right lane.
"Stop the car," I told my mom. "Someone could be hurt."
The shoulder of the highway was very narrow, and my mom was afraid that our car could get hit too if we pulled over. But I wouldn't take no for an answer. We parked. I told her to call 911 and climbed out.
It was dark and traffic was streaming down all three lanes of the highway. Cars were just barely swerving around the one that had crashed.
I thought, it's going to get hit again. I was suddenly certain that whoever was in that car could die if I didn't get them out.
As soon as there was a break in the traffic, I sprinted to the car. Glass and debris were strewn along the ground, and my sneakers crunched as I approached. I said a little prayer of gratitude that I had decided on sneakers instead of the open-toed heels I'd planned to wear.
A young woman was stumbling out of the passenger door of the car. She sank down onto the ground, mindless of the glass everywhere. She was wearing shorts, and her legs were bare to the shards. I could already tell she was in shock.
"Hi!" I shouted, jogging over and squatting to her eye level. "I'm Mia, and I'm an EMT trainee. I'm here to help."
The girl was sobbing as she looked up at me. I asked her questions as I visually examined her. She told me her name. I asked her whether she thought she was injured, and she said she didn't. She explained, in broken sentences, how the abandoned car had been jutting out into the right lane, and she hadn't seen it in time.
When I had concluded that she wasn't critically injured and was A&Ox3, I said, "I have to move you out of here, okay? There are cars coming, and I don't want you to get hit." I pulled her up.
She was shaking so hard that she could barely walk. I leaned her weight onto my side and helped her toward my car.
We had only gone a few yards when there was a huge crash behind us. One car, then another, and then a third collided with her vehicle.
Two of them spun across the highway blocking the middle and left lanes. The other car had crushed hers against the cement border. It was now in the right lane.
In the exact spot where she had been sitting moments before.
She looked back and started crying even harder. "Oh my God," she said. "I could have died."
I helped her into the backseat of my car. I didn't have any of my EMT equipment with me, so I had to conduct a trauma assessment without it. I knew her airway was patent because she was speaking, so I moved through the rest of the assessment — checking voids and pulses, palpating, inspecting, and assessing the entire body for bleeding and deformities.
Besides small cuts on her legs from the glass and the fact that she was clearly in psychogenic shock, she seemed okay, which was a miracle.
I heard sirens as the police and ambulances arrived and began helping the other drivers. I wrapped a blanket that I found in our backseat around girl's shoulders and tried to bring her down from shock by distracting her with more questions.
"This was my first car accident ever," she told me. "I'm only 20. I was driving home from college."
Twenty years old. She was younger than I am. She could have been me. Finally, her pulse slowed, and her breathing became more regular.
That's when she noticed my attire. "Why the f*ck are you wearing that?" she asked.
I laughed. "I just came from the Barbie movie. Have you seen it yet?"
She hadn't. We talked about what I thought of it and how excited she was to see it. It kept her calm until the EMTs came over to us.
I gave my report to the EMTs, and we all laughed a little at my ridiculous dress. They began walking the girl to an ambulance, and suddenly, she turned and crushed me into a hug. "Thank you," she said.
My mom and I stayed at the scene for a while to give our statements to the police. My mom was so shaken up by the experience that she couldn't drive. But I was flying high on adrenaline.
In less than an hour, my choice about EMT certification had once again been made for me. This experience had been a reminder that I couldn't live happily without using my medical knowledge to help others. I felt more alive and like myself when I was out in the field than I did doing anything else.
The next day, I returned to my EMT certification class. I graduated with a perfect score on my practical assessments.
A few months ago, I officially no longer met the criteria for PTSD. Today, I'm preparing my medical school applications.
If I hadn't been in the right place at the right time to help that girl, I probably would have given up on my dream of emergency medicine. Instead, I've learned a vital lesson: That no matter what life throws at me, it will never be stronger than my unbending desire to become a physician.
Mia Soviero is an EMT, neuroscience researcher, and pre-medical student at Barnard College, Columbia University.