This article is one that is extremely difficult for me to write, but nevertheless, I feel that my message is something that needs to be said and shared in order to make a difference.We've all heard the saying "don't text and drive," but how often do we put that into practice? I'm going to talk about the moment where I truly discovered the effects of just how dangerous that action is. Here's the story for perspective:

On the night of January 7th, at approximately 9:30 p.m., I had my first real car accident. They say your life flashes before your eyes when you get into a wreck, but I wouldn't say that's necessarily true. What I will say is that everything happens so fast that you really only have time for one thought to cross your mind. Mine was "what have I done?"; it's the one that kept replaying over and over in my head as I went to sleep that night. In order for you to understand what happened, I'll take you through a quick recap of events.

I was driving home after a long day of visiting friends at my former high school, and I was less than two minutes away from my home. It was raining pretty hard, and it was dark. I was driving uphill on the bridge near my house when I noticed the car in front of me. The car appeared to be moving because there weren't any hazard lights on. I didn't think anything of it so I looked down at my phone really quickly to change the song that I was listening to. When I looked up, I realized the car in front of me wasn't moving. I had about three seconds to slam on the breaks, and I rear ended them. It all happened so fast that I have absolutely no idea how long I wasn't paying attention. There were so many factors in the situation that thinking about it made my head hurt. I wasn't aware of how bad the damage was to my car until I tried to drive forward, and my car started rolling backward. I panicked. I was in the middle of two lanes on a giant hill at 9:30 at night. I put my car in park and started to cry. Luckily my dad was close by and helped me take care of everything. The important thing was that no one was hurt. The only damage caused by the accident was done to the cars.

The thing that impactedme the most about the situation was my interaction with the police officer. He didn't offer me a citation (thank the Lord) because it wasn't entirely my fault. The woman in front of me didn't have her hazards on so it would have been hard for me to tell that she was stalling in the middle of the bridge. However, he looked at me with a stern face and told me the following...

"You admitted to me that you had looked down at your phone. I hope you understand the seriousness of that. This accident might have been avoided had you not been looking down. You don't know how many times I receive calls about accidents and phone usage is usually the cause of it. People lose their lives every single day because of texting while driving. So next time you're behind the wheel, put your phone down."

That is all paraphrased of course, but the message is what matters. I looked at the officer with tears in my eyes, nodded and said "yes sir." I'm ashamed that I'm having to write this because when I took drivers ed for the first time, I remember how much accidents scared me. I think the more comfortable I got with driving, the more careless I became with using my phone behind the wheel. The reason why I'm open about writing this and sharing my story is because I know I'm not alone. I'm not the only one who does this. I'm not the only one who has used my phone behind the wheel. Members of my family do it, my friends do it and so many others do it. I believe this has become a serious problem in America. According to www.textingandrivingsafety.com, texting while driving causes 1,600,000 accidents per year and 11 teen deaths every day. Being on your phone while driving is the same as driving blind for five seconds. I wish I would have thought about this more. I could have avoided the whole situation had I been paying attention or maybe my accident would have just been minor. Maybe I wouldn't have totaled my car. Because of my accident, I know that I will make a conscious effort never to look at my phone while driving again.

How important is it really, to respond to a text? How important is it to check how many likes you got on Instagram? How important is it to send that email for work? And how important was it for me to change my music from one song to the next?

It wasn't.

It shouldn't have been.

My accident could have been much worse. I'm so fortunate that it wasn't. But I regret the way it happened, and I regret that had I not been looking away from the road, I could have avoided standing out in the rain until 11 p.m. with my family, the person I hit, a tow truck and a very frustrated officer.

Next time you're driving and you're tempted to look at your phone, don't. Think twice before you do. I know I will.