Wendy Tocha doesn't remember the car crashing through two-dozen bicyclists, the bodies flying, the screams and crunching and something slashing through her neck.
"I'm scared to remember," she said.
Others have told her about that July 6 morning when Joseph D. Pastore's Lincoln Continental swerved out of control.
They have explained how a shirt wrapped around her neck slowed the bleeding and how she was in the emergency room for 10 hours losing so much blood some feared for her life.
Still, nothing comes to Tocha.
"But that's okay," she said. "I don't want the nightmares and flashbacks like some of the others have had."
What she does want is the use of her right arm, which, because of the gashed nerves at her neck, she can't move.
What she does want is to run in Sunday's Gulf Beaches Marathon without the thick gait belt that rubs the skin raw around her waist, arm and shoulder: a device worn to stop her arm from dislocating.
"You know running with one arm might not sound that tough," she said. "But it is. It knocks you off balance, it makes all the muscles around the shoulder tighten up, it makes you work a lot harder.
"It gets so frustrating I want to take my arm off."
Instead she's doing the only thing she knows to do.
She's running with the brace.
"I'm not sure how I'll do in time, but I feel pretty confident I'll finish," she said. "If I have to walk at the end then I'll walk to finish. But I don't think I'll need to."
Neither does Mary Beth Shaw, a physical therapist who has worked with Tocha since the first weeks after the accident.
"Seven months ago we marked this marathon as a goal on the calendar, and Wendy has done everything she possibly could to be prepared," Shaw said. "She's gotten through her long runs (an 18-miler a few weeks ago), and she's done it while learning to run with the brace. I tried running with the brace just to see what it's like, and let me tell you, it's very, very difficult and frustrating."
Tocha, 27, has the ultimate goal of competing in an Ironman, which consists of a 2-mile swim, a 110-mile bike ride and a marathon. She finished the 2002 New York Lake Placid Ironman in 13 hours, 36 minutes, and before July's accident was three weeks from her second one in Lake Placid.
The idea to try again surfaced while watching last summer's Florida Ironman in Panama City.
"I saw a man with one arm finish there," she said. "And I told myself if he can do it why not me?"
Swimming has been the toughest, but she has developed a form: she throws her right shoulder forward and strokes with her left arm. Biking isn't far behind on the tough scale.
"I have to hold the bike with one hand so I can never let go to get a drink of water," she said. "If I want a drink, I have to stop and get the bottle with my left arm. I also haven't (snapped into toe clips), and I can't lean down into the aero bars, (upward turned handlebars where forearms settle in for a more aerodynamic position)."
And on top of that is fear.
"I was downright afraid to get on the bike," she said, "because I thought it might give me flashbacks."
Her good news: Last week she biked 41 miles in one day, a ride that involved a few water breaks, no accidents and no flashbacks.
Now the focus is completing Sunday's marathon, where Tocha could begin thinking more about an Ironman in a year, and, along the way, maybe get back the use of her arm back.
"I'm looking for a neurosurgeon who might be able to do nerve grafts," she said. "You have to remember this is more than just about sports, it's about life. If I have kids I want to be able to toss them in the air and play with them. I also want to be able to reach and get something off the top shelf with two hands, and open jars and so on."
She says she will try to accomplish that, but if she doesn't get there, she'll be okay.
"After everything I've been through - the accident and getting back into training and setting a goal - I've become a stronger person," she said. "I have to say, after everything, I'm very, very excited about this marathon.
