On July 14, 2012, Peggy Howard was riding her bike on 16th Avenue in South Surrey when she was hit by a dump truck and thrown into a ditch filled with water.
“I got to experience pretty much every lifesaving technique available,” Howard said, recalling how two bystanders, firefighters and police officers all came to her aid.
The accident left Howard with 11 fractures to her pelvis, ribs and vertebrae. She spent two weeks in hospital, then continued to receive physical and occupational therapy afterward.
But just three months after the accident, Howard was back at work, overseeing the redevelopment of Guildford Town Centre.
“I wanted to come back,” she said. “We had been working on this project for two years; it was a $280 million project and it was definitely the feather in my career to open this expansion.”
She now realizes that returning to work so soon after the accident was a huge mistake.
“I physically was super tired,” she said, “and when you’re tired you’re impatient, you may make decisions that are not the best, so your team is trying to work with you. … They didn’t want to disappoint me.”
Because she was the boss, it was tough for her staff to tell her it would be better for everyone if she just stayed home, Howard said.
Finally, the physical therapists who had been working with Howard took her aside.
“They said to me, ‘You know how important that opening is to you in August of 2013? You’re not going to make it,’” she said. “It felt totally like an intervention, like the ones on TV.”
After her therapists’ ultimatum Howard immediately changed her schedule to work less.
That helped, but coming back and then reducing her hours was probably more disruptive than if she had just stayed off work for longer.
Today, Howard works full time, but with some changes.
“I look after myself first,” she said. “That sounds a little bit selfish, but it’s less selfish than it was to come back to work not in perfect shape.”
Has a work or life challenge taught you a key career lesson? Contact Jen St. Denis at [email protected].
