The most important thing to address after an accident is your injuries.
But once you’ve seen a doctor and received the appropriate care and treatment, you’ll be wondering how you can recover wages for the time you’ve missed and will continue to miss at work.
After that has been dealt with, you can have peace of mind and focus on regaining a good quality of life.
Benefits
If you’re employed, your employer probably provides benefits that will help you to receive wages while you recover from your accident.
Typical benefits include paid time off, vacation days, and sick days. However, many accident victims are forced to use such benefits while recovering, which is a great short-term solution, but not so great in the long term.
After all, you shouldn’t be forced to dip into vacation days just because you’ve been injured, especially if the accident was someone else’s fault.
And if your benefits don’t cover you for long-term recoveries, you could find yourself financially struggling later on.
The good news is that you can potentially be compensated for any paid benefits that you are forced to use while recovering from an accident-related injury. You should speak to a lawyer to discover what your legal options are.
Compensation
If someone else caused the accident that led to your injuries, you have the right to demand compensation.
You can claim for both economic and non-economic damages. Benefits and lost wages fall into the category of economic damages. When you pursue compensation, with the help of a personal injury lawyer, you can potentially be reimbursed for your wages, benefits, and other financial losses.
Once you’re awarded such economic damages, you should be back to the same financial position you were in before the accident.
The first step is to contact an experienced and skillful personal injury lawyer, such as an attorney at Boohoff Law firm.
During an initial consultation with a lawyer, you can find out what your legal options are and what evidence needs to be gathered for your case to be successful.
Self-Employment
If you’re self-employed, things become a little more complex. But you can still pursue compensation to recover lost wages if you work for yourself.
The tricky bit is proving your losses, as your income is sure to fluctuate. You’ll need to gather documents that prove you have lost income and show how much money you have missed out on as a result of your injuries.
Again, an experienced lawyer will be able to help you explore your legal options and tell you what evidence you need to gather.
Typically, you’ll need to provide documents like your prior year’s income tax return, contracts for projects that you’ve been unable to complete due to your injuries, and bank account statements.
Regaining a Good Quality of Life
It can take time to regain a good quality of life after an accident. Not only will it take time for you to recover from your injuries. It can also take time to recover from mental issues that arise due to the accident.
For example, if you were involved in a horrifying accident, you could develop PTSD. And being involved in any kind of accident can lead to mental health conditions like anxiety and depression.
So, you may need counseling or other treatments for your mental well-being as much as you need treatment for your physical injuries.
With time, you should be able to regain a good quality of life. Just make sure that you always follow your doctor’s advice.
Also, make sure you talk to loved ones about how you’re feeling. Getting how you feel out in the open can help you in moving forward.