Mick’s story: How getting back on the bike changed my life after a car crash

When an accident stirred up memories of a friend lost in a horrific car crash, getting back on the bike helped this BMX rider turn his life around.

When his life was flipped upside down by a car accident, Armstrong Creek’s Mick found BMX helped him in his mental health battles. Picture: Brad Fleet.

Getting back on the bike saved a BMX rider’s life, after an accident stirred up memories of a friend lost in a horrific car crash.

Mick, who didn’t want his surname published, was driving home along Carter Rd near his Armstrong Creek home in January last year when a tree branch broke off and hit his car.

He wasn’t physically injured however in the weeks that followed, he began to feel the mental toll.

“It just went downhill from there,” he said.

Mick at Waurn Ponds Skatepark in January.

“I was on top of the world and I went to the bottom, within a month.”

Mick had lost his friend Kiefer Wilson in a horrific car accident in Ballarat in 2011.

The driver, Anthony Solomano, was drunk and speeding when he struck a kerb and collided with a parked car and tree.

Wilson, who was 19 and had been a passenger in the back seat, succumbed to his injuries. Solomano was jailed.

Mick thought he had dealt with the impact of losing his friend at the time, but his own accident had memories and emotions bubbling back up to the surface.

“I don’t think losing a friend is something you deal with completely,” Mick said.

A few weeks after his accident last year, Mick was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety and depression, and put on medication that made him “feel like a zombie”.

“I’d basically sit in my room, in the dark and just sit there for hours,’ he said.

Suffering flashbacks of the crash, he became increasingly withdrawn and his relationships with those around him were affected.

“I saw a few counsellors to see if that would help, but that didn’t really do much for me,” he said.

“I just didn’t really click with them … I was probably a little stand-offish myself.”

Mick at Waurn Ponds Skatepark in January.

Even going to the gym, which had been his “happy place” no longer felt the same.

“It was basically my therapy, it did everything for me,” he said.

“No matter what I was going through, I was able to do a workout and get it out, but this time I couldn’t get any connection.”

Mick had ridden BMX in his youth and after quitting medication, the decision to get back on the bike proved to be a turning point.

“Getting back on the bike opened up a different path,” he said.

“I was finding a way to deal with things, instead of just letting them just linger … it was a different feeling that I couldn’t get from anything else.”

Mick started “paying attention” again and came out of his room, out of the darkness.

“I was able to see everything a lot clearer and understand a lot of things,” he said.

“I sat down and thought about my accident, how I felt and what happened after it.”

Mick at Waurn Ponds Skatepark in January.

Soon Mick, who will be 38 this year, achieved one of his goals – a backflip.

“In my mind it was unattainable at my age,” he said.

Relationships with friends improved, and Mick’s bond with Togo, a puppy he adopted, is now “the best it’s ever been”.

Mick said his own experience showed everyone has their own mental health journey.

“(Mental health) affects a lot of people in different ways, that’s the thing people need to understand,” he said.

“Not everyone’s the same.”

Originally published as Mick’s story: How getting back on the bike changed my life after a car crash