05 Jul Woman Wakes Up From A Coma And Discovers That She’s Got A Second Husband

One of life’s greatest experiences is falling in love. When you start to catch feelings, the getting-to-know-you stage is easily one of the most exciting phases of a blossoming relationship. Everything about the process makes us glad to be alive; from awkward first kisses to noticing little details about our partner for the first time – even if it happens to be an embarrassing tattoo that we can’t help but find endearing.

But usually, once you’ve been with someone for around six months, sometimes less, you slowly but surely start to see their flaws. The tattoo you found endearing is suddenly branded stupid, and you have to bite your tongue everytime bae leaves the fridge door open. And 55-year-old Angela Sartin-Hartung had to go through all of this when she woke up from a coma and discovered she was married to a stranger.

Back in 2013, Angela was hit by a police car while crossing the road at the intersection of York Avenue and 72nd Street, New York. As a result of the accident, she ended up in a coma, and when she finally woke up, she had no recollection of the past 15 years of her life.

In an interview with the New York Daily News, Angela explained that when she woke up she thought she was still married to her first husband, who had tragically died in 1998, and she was convinced that her grown-up children were still toddlers.

Angela’s memory of her marriage to her second husband, Jeff Hartung, in 2000 had also been completely wiped from her memory.

“Every single day is about making new memories now. I’m very fortunate because I get to do that again. My life wasn’t taken,” Angela told the Daily News.

“I’m getting excited. My memory is still completely gone, and it takes me a lot to remember to get excited about things,” she added.

Thankfully, Angela’s husband, Jeff, has been incredibly patient throughout this process and said it began with him doing everything he could to make his wife remember the past 15 years of her life. A process which he started by placing countless pictures around their house.

Five years on from the accident the couple received a $2 million settlement from the city.

The Daily News revealed that Angela was “crossing against a light when she was hit” by an NYPD cruiser. Her attorney, however, has contested this claim and said that the reason the now 55-year-old was hit was because the police car did not have its lights on.

Angela has no memory of the accident either.

“Angela’s having very extensive retrograde amnesia,” said Dr. Kirk Lercher, a doctor at Mount Sinai Health System in New York who helped treat Angela. “She… lost a giant chunk of a period of her life.”

So, in an attempt to salvage the relationship they once had, once Angela had accepted that Jeff was not a total stranger, they began to date for the first time all over again.

Recalling what it was like to not have his wife recognize him, Jeff said of Angela’s time in the hospital, “She would look at me and ask me why I was in the room. She just learned to trust because I was there every day, all day… I was there more than the doctor.”

“She actually thought I was the doctor at one point,” he added.

Jeff said that while the situation was challenging, he always looked on the bright side of it, saying, “The situation could have been way worse. She was able to see and talk. She didn’t know who I was, but we worked through that.”

To discover how brain injuries can affect a person’s memory, check out the video below:

[[jwplayerwidget||http://content.jwplatform.com/videos/IhWQmqop-Q0L14jDU.mp4||IhWQmqop]]

To help Angela remember their relationship, in addition to pictures, Jeff took her on “memory walks through the city”.

“We would remember these things,” he said. “It was fun to go into different places, we would walk down the street and she would recall a store, so we would go into the store.”

“We did that over and over again for months,” he added. “And just enjoyed spending that time together for us, building that relationship.”

“Everything is a date,” Jeff said. “We would go to the grocery store and it’s like a date.”

“It is fun dating again,” Angela added. “He’s just an awesome man.”

Once Angela’s feelings for Jeff had firmly returned, there was only one thing left to do: get married again!

“I finally realized that, you know what we need? To redo our wedding and give her that memory,” Jeff said. “Now she gets to do it all over again and remember that, that’ll be ours.”

This month, the happy couple renewed their vows in Central Park, much to the delight of their family and friends.

Even though Angela’s accident was incredibly traumatic for her family, Jeff believes that it happened for a reason and is glad to have had the chance to fall in love with her all over again. “I honestly believe that this happened for a reason,” Jeff said.

“How many times have we said, ‘I wish I could go back and do something over again?’ I’ve gotten to do that,” he added.

The post Woman Wakes Up From A Coma And Discovers That She’s Got A Second Husband appeared first on Viral Thread.