Things like fear, anxiety, sleep deprivation, and depression are all types of things that would fall under the classification of emotional distress.
When you are injured in a car accident in Missouri, you are generally entitled to two types of damages.
Economic damages are those things that make you suffer a financial loss.
Things that fall under the economic damage umbrella are costs like medical bills, lost earnings from work, and hospital-stay bills. They are concrete and come with a bill or invoice as documentation.
The other types of damages that you may be entitled to are non-economic damages. Non-economic damages are things like emotional distress and pain and suffering.
Pain and suffering is a phrase that is pretty clear and easily understood for both patient and juries. When it comes to emotional distress, however, the scars from emotional distress are harder to see, define, and, in a court of law, sometimes harder to prove.
What Do Emotional Distress Damages Include?
Non-economic damages that are labeled “emotional distress” are those damages that are meant to make a person whole by compensating them for the emotional distress that they suffered due to the circumstances of their accident.
They are any damages that someone suffers due to the psychological consequences of the accident itself, and the injuries that you sustain. Emotional distress is anything that disrupts your daily life.
Things like fear, anxiety, sleep deprivation, and depression are all types of things that would fall under the classification of emotional distress. Some of them are short-term, and some of the can be life-long and disabling to car accident victims.
If you believe that you are suffering emotional distress due to a car accident, or the injuries that you sustained due to a car accident, it is critical that you get the help necessary to get past the distress, and have the proper documentation to prove that you are suffering.
How Do You Document Emotional Distress?
It may not be enough to say that you are fearful or anxious all the time. To make sure that you can get the compensation that you deserve for your non-economic damages, you need to seek medical attention and get documents to use as proof of your emotional scars.
Whether you seek psychological care (which is recommended) or you make your physician aware of your emotional symptoms, it is imperative that you speak up and tell the professionals involved in your treatment how you are feeling and how you are suffering emotionally.
Keeping a journal of your emotional journey from day one is also a great way to document the emotional distress of a car accident and its fallout. Since there are varying levels of severity of emotional distress, it is essential also to record how severely it is affecting your everyday life.
Since non-economic damages tend to be less concrete and more subjective, to get all that you deserve, make sure to speak up, explain your emotional distress to medical professionals, and seek the help of a St Louis car accident attorney to ensure that you get the full amount of compensation you are legally entitled to in the state of Missouri.