If you’ve ever been injured in an accident such as a motor vehicle, then you may be seeking compensation for damages. Damages to your car is one thing, but to your body is quite another. Soft tissue damage is unseen (another blog post) and can be a prolonged injury.
Some believe keeping an injury diary is a good way to keep track of the increasing severity of their injury overtime. This may sound like a good idea at the outset, but it turns out to work against the injured. Here’s why.
Quite simply, human behaviour is built in such a way that creating new habits is exceptionally hard. Sometimes it takes upwards of two years to actually make something a habit (like brushing your teeth).
If you have an injury diary you may enter diligently for a couple of months, but after a year or two you’ll notice a trend–you don’t enter as often or as detailed as you used to.
In litigation that will work to your disadvantage because through the diary it look as if you’re getting better, but in reality you may be getting worse but you just didn’t record the injury properly.
The best way to keep track of your progress (or regress) is to be completely clear and concise disclosing everything to your doctor and therapist when visiting.