On October 7th, 2007, his senior year of high school, Will Carter leaves work and heads home to get sleep before re-taking the SAT the following morning. Three weeks later, he wakes up in a hospital bed, a trach in his throat, covered in IV's and scars, confused, and with a terrible pain in his head. He learns that he has suffered a brain injury and stroke and that he is waking up from a medically induced coma. Will takes what scraps and bits he has of his memory to reclaim his story, as he takes the reader on a harrowing 7-month journey from his car accident and coma to his recovery and return to high school. Will fights the internal battle of wanting to be the person he was before and accepting who he is now. He must fight to graduate high school, re-learn how to walk, and re-discover how to live his life again. He must strive to figure out what getting better really looks like. Will must come to terms with God and fight to hold onto his faith. He must finally come to see getting better as not something physical but something emotional, personal, and spiritual.
This is not a memoir about what happened or how things were. This is not a memoir that even attempts to be true, but when the coma drugs cloud your memory, you must make the story your own. Will Carter's memoir, Getting Better, is Will's story of recovery after being in a car accident, suffering a brain injury and stroke, and being placed in a coma, all during his senior year of high school.