it’s not the first time i’ve dealt with unpleasant medical evidence in a motor accident case, but my past experience has been in defending the motorists against criminal charges. this is the first time i’m assisting someone acting for the victim in a civil suit for compensation, and i am finding myself more affected than i thought, yet also astonished at the resilience of the human body, that so damaged — i would have thought beyond hope — it could have undergone so much pain and so much surgery and to come out of the other side, defiant of death, and to reacquire, day by day, functionality.