EXCLUSIVE: ‘I was hit by a distracted driver:’ Windsor amputee offers dire warning

Kim Labonte of Windsor Ont. lost her right ankle and foot in what she says was a distracted driving collision in Chatham-Kent Ont. (Michelle Maluske/CTV News Windsor)

A Windsor amputee offers a dire warning after a serious crash.

Kim Labonte, 48, was severely injured in a collision in Chatham-Kent, which left her with multiple broken bones and an amputated right leg.

“My life has changed so much because of one mistake, in one second,” Labonte says. “That’s all it took was a single second where he (the other driver) came into my lane, and we collided. He died. I survived with a hell of a lot of injuries.”

On Oct. 13, 2024, Labonte was airlifted to a London hospital and placed in a medically induced coma for eight days during which she had multiple surgeries.

Her injuries read like a laundry list: a broken back, forearm, shin, nose and pelvis. She suffered a collapsed lung, and doctors weren’t able to save her right ankle or foot.

“It feels like somebody’s squeezing my (right) toes and they don’t exist. There’s nothing there,” Labonte explains, saying ‘phantom pains’ are a real thing. “All I can do is just kind of rub it and tell myself it’s gone.”

Five months later, Labonte admits she sometimes goes to step with her right leg only to fall to the ground.

Doctors have told her to constantly rub her ‘stump’ in the hopes it will eventually ‘trick’ her brain into realizing the foot is gone.

If the phantom pains persist, Labonte explains, her prosthetic leg will be very uncomfortable.

“I’ve had to learn how to live all over again,” Labonte says. “I had to learn how to go to the bathroom again, how to get dressed. (The) simplest things, how to wash my hair.”

Labonte describes her life right now as her ‘toddler phase’, having overcome what she says was her ‘newborn’ phase when she woke up in hospital not knowing where she was, why she was there, why she couldn’t talk and couldn’t move most of her body.

“That’s the only thing I can call it – a severe nightmare,” Labonte admits through tears. “Some days I wish I was dead. Some nights I pray that I don’t wake up.”

According to a news release at the time, the other driver died as a result of the collision, but Chatham-Kent Police won’t comment on Labonte’ version of events, saying their investigation is ongoing.

Labonte has accepted she may never know why the collision happened, conceding it won’t change her reality.

“This shouldn’t have happened at all,” Labonte says. “All I’ve been told is it was distracted driving.”

Labonte’s husband was in the Jeep with her at the time of the collision.

He remembers the other vehicle veering into their lane in the moments before their vehicles collided.

Labonte says the people who witnessed the collision reported the same version of events.

Labonte recently posted about her injuries to social media, meant to open peoples’ eyes to the dangers of driving distracted.

Since then, she’s been overwhelmed by the outpouring of support and acknowledgement from her own friends that it’s a wake-up call to put the phone down when driving.

“When I’m in a taxi cab and looking at other drivers, it’s amazing how many of them are on the damn phone, just driving (Labonte looks down) and you see them all the time,” she says.

The irony of Labonte’s story is she has never owned a cellphone and is the only driver for her family of four.

A self-described stubborn person, Labonte insisted on being released from hospital just two months after she was hurt.

She credits her recovery to the staff at Hotel-Dieu Grace Healthcare and community nurses who come to her home every day.

Not to mention the people who live near where the accident occurred.

“They saved my life,” Labonte says, noting they called 9-1-1 and stayed with her and her husband while they were extricated from their vehicle by first responders.

During the CTV interview, Labonte was wearing a shirt and pants that say “Never Give Up”; a daily reminder she says that even in her darkest moments she has a lot to live for.

“Some days I’m happier than anything going. I’ve got more energy and more ‘umph’ than I know what to do with,” Labonte quips.

She’ll need that energy next week because Labonte is going to London to learn how to drive with her left foot, in the hopes of getting her licence back.

“I’m lucky I’m a county girl and my dad taught me how to drive a manual car,” Labonte says, telling CTV News it’s not that different than driving just with her right.

In spite of her trauma, Labonte is eager to get back behind the wheel of a car, if for no other reason than to regain some of her stolen independence.

“I want to be normal,” Labonte says. “Normal was taken from me on October 13th.”