Raegan Revord recalls hysterically begging her dad to pick her up after filming Young Sheldon just hours after she and her mother, while on the way to the set, were involved in a car crash in which they were t-boned by another driver.
The 15-year-old actress exclusively spoke to ET on Friday and recalled in excruciating detail some of her PTSD moments in the hours after the car accident, the full-blown panic attack that desperately required her father's attention and how the cast and crew helped her get through the traumatic episode.
While she took to Instagram on Thursday and explained why that night's episode was "incredibly challenging" for her to film, this is the first time Revord is opening up about why it was so challenging. The episode required her to sit in a car for most of the filming, but she took no solace in the fact that there was no actual driving involved.
"There were some moments where there would be like a crashing sound in the back or something and I'd be, like, [gasps]," she tells ET.
In a way, the experience of getting back in a car just moments after the car wreck proved to be a little cathartic. Her co-star, Mckenna Grace, was right there by her side -- during and after the filming of the episode. Like in her trailer after filming the episode, where Revord recalls balling her eyes out and having a full-blown panic attack, and Grace was there holding her hand.
"She was in my trailer, holding me, and I was sobbing my heart out," Revord says. "It was nice having a really good friend there, who was just there to kind of help you through something that was traumatizing."
Amid the panic attack, Revord says she conveyed that the person she really needed was her father. There was no getting her in any car after filming the episode, and she knew exactly the only way she'd make it back home.
"I was filming and I had a late-night shoot and then we finished and I had to get in the car to go home and I had a full-on panic attack," she says. "I was sobbing. I didn't want to. I was literally on the phone with my dad begging him to come pick me up. He has a huge, apocalyptic-looking truck that I feel is indestructible. And I was like, 'Please, you have to come pick me up. I cannot go home.'"
Revord recalls being on the phone with one of the show's assistant directors just seconds before they were t-boned. She says they hung up and within five seconds they saw a car around the corner speeding directly toward them.
"And then, at like some point, you kind of realize there's nothing you can do if you've been in a car accident," she says. "You realize at some point it's, like, brace yourself. There's not much you can do about it. I'm just trying to picture it -- you see a car coming around and then you hear, like, metal on metal, and that sound sticks with you. It's so loud, like my hearing has been going out because of it. It was insanely loud. And I'm like, I don't know if I blacked out. It just happened so quick, but the car comes around and hits us and then the car fills with smoke, because the airbags have a little explosive behind it that shoots out at you. So the car fills with smoke and I got out because I had hurt my foot somehow."
Revord remembers "freaking out" because she thought she broke her foot. She says she also thought she lost her hearing.
"I didn't have hearing for, like, five minutes," she says. "That was the scariest thing about it. But I got out and my mom got out and I was sitting on the side of the road crying. Then the guy that hit us got out and he was like, 'Are you OK? Is everything OK? I'm so sorry.'"
The young actress went on to say a "really nice old lady and her husband" came running out of their house after hearing the accident and they brought their chocolate Labrador.
"If you know me, I love dogs. And so I was like, 'Dog, let me hold you.' And they sat with me for, like, 30 minutes. They brought me water. They were so nice. They were holding me as I was sobbing on the side of the road. They were the nicest people."
Revord and her mother phoned the set and told them about the accident. A crew member picked them up from the scene of the accident and asked the actress if she wanted to go home. She says she was told production could stop filming for the day and that she did not have to feel obligated to come to the set.
"I was like, 'No, I have to come to set' because I know myself and if I went home I would've sat and I just would've ran it over and over in my head," she says. "That would not have been good. So I was like, I have to go to work and be with these people that I love."
Revord says normally, while on a car ride, she's sitting there listening to music or reading. That won't be the case anymore. Her perspective's been permanently altered after experiencing her first -- and hopefully only -- car crash.
"I'll kinda just zone out, but now, I'll still listen to music but I focus on every car that's around," she says. "I'm starting to tell my mom, 'Look out for that car.' I'm just being very aware now. If, like, a car happens to start to pull out of a driveway or something, your heart starts to race. You kind of grab your seat, like, 'What's gonna happen? Is the car gonna stop?' [The accident] definitely impacts [you]."
Revord says one of the ways the crew helped her with her panic attacks was by just being there and holding her. During one particular scene, she says, she freaked out because the sound was just too unbearable.
"You're in a car scene and [there's] this huge plank of wood in the back that moves the cars so it looks like it's going down the road. It's bumping and stuff and at some point, the slab of wood broke and it sounded so much like the metal on metal," she says. "Even though it's wood, it sounded close to it and I panicked. I freaked out. I was sitting in the car at the time and I heard it behind me. I open the door like, 'Nope. Nope.' I had to get out."
She says an assistant director came over and held her and helped calm her down, and that the crew was also making sure she got the emotional support she needed, like asking her if she was OK or if she wanted to go lie down.
Revord says she was asked what the crew could do to make her feel comfortable, and immediately one thing came to mind -- Van Leeuwen ice cream. The next day, six cartons arrived for her. She also wanted a haircut, but the role didn't call for her character to debut a new hairdo. She says she's been wanting a haircut for four years now.
"And they went, 'We'll see,'" she recalls. "And the next day we had a night shoot and we were filming. We had a little break and they called me over and they were like, 'Hey, we have some news for you.' And then my hair person walks in and I'm like, 'No, no, no, no, no. This is not happening!' This is not happening!' And they were like, 'You get to cut your hair.' And now I have short hair and I'm so happy. I love it so much. I got Van Leeuwen and I got a haircut. What more can you ask for?"
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