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I did everything right. I left Christchurch at dawn. I told my sister I’d text her every two hours—I knew she was nervous about letting her daughter go on such a long trip. I packed the snacks, charged the phones, and made sure my niece, Charlotte (14), was buckled in for the drive up to my parents’ place in Nelson. It’s a drive I’ve done a hundred times. A simple trip. But you never think it’s going to be you. The road near the Lewis Pass was slick from the morning drizzle. I wasn’t speeding. I wasn’t distracted. I just took one greasy corner a fraction too wide, felt the tyres lose their grip, and in that horrible, slow-motion second—I knew we were going off. The car rolled once. Just once. We came to a stop wedged hard against a thick stand of manuka trees on the driver’s side. The door wouldn't budge. Not even an inch. For a moment, it was silent. Everyone was breathing. I did a quick check: Charlotte was in the passenger seat, white-faced and shaking, but okay. No smell of petrol. No smoke. But we couldn't get out of the driver’s side. I tried the passenger door. Jammed tight against the dirt bank. I hit the electric window buttons. Nothing. The battery had cut out when the chassis twisted. The passenger window was cracked open maybe two inches—not enough for an adult, and definitely not safe for a teenager to try and scramble through. I had my phone. I had bars. I called 111. Help was coming—but they told me it would be twenty minutes, maybe even thirty, given how far out we were. We were safe. We just had to wait. But then Charlotte looked at me, and I saw the panic starting to set in. "It’s getting really hot, isn't it?" she whispered. She was right. The sun was beating down on the glass, the car was a sealed greenhouse, and twenty minutes is a lifetime when you’re trapped in a metal box in the middle of a New Zealand summer. The panic I felt wasn't loud—it was quiet and absolute. I was the one responsible for her. I was the one who promised her mum she’d be safe. And I was completely powerless to get her out. We were okay in the end. The wait was 27 minutes. We were dehydrated and shaken, but we walked away. Yet for months after, I couldn't shake that feeling of being a "sitting duck." Every time I looked at my sister, I felt a pang of guilt. What if the car had caught fire? What if we’d been on a back-country road with no mobile reception? A few weeks later, I was chatting to a friend in Blenheim. I mentioned the crash—the lingering anxiety of being trapped. She told me her dad had been a volunteer firefighter for thirty years, and the first thing he did when she started driving was give her a little orange and black tool. "He told me every car in NZ should have one," she said. "For the moments when the doors just won't open." I’d never heard of it. That night, I looked it up. It was called SafeBreak. A two-in-one tool: a spring-loaded window punch and a razor-sharp seatbelt cutter, all built into a tiny keychain. The reviews from first responders were incredible. "Smashes modern safety glass in one click." "Cuts through webbing in seconds." "I recommend this to every driver I meet." I ordered one that week. Just one, for my car. But then the "what ifs" came back. I thought about Charlotte. I thought about my sister. I ordered four more. One for my husband’s ute, one for my sister, and one for Charlotte to keep on her own house keys now that she’s learning how to drive. The SafeBreak is now clipped right next to my steering wheel. I’ve never had to use it. I hope I never do. But something shifted the day I put it there. It wasn’t that I suddenly thought I was invincible. It was something stronger. It was the permission to stop being afraid. For nine months after the accident, I couldn't drive over a mountain pass without my heart racing. I was constantly aware of how a car can turn into a cage. I was managing my fear instead of living my life. The day I knew that tool was within reach, something released. I stopped being a helpless bystander. I decided to be the person with options. People call me paranoid. "You survived once," they say. "What are the odds?" And they’re right—the odds are low. But being prepared isn't about probability. It’s about who you want to be when things go wrong. Most Kiwis have a fire extinguisher in the kitchen even if they’ve never had a stovetop fire. We carry first aid kits for accidents we hope never happen. We learn CPR "just in case." We don't do these things because we’re waiting for a disaster. We do them because we love someone. To love someone is to make the small, boring decision to be ready. It means carrying a SafeBreak the same way you carry insurance—not because you expect the worst, but because you’ve already decided: If something happens, I am not going to be helpless. A SafeBreak costs less than a restaurant dinner. It weighs nothing. But it did something for me that months of "getting over it" couldn't: It let me breathe again. It let me be the "fun aunt" again, instead of someone just waiting for the next disaster. I bought one for me, my partner, my parents, my sister and niece. Not because I expect them to crash, but because I know how it feels to be trapped. I know that moment when you realise you have zero control. And I never want the people I love to feel that way. Police and paramedics carry these for a reason. They know: when seconds count, and the door is jammed, a tool that gives you control back is worth its weight in gold. Get one for your car. Get one for the people you love. You’ll probably never need it. But if you do, you’ll be the person who was ready.