Kulbergs' wife on how the PM's serious car crash changed their family life

Anna Kulberga, wife of Latvian Prime Minister Andris Kulbergs, has described in an interview with the magazine Ieva how the family lived through the serious road accident of 1 May 2022 and the recovery that followed. According to her, the crash affected not only the politician but also his loved ones, and changed their relationship.

What happened

Andris Kulbergs (AS) was involved in a head-on collision on 1 May 2022. He suffered fractures in both legs, used a wheelchair for five months and underwent nine operations over the following two years.

Fear before the homecoming

Anna says Andris returned home from hospital after about a month and a half. At the time she feared what her husband would be like, since his life had come to a halt, and worried he might turn bitter and irritable. She had never before seen him in a helpless situation. Yet seeing his strength, she says, she fell in love with him again. His legs still hurt, and in the mornings he gets up slowly, she said.

Concern for their daughter

Her greatest worry was for the couple's daughter. Anna was sure her husband would endure the physical hardship, but the girl, then three years old, was closely attached to her father. In Anna's view, the fear of losing a parent can become a serious lifelong trauma, and the family had to work on it for a very long time afterwards.

A change in outlook

Anna believes the accident changed Andris's personality and way of thinking. After facing the possibility of death, a person changes fundamentally, and what matters is how one perceives the experience and what one learns from it. Michael Newton's book "Journey of Souls: Case Studies of Life Between Lives" is very important to Kulbergs, she said. She added that she, too, believes things do not happen without reason.

She feels the family got through the ordeal together, and that it made them value life and each other even more. The fuller interview appears in the latest issue of Ieva.