Nina Dobrev Walks Without Crutches for First Time After Bike Accident

Three months after suffering a severe knee injury in a dirt bike accident, Nina Dobrev is able to walk again without crutches — and she’s opening up about the “brutal” road to recovery.

The Vampire Diaries star, 35, shared the news in an Instagram post on Sunday, July 28, as she stepped out with boyfriend Shaun White at the Ritz Hotel in Paris using just a cane.

In the new post, Dobrev narrates over vulnerable clips spanning from the initial accident to her first “baby steps” without any assistance.

“Three months today marks my first and last time on an electric dirt bike,” Dobrev said in the video. “After losing control and crashing the bike — and a not-so-quick hospital visit — I found out that my ACL had completely torn off, my meniscus was torn through and I had a fracture in my tibial plateau. Not ideal.”

Then, the star recalled, she learned she had to wait three weeks to have surgery — plus, endure the “excruciating” experience of doctors draining blood from her knee.

“A lot of people have been asking how I’m doing, so the reason I made this video is to share my progress and my experience,” Dobrev continued. “But I also wanted to show other people that are either going through the same thing or about to go through the same thing that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel if you stick to it.”

“And try to laugh a little in the process,” she added over clips of her giggling with White, 37. “It’s nature’s best medicine.”

The actress went on to share that she was “pretty nervous” and “anxious” for the procedure because she had “never had a big surgery like this before, so it was really scary.”

But, she continued, “it was a success,” and she was quickly able to return to physical therapy.

“I’m going to be honest with you guys. The knee was so swollen. I was in so much pain. It was the most brutal recovery that I ever could have imagined,” she explained, adding, “If it wasn’t for my friends, and my incredible support system, I don’t know how I would have made it through.”

Elaborating on the “brutal” experience, she said, “There’s obviously the physical pain that comes with surgery and recovery, but what I wasn’t necessarily prepared for was the mental toll that it would take.”

“Not being able to walk, or go to the bathroom by myself or carry a drink was really challenging. I’m a very independent person, so having to rely on other people was really hard for me,” she continued. “This whole experience has tested me physically and mentally but with time, I started making progress. Each day, one step in front of the other, one exercise after the other, one piece of bacon after the other, I got stronger and stronger but it was exhausting at times.”

“It’s crazy how we take very basic things for granted,” she later added.

Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from juicy celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.

In the caption of the video, Dobrev showcased her philosophy about laughter being “nature’s best medicine” once more by punning about her injury.

“Glad I don’t KNEE’D those crutches anymore. They finally got me Christopher WALKen. Okay, dad jokes aside…,” she wrote. “‘Brace yourself’ this is a long video and even longer caption. Last one 😂🫣.”

Also in the caption, Dobrev wrote that her injury was the universe sending her “a message that you don’t really want to hear.”

In her case, she said, “the universe wasn’t not asking… it was telling me to slow down.”

ncG1vNJzZmiolaS9rbGNnKamZ56eu6J5w6iZq52mYsSiuMqsZLChpJ28tsCMnKmurJOdsrR5xaipZp6Zp8C1edOipJ5lkZvBpr6Mm6CknV2WsKS1w56lrWVoa4V1hZhr