Reply to: The self-inflicted injury and DIY healing thread

[realityhack]

Points will be awarded for near misses that might have resulted in a serious or terminal conclusion

I've had many near misses, but the closest one that would certainly have resulted in death was very ordinary:

I was crossing the road late one night, had reached the halfway point, and heard the sound of an engine. Instinctively, I jumped forwards (I don't know why, perhaps it was in my peripheral vision) and a speeding car missed me by about an inch. No headlights, no warning - it seemed to come out of nowhere.

I was a tad shocked for a wee while.

[original PM]

When I was a young boy scout I was chopping wood and slipped - had an axe wound in my knee.

doing some diy year or two ago taking tiles of a wall a rather large chunk slipped and sliced my wrist - took ages to get the blood of the bathroom ceiling!

and when i was about 7 I was climibing a ladder, slipped and fell ripped my back open! still have the scars to this day.

[lightng]

[QUOTE=Mich the Tester;738491]a stinging nettle against my bell-end.[QUOTE]

I know someone who enjoys this kind of thing as foreplay. Wierdo.


No - its not me by the way.

[DaveB]

Whilst demolishing an old shed at the age of about 12 ( dont ask, it was legitimate ) I stepped backwards onto a piece of wood with two protruding 8 inch nails, although at the time we thought it was just one. They went straight through the sole of my trainer, through my foot and out the other side.

Mate I was with ran off and got my dad who came down and had a tentative wiggle of the attached peice of timber and decided it wasnt just going to slide back off. Since said lump of wood was a 5 foot long piece of 4" x 4" timber, he got my mate to hold my leg still while he cut it down to the size of my foot with a tenon saw before carting me off to the local cottage hospital.

This didnt have an A&E department as such, just a couple of nurses and one of the local GP's on call. The nurse on duty confirmed the lump of wood still attached to my foot wasnt going to give up without a fight and called the doctor.

The doctor arrived, had a quick look and proceeded to cut away the trainer, leaving just the sole sandwiched between my foot and the timber. Having done this it became clear that there was not one, but two nails involved, the ends of which stuck about 1/4" out of the top of my foot. At this point he decided it was beyond his capacity as a GP and I needed to be shipped to the nearest hospital, 20 miles away, to be dealt with. While we waited for the ambulance he started taking pictures of my foot to show to the local St Johns Ambulance brigade before wrapping it in foam strips usually used as slings.

I was packed off to hospital in the back of the ambulance with a bottle of entonox to keep me company and my dad following behind in the car.

On arrival my foot was examined once again by a junior doctor, who, on cofirming that the wood would not simply pull back off sent me off for an X-Ray.

At this point the reason for the lack of cooperation from the offending item became clear. Not only were there two nails, but they were both bent slightly towards eachother. On going through my foot they had flexed enough to get the points either side of one of the bones in my foot before springing back together. Having determined that since I hadnt bled to death in the mean time there were no major blood vessels involved and since I could still wiggle my toes, no tendons damaged, it was decided that the best course of action was to up the concentration of the entonox I had brought with me, wait for me to relax and pull it back off by bracing against the end of the trolly and pulling really hard while a nurse held my leg down!

I still have the lump of wood, complete with nails, trainer sole and blood stains in my garage

[Chugnut]

Back in the 80s when I was a BMX kid, I showed my mate how to do an endo. Unfortunately on this occasion, my feet slipped off the pedals and I fell onto the handlebar stem using my nuts as a brake.

The pain was ridiculous, and I was unable to speak as it was like being winded. My mate said "Wait a minute, did you fall on your nuts then?"

"No, no. It's all fine", I squeaked. "Anyway, gotta go now. See you tomorrow", as I limped off pushing my bike.

They went all sorts of colours over the next few weeks. I'm wincing just thinking about it.

[Ravello]

Did the skin graft itself back or drop off?

It was actually all a bit strange, the flesh grafted itself back on and new skin grew over the top (from the point at which the flesh was still attached). The old skin died but remained in-situe so for about 18 months after I had a sort of lump on the side of my thumb which was completely de-sensitized.

Gradually thereafter the 'lump' began to reduce and the area now has regained feeling and no longer protrudes.

[TimberWolf]

I once went for a pee at the roadside and the wind turned and blew a stinging nettle against my bell-end. I went home in severe pain and my girlfriend (who’s a nurse) gave me a bag of frozen peas and said ‘f**k this for a while’.

So the gist of the story is that you were having a pee, got stung on the peeness and was healed by peas.

[Mich the Tester]

I once went for a pee at the roadside and the wind turned and blew a stinging nettle against my bell-end. I went home in severe pain and my girlfriend (who’s a nurse) gave me a bag of frozen peas and said ‘f**k this for a while’.

[TimberWolf]

Whilst preparing the culinary delight of Cheese on Toast, I was using a cheese slicer on a fairly small lump of cheese, in which, the cheese slicer became embedded... Wrenching on the slicer as hard as I could immediately sliced through the cheese and indeed an inch long strip of my thumb, rendering the bone visible.

Unfortunately the house I was in was fairly low on medical supplies, so having done my best to stem the flow of blood with paper towel, I snatched off another sheet, put the flesh back into place and sellotaped the whole lot together.

Did the skin graft itself back or drop off?

[Ravello]

Whilst preparing the culinary delight of Cheese on Toast, I was using a cheese slicer on a fairly small lump of cheese, in which, the cheese slicer became embedded... Wrenching on the slicer as hard as I could immediately sliced through the cheese and indeed an inch long strip of my thumb, rendering the bone visible.

Unfortunately the house I was in was fairly low on medical supplies, so having done my best to stem the flow of blood with paper towel, I snatched off another sheet, put the flesh back into place and sellotaped the whole lot together.

[EternalOptimist]

I was working on a radar set, it was a hot sunny day and I was perspiring freely. The 20kv unit arced onto my beak, right on the tip. The fright was worse than the injury.
I still have a tiny black dot on the end of my nose

[conned tractor]

Whilst getting my degree I used to work in an axle factory. One night I was working on the induction softening of the threads of a pinion gear. The pinion had a threaded end then a splined bit then some circular bits (bearing surfaces etc) on the non-geared end. They were heat treated to harden them but this making the threaded part too brittle this was then induction softened.

I would place two of these in the machine at a time. Press button. Remove and place in rack. Upon picking two up one slipped and fell onto my forearm still obviously red hot. This left a burn for which i was sent up to the hospital to get checked out. The burn had left three seperate areas of cooked skin from each of the sections of the top end of the pinion and when I saw the doctor the doctor asked who on earth is Joe. I hadn't noticed up until this point but the burns from the seperate sections had marked me with what looked like the letters J-O-E on my forearm.

And then theres the time i was walking along a wall as a kid and my dad was telling me to get down before i fall. Knowing better never listened to him. Fell off the wall scraping the skin off my inner thigh and still have scars (just about visible) from that now 20 is years on.

[foritisme]

On a skiing trip many years ago (my only one), we were skiing across a frozen lake. It was a lovely 'hot' day and not knowing any better I took my gloves off. About 10 minutes later I fell back and the way I was gripping the sticks my fists took the full force. Didn't feel a thing, got up and carried on skiing. One of my mates looked over and asked what I had done to my hands. I looked down and then noticed big holes just below each knuckle.

Felt it later on that night when my hands had warmed up - still have the scars now !

[TimberWolf]

Having spent a couple of years in a commercial kitchen I have lots of injury stories

Cut the end off the top of my finger chopping carrots, cue copious amounts of blood and swearing, mostly from the head chef who was most annoyed that I'd got blood all over the work surface and chopping board.

Once slid a tray out of the oven a bit too violently, only to have it land on my inside forearms. I can still remember having to peel it off and watching the amount of skin it took with it

I think my luckiest escape was when I was taking a rather large meat slicer apart and dropped the very heavy circular blade on my foot, sharp edge first. If I hadn't been wearing steel toe-caps I'm fairly sure I'd have one foot seriously smaller than the other

Yeah, kitchens are dangerous places. I worked in a kitchen when I was doing my 'A' levels, and one day I leaned on a hot-plate. It takes maybe a second or so to register searing heat and that was enough time to turn my fingertips white. Ouch.

[DiscoStu]

Having spent a couple of years in a commercial kitchen I have lots of injury stories

Cut the end off the top of my finger chopping carrots, cue copious amounts of blood and swearing, mostly from the head chef who was most annoyed that I'd got blood all over the work surface and chopping board.

Once slid a tray out of the oven a bit too violently, only to have it land on my inside forearms. I can still remember having to peel it off and watching the amount of skin it took with it

I think my luckiest escape was when I was taking a rather large meat slicer apart and dropped the very heavy circular blade on my foot, sharp edge first. If I hadn't been wearing steel toe-caps I'm fairly sure I'd have one foot seriously smaller than the other