I got very lucky yesterday. On my way back to the office from an Ubisoft preview, I ordered an Uber. The Uber stopped and as I proceeded to get in the car, the driver wound the electric window up – and jammed my fingers in the process.
Needless to say, it hurt. A fucking lot.
In case you’re wondering, I’m OK. Instead of going back to the office, we (after some yelling on my part) drove to the hospital where the X-rays fortunately turned out clean. I discovered I wasn’t really built to tolerate injuries though – I saw my fingers going purple in the car and started going into shock, which resulted in a very scattered conversation with my publisher and Tegan enroute to the hospital.
What other incidents have happened that have resulted in you making a trip to the hospital?
Comments
33 responses to “Tell Us Dammit: The Hospital”
What Uber rating did you give him? 🙂
Holy crap dude.
Glad to hear you are okay.
Thankfully no real hospital incidents for me ever. Yet.
My most memorable (and recent) was last year in April. Was carrying some car corner weight scales – basically like house scales except blockier and heavier, roughly 15kg. As I went to put it down it slipped out of my hands and landed on edge on the 2nd toe of my left foot.
The impact essentially caused the bottom of my toe to burst open, in addition to breaking the bone. Ended up with some nice stitches and a moon boot for a couple weeks.
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think in means
Well, it could have been worse since I was yelling for 5 solid seconds and he had no idea what was happening
I have been very lucky when it comes to injuries, none have resulted in a trip to the hospital. The worst I can remember is picking up a metal wire gauze mat in chemistry after a bunsen burner experiment with my bare hands without letting it cool. I had a neat wire pattern melted into my fingertips.
How to avoid a 1-star rating.
Tip 1: Break the customer’s fingers so they can’t use a smartphone.
I once had Bloaty Head
@anotherrat
How about The Squits?
Well, I guess it’s not me as such, but I had to *take* someone to hospital a few years back. We walked into his house, middle of summer, sat down on his couch and he *SCREAMED*.
Someone left a pin on his couch, as they do quilting there, most likely his mum, it went up through his shorts and speared his nut. Oh the humanity… I told him to leave it in, not take it out, just incase. He fucking hated me for it I tell you, I heard every curseword under the sun that trip due to that, I told him if he took it out he might make it worse, who knows. Turns out I was right too, I was told I did the right thing.
He ended up laying on his back in the back of the car, legs up, it was a hell of a goddamn ride as I took him to the Mater hospital.
The looks we got as I tried to explain “He has a pin in his testicle…” “And how did it get there…” “I don’t…. know…” *Nures gives me a strange look like she doesn’t believe me*
Fun times lol.
Most importantly, he didn’t lose his nut, we’re still mates and we joke about it. But MOST importantly……. did you have to pay for your Uber mate?
Holy shit that was hard to read. Oh dear me I can’t even find the wor…
I did not have to pay for the Uber, fortunately, although the dude was insistent on the way to the hospital that I could cancel the trip on my phone (while I was preoccupied with gripping my fingers tightly)
My list would be easier to say what I havnt broken… My mind set is go hard or go home so
my left leg is about the only bone I havnt broken. the cool thing is, I almost have a full skeleton xray which makes a cool wall decal (kinda looks like a one legged pirate)
I did manage to get ejected from my local hospital once for ‘suspected drug scamming’ when i went in with 3rd degree burns to my entire back and neck but luckily enough Liverpool hospital admitted me for 4 days
I the words of the great philosopher Osbourne: “If you gotta go down, go loud, go strong, go proud, go on, go hard or go home.” 😛
I distinctly remember making a ham and cheese sandwich after school one day… and never getting to eat it as I nearly sliced the top of my finger off in the process of cutting it in half. I went to the hospital, gained three stitches and a fresh appreciation for my dad’s skill at sharpening his knives 😛
Oh man… where do I start… Too many times I’ve been there really. Fell 20 feet off a jumping board when I was like 5, head first on to concrete… on xmas eve! (Merry Xmas mum! ;))
More relevant to your story though, one morning when I was getting ready to go to kindergarten or pre-school, my sister shut my thumb in the car door… that was rather unpleasant!
I accidentally left the stove on too long and an oilbpan caught alight. Grabbing it from the safe handle I took it to the front door. Our front near the door is all concrete so the fire would die. Somd of the oil spilt on my hand and my hand caught on fire. I dropped the pot and the carpet caught on fire. I kicked the pot out and stamped the fire out. I live across from a hospital so went straight there. My hand blistered up big and i got some nice scars but didnt lose function. Was coughinv ip black shit for 3 hours.
Ooh I have one. I was about 13 years old and laying on a mattress in my lounge room after I had a couple of mates sleep over the night before. We were watching a movie I believe. Anyway, they thought it would be fun to try and distract me from the movie by piling up pillows on top of me and diving onto them (not painful since the tower of pillows was about 1m high). Anyway, my rather large 110kg friend dived on me and rolled off onto my arm that was half way off the mattress about 7-8cm from my wrist joint. Well, after about 3 seconds my arm snapped in two. I was in shock and held it up in front of my friend where it did a full 360 hellicopter-like movement (think the Harry Potter scene where he breaks his arm in quidditch) Went to the hospital, they had no rooms for me so I’m laying on a stretcher in a fucking hallway doped up on morphine (hated every second of it). Had to get transferred to another hospital but they had no ambos so my parents drove me. My arm was throbbing by this time and the morphine made me feel horrible. Anyway, 8 weeks in cast and my guilty arse friend called like 10 times during the 3 days I was in hospital.
I had to go to emergency on New Year’s Day because I had a scratched cornea. Taking your contact lenses out after many beers can be perilous.
Where to begin. I was a very accident prone child.
There was the time I tripped over my own feet and split my head open on one of those rectangular ashtrays on the floor in a hotel (that was back when you could smoke indoors), my Mum tells me I lost about at least a cup of blood.
Then there was the time I was helping Mum peel potatoes for tea, after peeling them I went to cut them up with one of those Wiltshire Staysharp knives (which I ran through the sharpener at least 10 times). I then proceeded to chop halfway through the end of my middle finger because stupid me had it underneath the potato, 4 stitches for that one.
Another time I was staying at my cousins house for a weekend. He lived near the beach, so we decided to go. about halfway there I realized I forgot my towel and ran back to the house to get it. Then on my way out I didn’t realize the glass door was shut and put my knee through it requiring 6 stitches.
I also remember my fingers being shut in a car door on a couple of occasions, and these were 1970’s cars, so the doors were heavy and no central locking, so you had to wait for your dad to get his keys out to unlock it. It hurt like fuck, but never had to go to the hospital for it.
I could go on and on, but I think you get the idea, so I’ll leave it there.
The only time I’ve ever had to go to hospital was a few years back, it was just before NYE and we were visiting Sydney (before I eventually moved there). I was at a bar in circular quay that had toilets on the second floor, and a very low ceiling over the stairs. I decided to run down the stairs a bit too enthusiastically, and knocked my head on the ceiling. I didn’t think too much of it, and walked back up to the bar to finish my drink. Next thing I know, my girlfriend is screaming and bouncers are running over to me, apparently i’d nicked my scalp and blood was EVERYWHERE. Ended up heading to St. Vincents (after finishing my drink, of course) and waiting in emergency for 3 hours without seeing anyone. Some paramedics ended up bringing someone in and I asked them to have a quick look while they were waiting, they said it didn’t need stitches or anything so I just headed back to the hotel… fun night!
That being said, I’ve had to take people to hospital a few times. Highlights include my friend getting so drunk that he fell over while urinating against a brick wall and banging his head against said wall, then forcing the ambulance to pull over on the way to the Mater so he could throw up. Also that time my girlfriend fell over and cracker her head while we were dressed as zombies for a survival game – the makeup had been done by a professional makeup artist, and the nurses freaked out as we walked into emergency until she told them she just had a little bump on her head.
Personally been very lucky and only had minor visits for some stitches that I can remember
Spent a lot of time in hospitals with my wife until we got her dietary stuff under control and she got her gall bladder out
As a kid I went on holiday to Echuca, and was getting into my Dad’s boat to go water skiing. My big toe was caught underneath as I put the full force of my body into the step… and I broke the toe clean. I had to wait until everyone had their turn skiing, 4 hours later before I was taken to the hospital.
Damn, that’s cold.
So many stories but the one that makes most people cringe is when I was 4 years old (1981) I was sent to a burn treatment ward for second degree burns to 90% of my body. Skin bright red blistering and boiling off, shaved my head had to pop and peal of large volume of skin in screaming pain, didnt sleep, just passed out from pain only to wake up in screaming when I heard a noise cause I knew it was the nurses coming to torture me. Left alone in the dark isolation ward for weeks. 4 years old traumatised and tortured in hospital for burns that were preventable.
How did I get burnt… a day at the pool without sunscreen, cause they forgot.
PUT SUNSCREEN ON YOUR CHILDREN!!!
Daaaamn, Alex. It sure would suck if you needed all your fingers for your profession and/or hobby, like video ga… oh dear.
I worked in hospitals for a contract job so that would be the most I did :). Unfortunately the one time I did need to go to the hospital was when I was 10 and woke up being unable to move my neck without blinding pain. My parents had to carefully dress me as I tried to keep my head ramrod straight as every little twitch had me howling in pain and very ( and reasonably) freaked out. Just try it for yourself keep your head perfectly still and imagine every time you twist it at all you get blinding pain.
Turns out I had just seriously strained a neck muscle and was fine after a couple of days of rest.
I had a gallbladder attack back in 2012. Most painful experience of my life.
It started in the mid-afternoon, just feeling like I hadn’t eaten and/or had some mild indigestion. Just a bit of a sore stomach. I had some peppermint tea, which did nothing.
Then it got a bit worse, and spread around my right side into my back. I had a lie-down. No effect.
It got worse. I decided (I don’t know why) that throwing up might help. I made myself vomit into the toilet. No effect.
At some point I decided that this was, in fact, the first time I needed to go to the hospital. I drove myself, because I don’t know why. By this point the pain was excruciating – I’ve never had such a long 15 minute drive.
I don’t remember the walk from the car park to the emergency room, but I could barely talk to the nurses at the counter when I got in. They gave me oxynorm – “it’s all we can give you for now. It should kick in in about… 40 minutes?” *sympathetic look*
Triage nurse told me to sit in front of her so she could keep an eye on me. I literally writhed in pain for the next 40-45 minutes – it would occasionally feel like a certain position was less painful, but that never lasted long.
After that time, the nurse looked over: “are you feeling any better?” Me: “no”.
She picked up the phone.
About five minutes later I got called into the treatment area. I don’t remember much of what happened next, but I think they X-rayed me – the ultrasound people had gone home – which didn’t find anything. Then, finally, they gave me morphine. Sweet relief.
I called my mum (that’s what you do when you go to hospital, right? You call your mum to let her know?), and during the discussion discovered that morphine makes me vomit. Since I was on morphine I didn’t really care, and promptly went to sleep.
When I woke up, several hours later, I was feeling OK. They gave me a sandwich and let me go, telling me to follow up with my GP.
Ended up back in hospital three days later with a terrible gallbladder infection (my GP was furious that the hospital had let me go the first time without doing any proper tests), then about seven or eight weeks later I had the damn thing taken out.
Fun times.
This one time I spent too long sniffing cheese and drinking unpurified rain water which resulted in bloaty head syndrome, luckily my local hospital had an inflation room and they fixed my right up quick.
I feel bad for the Uber driver, who checks for fingers when they’re doing their windows up?
For all the stupid shit I do which results in me hurting myself, I barely even end up having to see a doctor let along going to hospital. Guess I’m the lucky one 😛
I work as a booking clark in a hospital emergency department.
I’ve seen some absolutely brilliant self inflicted ones…
New Years eve we had someone come in because they were holding a firework that went off… the year before we’d had someone who thought it was clever to hold a lit sparkler between his bum cheeks.
We had a kid (22) book in because he decided to throw a can of petrol onto a bonfire (looked like he’d taken a shotgun blast to the chest, coupled with a shocking sunburn… lucky he turned his head away or he’d probably have lost an eye).
This, of course, doesn’t include numerous halfwits who’ve come off their dirtbikes, punched walls, put their appendages through glass, taken something, kids who’ve gotten drunk, girls who’ve fallen off of horses, morons who think that sunburn is a hospital emergency, people who’ve “fallen” onto something, and the occasional ‘organ-donor-in-waiting’ who’s crashed their crotch rocket into something without wearing leathers.
I used to ride dirt-bikes (before I moved to the city for work) and I went out with a bunch of mates to ride. There was a girl there who has always been a good mate, their family are close to mine. She asks for a double, and I had been declining all day – she didn’t have a helmet after all!
BUT after the 5th or so time, we are moving riding locations – to the next paddock (about 300meters away over a flat area with grass about 30cm high…
She hops on and I make sure to go real slow – about 20kms (no faster than running) and then we roll over a small log in the grass that I couldn’t see.
This normally wouldn’t be a problem, the bike should have just rolled right over – BUT I had the suspension set soft on front/hard on back for the type of trail we were on.
The result was the rear of the bike bounced up, she went into the air, and came down on top of me, on top of the bike.
When we got up she was having trouble breathing.. we all were kinda stunned, then her brother assured me it was her asthma…
Anyway.. I then tore back to the house and rang the ambulance, who came and took her to emergency – she had a punctured liver…
I felt horrible, and to make matters worse, the ambulance driver had told her father “they must have been doing at least 80-100kms!!!”
She ended up being ok and happily we are all still mates!