What's the worst injury you've ever had?

After checking out a post that had a lot of x-rays in it, it got me thinking, what's the worst injury you've ever had? Post 'em up. I'll start.

A few years back, I was out in the coast range in Oregon doing some mountain biking (by myself, first mistake). I was about 3 miles from the trail head, took a really tight switchback too tight and too fast. My bike slipped out from under me, and as I went down, my foot caught on a rock that was embedded in the ground. My body kept going one way, and my foot and leg caught up on the rock and went the other way. Next thing I know I'm on the ground looking down at my leg feeling likes it's on fire, and my foot is facing backwards. I've dislocated my shoulder multiple times and I've always been able to pop it back in on my own, so I thought I had dislocated my ankle, so I tried to pop it back in my holding my leg stable and twisted on my foot. After I came to from blacking out, I realized I was possibly very screwed. Luckily the trail intersects with logging roads every so often, so I was able to slide, crawl, and use my bike as a crutch to get to an intersection about 500 yards away, and also luckily for me, right when I got to the road, a logger happened to be driving by who picked me up, drove me to his truck, and then drove like hell to a hospital.
Long story short, I ended up breaking my fibula in one spot, and had a spiral fracture of my tibia in 4 spots (the spiral is what happened when my foot spun backwards). The doc put me back together with 2 plates on either bone, 15 screws holding everything together, and I was on crutches for 4 months, walking boot for another 4 months after that. Got depressed while recovering, which ruined the relationship with my at the time wife, which led to divorce. Over all, not something I want to repeat, but something I learned from.
Whatcha got?

 

I walked out of Bradley International Airport, fell and tore my Quadriceps and
LCL. I heard that joker snap before I hit the ground.

 

Damn.. humm.. I had to get stitches above my eye once from playing basketball and hitting my face on top of another guys head jumping for a rebound.
Had to get my gallbladder removed another time. Yep, That's about it. I've never broken anything, never been in an accident, to his point anyway.

 

Torn ACL, meniscus with sprained mcl and lcl - Wakeboarding
Partially torn ACL - Mountain Biking
Torn AC ligament in shoulder - Mountain Biking

 

BC or not - I think I'd have to beat that BC butt!

 

Tib/Fib fractures when I slid down a house roof and jammed my leg on the connecting garage roof.
Had to crawl/drag myself off the garage roof, down the step ladder, and into the house to call the ambulance. Not fun with my foot flopping around grinding the ends of the bones together. When the x-ray tech at the hospital twisted my foot in the plastic form to hold it in place for the imaging, I was later told everyone in the hallway heard me screaming and threatening the tech. THEN they gave me the Demerol.
Weeks later when it came time to change out the full cast, the ortho told me it was bad enough he wasn't sure the hydraulic cast would work and he might have to drive a rod down from my knee to hold the bones in place. Fortunately I didn't need that.

 

I was mountain biking in Silverado canyon near Irvine lake in SoCal. I was coming down the trail at about 30mph and my bike slipped where the trail criss-crossed a stream. The bike went right and I went left. My face hit the ground first and then my left knee hit a rise in the trail. My knee cap broke into 3 pieces and shattered about 10% of it. My nose exploded across my face, my eyes swelled shut, I had rocks embedded in my chin, my hands were torn open from the road rash, my ribs were bruised, and I had cuts and abrasions all over my body as I tumbled to a stop. Fortunately, I was riding with a friend and he hauled ass to the trail head to call 911. The county responders had to bring in off road emergency vehicles to get me out of the canyon. I spent 4 days in the hospital, 2 weeks in bed, 5 weeks in a full leg cast, and 3 months in physical therapy to learn how to walk again. It took a year before I had the courage to get back on a mountain bike. I still have metal in my knee and it is starting to give me some pain. I am considering having surgery to have the metal removed. It would help the pain and I could go through TSA without being hassled.

 

Yeah - leave us tankers alone. We're used to throwing Sabots in small spaces

 

My pops bought me my first dirt bike in 7th grade. A little KX80. He had 3 conditions. 1) Keep up my grades. 2) I never buy a street bike, ever. and 3) I never ride it without him present. So the guy delivers the bike on a school night and my dad tells me we'll ride it on the weekend. No way I was waiting til the weekend. So the next morning I leave the house for school and hide out in the bushes. Wait for my dad to leave for work and as soon as he left, pulled my bike out. I've driven a stick shift a few times before so I understood manual transmissions but never rode a motorcycle before. I kick start the bike, kick it into first gear, pop the clutch and the bike stalls. Without really thinking, I kick start again without the clutch and this bike launches and drags me 30 feet into a fence and my shin hits the footpeg. Not my worst injury ever but it hurt like a mother and it's gushing out blood. I wrapped it up with a sock and duct tape. I couldn't put any weight on it and basically hopped on one leg all the way to school... crying in pain. Had to hide the injury from my dad, he would have known right away I rode the bike without him. Took about 2 weeks before I could fully put weight on the leg again and it still hurts a little to this day. Never did find out how bad I injured it, but there's a huge dent in my shin bone now.

 

Was at a buddies party. He had an old 70's era 3 wheeler. Everybody was riding it. The idiot that rode it before me left it in third gear before he turned it off. Got on, gave it some gas...BOOM takes off, immediately lose control and crash through a screen door lodging my legs between the door frame and the tires going 35 mph. Tires don't stop spinning. Had to drive home and use a nail brush to get the burnt rubber and particles out of the back of my legs while my buddy who followed me called my mom. 2nd and 3rd degree burns. Still went on my senior trip to Panama City the next week. Swam in the ocean with my burns and they were gone within two days.

Still have a dent in both of my legs where I hit the door frame.

 

A friend of mine stopped over my house on his motorcycle so I could check the carb on his bike. I decide I would take him for a quick ride around my favorite roads up and down the mountain.

Then I wake up smelling gasoline, all sleepy like I just had a weird dream.

I sit up and start to check my self. I could move my neck, my fingers, I could wiggle my toes on my right foot. Then I try my left foot, hmm, felt funny, look down and try to move my leg and all of a sudden notice my foot was facing the wrong way and it looked like I had two knees. My newly acquired knee was higher up and flopped funny.

I looked at my friend and said. I broke my femur.

That was that.....


My Gerber pocket knife looks cool in an X-Ray right?

 

Those injuries make mine feel pretty weenie, though there have been a lot:

12 yrs old flipped over the handle bars of my Huffy and the firs thing that hit the street was my face and front two teeth. 2 root canals, 5 sets of porcelains and plastic surgery on the right side of my face. Yep...you guessed it...that's why i'm so ugly

27 yrs old fell off a 15 foot tall fence and broke the elbow bone that gives you all the mobility. Needless to say any movement was so painful i wanted to vomit

28 years old saw my best friend for the first time in about 8 years and we went out for "a beer." 8 pitchers later he convinced me to get on his long board. Cruised the first two hills as he followed in the truck. 3rd pull up the last hill the board got speed wobble and the back end went under the rear passenger tire (i was holding the passenger open window) and it stopped the board instantly but i kept going. Board snapped in half. We are at the emergency room getting 20 stitches above my left eye and he was behind me watching the doctor work when he burst out laughing. I had the perfect tire track down from the neck of my white t-shirt to the tail. He had run over me and we didn't even know it.

I still have the shirt today!!

38 yrs old - been snowboarding for 15 years. Was much better/faster than my friends that were with me at Squaw that day and i had taken a turn beyond their field of vision. I then had to try to find them....doing Mach 5 for about 2 hours when i realized i hadn't eaten all day and i was exhausted from trying to find them. I decided to call it a day and was bombing down to the bottom of the mountain when all of a sudden i woke up in the clinic at the mountain and a juice box in my hand. Helmet was cracked, goggles were gone, and my board was broken on the tail. I had caught an edge at about 60mph and cartwheeled, obviously knocking me out. There were bystanders that were surprised i even woke up.

 

The whole waking up thing is odd huh?

 

very. especially when it's not where you'd ever been before. when i snowboard i'm not used to finding myself lost inside. i'm usually lost in trees if at all

 

Well, here's the top 4:

1. Broken leg at 3 years old. Jumped off the day bed at my Aunt's and landed foot on the floor and calf on the edge of the treadmill. The bones basically looked like a "V" on the x ray.

2. 5 stitches when I was 4 or 5 years old, was running my hand along a row of shovels at the hardware store and then a garden hoe came off the rack and split the top of my head open.

3. 25 stitches on my left side and hand when I was 15. One of my buddies and I were going "bodies" in the locker room (you punch each other in the torso until someone cries uncle). That turned into wrestling, as I stood up he tackled me through the window into the coach's office. The window sliced me open so clean I hardly bled.

4. Partially torn labrum in my right shoulder from 4 years of HS wrestling. I went to the doc because my shoulder was sore as hell, he concluded it off of my range of motion. Unfortunately it's not torn so badly I can get surgery to fix it, he said the only way is if it gets fully torn or I blow my rotator cuff someday.

 

Amazing how a severe injury rattles the fun out of certain activities.

Glad you're here to tell about it!

 

Right? I started riding when I was eight years old and it was basically what consumed my being up until that major accident. I had other accidents and injuries, but nothing quite that life threatening. I had a rough time trying to figure out what to do with myself once I gave it up.. Having the new Tundra and adding mods to it has filled in that gap fairly well though. I just spend the money I spent on the bike on my truck now

 

Dude, your story is very similar to mine except it wasn't a physical injury. An emotionally ugly separation and soon to be divorce went from always worrying to now I'm throwing money at my truck rather than funding her activities

 

Not really an injury but scared the bejeezus out of me. Also my first Tacoma. 99 black prerunner. I LOVED it!

Driving home from a LOOONG day at college. Drive was about 45 minutes. 5 miles from my house, I fall asleep and run off the road. I wake up upside down, look around I realize the truck is upside down and wrapped around a tree, I see my sisters legs right by me (she was riding with me and neither of us were wearing our seat belts) the cops, fire dept and EMS were there when I woke up so I had to have been out for a good 15 minutes or so, blood was already dried on my face. I crawled out, made sure my sister was ok. She had broken her collarbone and all I had was a busted lip.
Got hauled to the hospital for a checkup, doc told me 95% of car accidents that bad don't end well...and those are the people that had seat belts on. He said "God must not be done with you, because you standing here with barely a scratch on you is probably the most amazing thing I've seen in a while, if ever."

Apparently the truck lost the front passenger side wheel (torn from the axel) veered into oncoming traffic, hit a car which catapulted it in the air flipping three times finally being stopped by an oak.

Needless to say, I wear my seatbelt now!

 

That is frightening to hear, bro.

Did your sister get full recovery and does she remember the accident?

God does have a plan...he had you making me cry laughing talking about the "mommy and me" AR gauntlet. If God never does anything else good he knocked it out of the park on that one

 

Tell me about it bud!!

She recovered perfectly fine. Still has a little scar and bump where the fracture was and does remember a little about the wreck. She said she heard me yell "OH SHIT" and was awake for a little of it same as me. She woke up before me and tried to wake me up, but couldn't and thought I was dead. When I woke up she told me she couldn't move her legs, so I thought I had paralyzed her (she was getting married the following month)

Never forgetting that feeling, especially as close as my sister and I are. Whew...almost makes me cry thinking about it even now.

LOL dude I was dying laughing! My mind was stuck on mommy and me and you were going on about football....WTF??

 

I'm glad you both made it out fairly unscathed. Did she end up getting married the following month?

 

Oh yeah. Still married to the same guy and have two little shits...I mean boys.

Guys a stand up dude. Retired marine (was in the reserves but had to take a few tours to Afghanistan, so he's got experience embracing the SUCK)

Best part? Me and him FEED off each other and it turns into a game of who can be the stupidest sumbitch. Definitely a plus to have a bro in law like that!

 

I need one of those

 

Worst injury for me was getting electrocuted when I was 19 working for construction company doing demo. Electrical contractor said all power was killed on 2nd floor. I went to move a fluorescent fixture and got hit. Melted my screwdriver to the plastic and knocked me off the ladder. Found out later it was 277 volts.That scared the living shit out of me.

I was bit by a cocker spaniel when I was 5 or 6. Got 1 stich on my middle right finger. Fast fwd to when I first met my wife. She asked me how I got that scar, well I told her I was hiking out in Arizona with some friends and ended up getting bit by a gila monster. The look on her face was priceless. Well I couldn't keep it in anymore and confessed.

 

Electricity is no joke. I've had my run in too. Clipped a 220 with pliers but it didn't get me though I saw the power. You are really lucky!! Glad you can still talk about it

 

No doubt Mark, I definitely have a lot more respect for electricity after that.

 

Absolutely. When I was building houses in Charleston, SC I had to wire the panel and the outside box. When I was pulling (4) 1 inch pieces of cable from the street all I could think about was if it was live and how powerful that would've been