I think it would be fair to say I’m a reasonably clumsy person; I won’t break things or drop the catch when someone throws me their phone, but it would appear I’m intent on hurting myself. Admittedly it’s never anything life threatening or major (shouldn’t have said that really) but my little mishaps will, more often than not, end up in a permanent scar or trip to the hospital.
I’ve got scars everywhere, but over the last few years my hands have taken the vast majority of the punishment. Around 3 years ago I punched a brick wall and achieved what the doctor called ‘the most impressive’ boxer’s fracture he’s ever seen. Not really sure it was meant as a compliment but it kind of felt like one, plus it was Christmas Eve so I needed something to cheer me up. I’m fully aware that punching a brick wall was a moronic thing to do, but it wasn’t my fault. OK it was my fault but it’s done now so let’s move on.
As you can see from the X-Ray (which the hospital kindly let me keep and I found the other day, hence the post), I managed to break the bone in my hand in several different places:
The hospital managed to ‘forget’ my fracture clinic appointment and I ended up having a semi-permanent cast on my hand for a month, followed by …. nothing. They just took it off and told me to go home. As a result, my right hand is now missing a knuckle and it hurts whenever it’s cold, I can’t punch with it either (although that’s probably a good thing). Someone once told me I had a good case for compensation considering that I was never given a permanent cast or any sort of physiotherapy, but considering the injury was my fault I always thought I’d just leave it.
Since breaking my hand, I decided to try and be a little more careful with them (seeing as I’m a writer and musician, both of which rely quite heavily on my hands working). Unfortunately however, I haven’t done a particularly good job looking after them.
About a year later, one of our Jack Russells (named Maximus due to his love of fighting and hunting) decided to start a fight with a boxer who was at least four times his size. As you might expect the boxer ended up grabbing my dog by the neck and began throwing him from side to side. Fearing Maximus would end up dead I got in between them and tried to seperate them; I succeeded and managed to extract my Jack Russel from the situation, but not before getting bitten several times by both dogs, all in the hands. Another trip to the hospital followed, during which I recieved stitches and a tetanus jab, resulting in a whole batch of new scars and an overwhelming feeling that my hands were beginning to hate me.
In the 18 months between then and now, I’ve nearly chopped my thumb off with an axe (twice), trapped my right hand in a car door, sliced my finger with an extremely sharp cooking knife and burnt my hands upwards of 20 times on the oven, kettle, toaster and just about anything that’s hot. I’ve also (wisely) been permanently banned from the chainsaw and the axe at home.
So maybe my hands don’t hate me; maybe I’ve just got a subconscious desire to hurt them. Either that or I just don’t learn – my overriding attitude towards most things is ‘it’ll be fine’, usually stated confidently before I hurt myself and end up in hospital.