I Severed My Finger – The Climb #373

Monday 29^th January 2018

For someone who fights with blades I’m not very good with sharp objects.
I had a major injury today and sliced a good chunk of my finger off, nail and all.
The day job was really busy this morning. We had a major incident that took a lot of our time and then had to jump straight into a product demo. By the time we finished it was 1pm and we rushed off to get lunch.
Because I’d not had time to take the turkey burgers out the freezer, they were offset frozen together. Normally with the strength I’ve built up I’m good at snapping frozen things apart, but these stuck firm. So I decided to cut them apart.
The ironic thing (aside from the fact that I fight with blades but should not be left alone with a knife in the kitchen) was that I thought to myself that I did not want to chop my finger off. And so I was careful.
But not careful enough obviously.
I chopped them apart but nicked my index finger half way down the nail. I cursed and went to get some kitchen roll knowing it would bleed loads. It was then that the top of my finger hinged and I knew that I’d done some major damage.
I’d sliced from the side across the nail up to the top, the flap of skin above the nail the only thing keeping it attached.
I remembered that cold realisation when you majorly injure yourself. I had it with leggeddon. Your heart sinks, the beat goes up, and you try not to panic. I’m generally good in crisis situations, I keep myself busy. I tried to wrap it in kitchen roll but I found it just caught the flap of skin and nail. So I went upstair, got a wet wipe and wrapped that round it. Then put a load of kitchen roll encompassing it. I was in my lounge pants, so I quickly got changed and left a hurried cryptic message for co-workers “cut tip of finger off. Ae”
I decided that it wasn’t safe to drive. I don’t get queasy but I did feel a little lightheaded. I suppose I could have got a taxi or a bus but I figured by the time I managed, with one hand, to figure that out I could be half-way to the hospital. Even if I did pass out walking, it’s not like I would die.
I think the act of walking the 40 minutes to the hospital stopped me panicing, but I’ve never been to A&E before and so wasn’t sure whether I should go to A&E or Urgent Care. So I went to urgent care and waited patiently as the receptionist dealt with some woman who wanted some special plasters. Then I waited more as the receptionist went to ask a nurse. This is when I started to get impatient.
“Hi,” I said when it was finally my turn. “I’ve sliced the top of my finger off should I come here or A&E?”
“Go straight to A&E,” I was told firmly.
I was seen pretty quickly. Seems I chose a good time of day to injure myself.
I have a golden rule that if you injure yourself you should always get pictures. I always regret that about leggedon. Either you are gonna die in which case a few extra seconds probably won’t make a difference, or you are going to want bragging rights down the line. My nurse humoured me but I was still in a bit of shock.
They’ve taped / strapped / stitched the tip back on and wrapped up the finger. I’m probably going to be out of action for the rest of this week and it hurts like hell (especially when I knock it). Probably going to take tomorrow off work as I know from storm chasing that adrenaline comedown wipes me out.
My friend Craig came round to nursemaid me tonight. He was an absolute star, opening packets for me and making me tea in between a couple of episodes of The Punisher.
So the morale of the story is: never trust me with knives.
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