Kendon's NEW and NOT so improved finger!!!!
It was a Friday morning. Much like most other Friday mornings, yet I was nine LARGE months pregnant and a little bit perturbed that I was not at the hospital having a baby. As with my two previous pregnancies my blood pressure had been elevated for some time. Due to my blood pressure I was happily induced two weeks early with Connor and I planned on the same happening with this baby. I had it all worked out in my "I like to have things planned" brain, that I would schedule my baby to be born on Friday November third. I like having babies on Fridays and I like having them early (since Connor was 9 lbs. Can you imagine if he had hung on for two more weeks. Hello... half grown baby!)
Suddenly, Kendon came screeching through the door. His face and shirt were covered in blood, he was holding his left hand in his right and blood was flowing everywhere. The first words out of his mouth alarmed me to the fact that this was serious. "Get in the van, now. We have to get to the hospital." In all the years that Kendon and I have been married he had only been to the doctor one time before and that was when he rolled his four wheeler and dislocated his collar bone, tearing the tendon and ligaments. (That time I truly thought he was having a heart attack by the way he came in the house all hunched over unable to talk or breathe.)
This time he had been working on building his brother a shed. Against his own better judgment he was using the table saw without the safeguard of a push stick. You can guess the rest of the story. Instead of cutting the wood, he got his fingers instead. It sliced his pointer finger and cut off his middle finger just above the first knuckle.
I quickly began getting my shoes on. Apparently not fast enough. Kendon was losing lots of blood and his calm all at the same time. It took me roughly two minutes to get my shoes on, call a neighbor to take the kids and get us all loaded into the van. To Kendon, it felt like an eternity.
As I began speeding down our road, with Kendon riding passenger (something that rarely happens. Another indicator of the seriousness.) I suddenly got a serious, and I mean serious, case of the giggles. I could tell Kendon was not humored by the situation but I could not help myself. The harder I tried to get in control the harder I began to laugh. The giggles ruptured into full blown laughter. Kendon, at the end of his rope, and his finger hanging on by a thread, lost it. "Could you PLEASE stop laughing? This is not funny." I truly did feel bad and tried to suppress my emotions. For that is truly what the giggles were, emotion. I tried to explain to Kendon that in a panic I either laugh or cry and I guess this time we got laughter. I'm not sure he would have wanted to be dealing with a bawling wife either!! The only way that I was able to gain some semblence of control was when I realized that Kendon was near passing out and to avoid that I had to keep talking to him. The whole way to the hospital I was pleading with Kendon to "please don't pass out. Please don't pass out on me." Thankfully, it worked.
We arrived at the ER and unlike on the movies, did not have to wait for a minute. The second they took one look at Kendon's blood splattered, pail white face, and "I'm going into shock" eyes, they took him directly back. The ER doctor was quick to make his rounds and even quicker to decide that this case would put him in over his head. He was able though to prescribe an I.V. of Morphine that was greatly appreciated by Kendon.
The Orthopedic Surgeon was called. As we waited and I fumed and grumped that this was supposed to be MY day in the hospital we made wagers over whether or not Kendon would keep his finger. I did not feel that I could make a proper guess seeing that I had not yet actually seen his finger. Kendon carefully pulled back the makeshift dressing that was covered in blood so that I could take a gander. It was horrible. It was disgusting. It was much worse than I had anticipated and now, I really felt bad for laughing. It was like a bad car wreck. You don't want to look becuase it is horrific but for some unknown reason you keep looking. And, it was literally CUT OFF.
Kendon and I both felt that his finger would probably be unrepairable but allowed the doctor to make the judgment call. Good thing he had the last word because he was quite hopeful that the finger could be saved with surgery. He was able to do the surgery right there in our ER room and I was able to stay and watch. Well, I did more staying than I did watching.
Approximately four hours after arriving in the ER we were on our way home. I have to say, that Kendon really was a great sport throughout this whole, not so fun, adventure. He truly was in good spirits. He was also shirtless because they had to cut his favorite (brand new) Cabela's sweatshirt off of him. But hey, he wasn't fingerless.
One year later, Kendon still doesn't have any feeling in the tip of his now crooked finger except for sharp pain in the cold. But, hey, as Kendon says, "it's THERE!"
WARNING!
THE FOLLOWING PICTURES ARE NOT FOR THE FAINT OF HEART.
Seeing as how we got out the door so fast on the day of the accident we didn't think to grab the camera. Sad.
This was taken three days later at a follow up app't.
These two are one week later.
And, TODAY!
It was a Friday morning. Much like most other Friday mornings, yet I was nine LARGE months pregnant and a little bit perturbed that I was not at the hospital having a baby. As with my two previous pregnancies my blood pressure had been elevated for some time. Due to my blood pressure I was happily induced two weeks early with Connor and I planned on the same happening with this baby. I had it all worked out in my "I like to have things planned" brain, that I would schedule my baby to be born on Friday November third. I like having babies on Fridays and I like having them early (since Connor was 9 lbs. Can you imagine if he had hung on for two more weeks. Hello... half grown baby!)
Suddenly, Kendon came screeching through the door. His face and shirt were covered in blood, he was holding his left hand in his right and blood was flowing everywhere. The first words out of his mouth alarmed me to the fact that this was serious. "Get in the van, now. We have to get to the hospital." In all the years that Kendon and I have been married he had only been to the doctor one time before and that was when he rolled his four wheeler and dislocated his collar bone, tearing the tendon and ligaments. (That time I truly thought he was having a heart attack by the way he came in the house all hunched over unable to talk or breathe.)
This time he had been working on building his brother a shed. Against his own better judgment he was using the table saw without the safeguard of a push stick. You can guess the rest of the story. Instead of cutting the wood, he got his fingers instead. It sliced his pointer finger and cut off his middle finger just above the first knuckle.
I quickly began getting my shoes on. Apparently not fast enough. Kendon was losing lots of blood and his calm all at the same time. It took me roughly two minutes to get my shoes on, call a neighbor to take the kids and get us all loaded into the van. To Kendon, it felt like an eternity.
As I began speeding down our road, with Kendon riding passenger (something that rarely happens. Another indicator of the seriousness.) I suddenly got a serious, and I mean serious, case of the giggles. I could tell Kendon was not humored by the situation but I could not help myself. The harder I tried to get in control the harder I began to laugh. The giggles ruptured into full blown laughter. Kendon, at the end of his rope, and his finger hanging on by a thread, lost it. "Could you PLEASE stop laughing? This is not funny." I truly did feel bad and tried to suppress my emotions. For that is truly what the giggles were, emotion. I tried to explain to Kendon that in a panic I either laugh or cry and I guess this time we got laughter. I'm not sure he would have wanted to be dealing with a bawling wife either!! The only way that I was able to gain some semblence of control was when I realized that Kendon was near passing out and to avoid that I had to keep talking to him. The whole way to the hospital I was pleading with Kendon to "please don't pass out. Please don't pass out on me." Thankfully, it worked.
We arrived at the ER and unlike on the movies, did not have to wait for a minute. The second they took one look at Kendon's blood splattered, pail white face, and "I'm going into shock" eyes, they took him directly back. The ER doctor was quick to make his rounds and even quicker to decide that this case would put him in over his head. He was able though to prescribe an I.V. of Morphine that was greatly appreciated by Kendon.
The Orthopedic Surgeon was called. As we waited and I fumed and grumped that this was supposed to be MY day in the hospital we made wagers over whether or not Kendon would keep his finger. I did not feel that I could make a proper guess seeing that I had not yet actually seen his finger. Kendon carefully pulled back the makeshift dressing that was covered in blood so that I could take a gander. It was horrible. It was disgusting. It was much worse than I had anticipated and now, I really felt bad for laughing. It was like a bad car wreck. You don't want to look becuase it is horrific but for some unknown reason you keep looking. And, it was literally CUT OFF.
Kendon and I both felt that his finger would probably be unrepairable but allowed the doctor to make the judgment call. Good thing he had the last word because he was quite hopeful that the finger could be saved with surgery. He was able to do the surgery right there in our ER room and I was able to stay and watch. Well, I did more staying than I did watching.
Approximately four hours after arriving in the ER we were on our way home. I have to say, that Kendon really was a great sport throughout this whole, not so fun, adventure. He truly was in good spirits. He was also shirtless because they had to cut his favorite (brand new) Cabela's sweatshirt off of him. But hey, he wasn't fingerless.
One year later, Kendon still doesn't have any feeling in the tip of his now crooked finger except for sharp pain in the cold. But, hey, as Kendon says, "it's THERE!"
WARNING!
THE FOLLOWING PICTURES ARE NOT FOR THE FAINT OF HEART.
Seeing as how we got out the door so fast on the day of the accident we didn't think to grab the camera. Sad.This was taken three days later at a follow up app't.
These two are one week later.
And, TODAY!
10 comments:
AWESOME!! I loved those gory photos. What a terrific story. I hope your baby was born soon after?
My husband cut the end of his finger off once. I didn't even know him then. He likes to talk about it all of the time. I wish I had photos like yours.
Uhh!! I scrolled too fast and did not read the picture warning. Now I'm vomiting all over my keyboard!
LOVE IT. Thank you for the pictures. I normally don't like gore but you did give fair warning.
Why are only Greenan sisters here commenting on your blog?
Ask me about the time my boyfriend blew 2 and 1/2 fingers off his hand right in front of me and my mom wouldn't let him come in and bleed on the carpet. The ambulance driver and I searched for a while but we never did find those fingers. I did find a nail but that was no help. You guys got lucky!
Oh, poor guy. My husband has a table saw, among many other tools, and I am always worried something like that will happen. So far we've lucked out. Looks like he healed really well and at least he has all of his digits!
The finger. Ugh. I'm so glad it's on and fine now though. A similar thing happened to my step-dad's finger and nearly turned gangreen (is that how you spell that?) We call his finger "the claw". Do you have a special nickname for your hubby's?
Hopefully you had your baby soon after. Did you let your hubby hold your new baby with his claw?
Hi Honey, Wow! That is the first time I had heard about that fiasco! I knew about the fingers, but not how it all took place! He sure healed up good didn't he? Helen took me in to the Dr. when I was pregnant with John (so big I couldn't get behind the steering wheel!) and she put Patty in the back and closed the door. Whoops! Patty's hand was in the way! Helen pulled off Patty's mitten and nearly fainted! She ran into the house, grabbed a large towel, wrapped the hand in it and off to the Dr. we ALL went! Patty got to be first and the Dr. sewed it back on. Today, you would never know which hand it was!! Hooray! It's a wonder you didn't have Meg right then!!
Love You@
Just like a man to upstage a delivery with his sawed-off fingers and such. Seriously!
(after reviving from sudden fainting spell...) See? I alway knew I could never be a nurse.
I feel a teense sick. BUT I can relate to your husband. I once chopped my finger off too but it is on and doing fine. I can't handle that you got the giggles. That is so funny but I can understand your husband's annoyance! (o:
Happy Birthday to the finger!
That was really gross! I understand why you laughed though. I do the same thing. It's really bad because sometimes I laugh at the really wrong times (like at funerals). Glad his hand pulled through okay.
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