The School of Hard Knocks: Injuries Sustained Over a Lifetime of Klutziness

I've mentioned before that I am soon approaching a semi-milestone birthday - I'll be 45 on Sunday. 

This has given me pause to reflect on the many things that I have experienced in my past 44 years.  I have written about some of these experiences in earlier blog posts - including friendships, riding bikes, skipping church, TV shows of old, and the toys I yearned for as a child.  (A Pebbles Fiintstone doll and Amazing Sea Monkeys - which are entirely NOT amazing as it turns out - and a Bozo the Clown punching bag thingie.)

Today, for some reason, I have been reflecting on the injuries I sustained while growing up. In hindsight I wasn't really an accident-prone kid, compared to some kids I knew. 

My accident-prone life developed slowly. In a way, I sort of developed something similar to Type 2 Diabetes, only in the form of klutziness. I think I have what I'll call "Adult Onset Klutziness." There is no cure; only changing my lifestyle and the way I walk will help sustain me throughout my journey with this terrible disease.

My childhood injuries were small, but insignificant. See below:

In first grade, I was hit by a car, but only lightly. Really. I was crossing the street to my bus stop (yes, there was a Crossing Guard there), and a jeep, driven by a teacher from my school, took the corner too fast on a snowy day, (because he was TARDY), and when he saw the children, (including me), in the street, he slammed on his brakes.  Of course he went in to a full skid,  (lots of people who drive four-wheel-drive vehicles think they have an automatic free pass to drive fast in the snow, but THEY STILL CAN GET INTO ACCIDENTS!  But I digress, that is a different topic for another blog post). 

The rest of the intelligent  and quick-to-react kids, (and the crossing guard), ran to safety on the other side of the street, but not me. I suffered from the "your legs are heavy as lead" syndrome, and stood still, with that "deer in the headlights" look, and watched and waited. The sliding jeep was almost at a dead stop by the time he got to me, and as it came to the final halt, he tapped me with his bumper. I fell down, flat on my back, and the jeep came to a stop right on top of me. I fell right under the middle of the car; not a tire near me. Sort of like I'd be laying if I were changing the oil, only feet first! Lucky, huh? What really upset me was that all the parents who normally waited at the bus stop with their kids ran to help my brother, who had happened to have fallen while running to cross the street with the other kids, and had skinned his knee AND IT WAS BLEEDING! As I climbed out from under the jeep and saw that no one cared that I had just been RUN OVER, (so to speak, since I didn't have any tire marks on me to prove that I actually had been RUN OVER), I was livid! Here I was, actually UNDER THE VEHICLE, but my poor brother had a bloody knee! The adults didn't give me a second look!  Wow, that STILL irks me 38 years later. Maybe I have Post Traumatic Stress Disorder!  Just wondering...Only the teacher who ran me over saw me as I crawled out from underneath his car. Since he was guilty but he was the only witness to my "whereabouts"  he was not going to bring it up in casual conversation or offer any information that might harm his career as race car driver/school teacher. He did ask me if I was okay, and I told him, (while in shock of course), "Yes, I'm fine." (I think this must be where I began the bad habit of saying, "Don't worry, I'm okay," when I'm really not.) BIRTH OF A PEOPLE-PLEASER, STORY AT SIX."

In second grade, I came close to drowning while on vacation in Cape Cod. I got stuck in a rip tide while innocently walking in water a little over my knees, and I remember being sucked under by the swirling water. This was very frightening, and I remember it like it was yesterday. I saw no way out; then my friend's Dad's huge had came out of nowhere, and pulled me to safety. Miraculous. I'd be "swimmin' with the fishes" right now if it weren't for him.

In second grade, I fell off the monkey bars on the playground and got the wind knocked out of me.

In third grade I got hit with a baseball in gym square in the left boob. That was horrible. Sadly, I had "developed" early, and this was horrendously painful. I remember thinking then, "This must be what it feels like for a boy when he gets kneed in the groin." Owie.

Also, while in third grade, while playing baseball in gym class, I was playing the position of catcher, and the pitcher, a boy named Stephen Hopkins, pitched a ball pretty hard. I tried to catch it, but the ball popped up off the tip of my glove into the air above me,  and as I looked up to catch it, the ball landed in my mouth, chipping a tooth ever-so-slightly. I was born with a great set of teeth, so this was very upsetting. See how I've never forgotten Stephen Hopkins? Sure, it was an accident, but these were my teeth! The chip was so small, it didn't even need to be fixed, but it was there, and still is. Every time my tongue hits that chip to this day, I say, "Damn you, Stephen Hopkins!"

In fourth grade, I went to school one day when I swore to my mother that  I felt sick, but she sent me anyway. I made it all day until the last class. We had been waiting for weeks to receive our new musical instruments - Recorders! - and they were to be handed out that day. Just as I got my brown plastic "Recorder" which came in a lime green corduroy case, I felt nauseous. I asked the teacher if I could leave to use the restroom. I got permission to leave, ran out of the classroom and didn't quite make it to my destination. I vomited all over the hallway. Sadly, this was a brand new annex to the main elemenatry school building, and it had only been open a month or so, and it was lined with brand new  lime-greenish wall-to-wall carpet. I was mortified. Even after the school nurse sent me home, I was afraid to return because I had puked all over the new carpet and everyone had seen it. There's no quick mop job on a carpet. Years later, after my high school graduation, a classmate kindly reminded me "Hey, remember when you yacked all over the new carpet in elementary school? There's still a stain there, and they deoderized it for months, but the smell never left. YOU did that! Remember?" I want you to know that I do realize that what I have just described is not an actual physical injury, but an injury to my psyche. To this day, no one who was there that day will let me forget. This is why I live three thousand miles away from my home town. This was a significant-emotional event.

Aside from these all little "mishaps", I had a few memorable bike accidents. One on a tricycle, and two on a ten speed. Each time, I gouged each one of my knees horribly, blood everywhere. I still have the scars to remind me, but it was worth it to have had those great rides. Battle scars for the young, if you will.

Oh, once I dove head first into a pool at the same time my brother dove in head first from the other side. We smashed heads underwater - that REALLY hurt. My poor father was a witness to the event, and nearly had a stroke thinking he'd have two paralyzed kids surfacing from the pool. We had hard heads, fortunately, and we were ready for another dive right away. Dad said, "NO WAY. GET OUT OF THE POOL FOR THE REST OF THE DAY." Man, what a meanie!

I also, during that same summer, leaned against a built-in kerosene heater that was fully on and functioning in my friend's pop-up camper, and got second degree burns on the backs of my legs. I had blisters in the shape of the heater, seven rows of seven circles on each leg -it looked like I was branded. My legs looked like that candy you used to be able to buy that came on a strip of paper and you ate candy "buttons" off it. Gross stuff. I couldn't sit for weeks!

I broke the pinky toe on my right foot three times. The first time I broke it I was playing soccer and looking at the boy I had a crush on. Instead of kicking the soccer ball with my instep, I used my toes. CRACK!  Then I re-broke it shortly after it healed by diving off a diving board the wrong way at a pool at the YMCA while LOOKING AT THE SAME BOY. The third time I wasn't wearing shoes and kicked a table leg while running through a room.

As an adult, I've done the following: (And I qualify "Adult" here as being over twenty).

Slammed my index finger in the driver's side door of my car and broke it in three places. I actually did this from the inside of the car, which was interesting, and you couldn't pay me to tell you how I did that now.

I accidentally swallowed a straight pin that I had bent into the shape of a "V". I did this while picking my teeth with said pin, and it accidentally flew to the back of my throat. That cost me four days in the hospital, in the pediatric ward. Where else do they put people who swallow funny things? Kids swallow pennies, quarters, put beans up their noses; I was on THAT floor at the age of 21. Pride slowly leaking away now.

I have broken every toe on each foot ,(some twice), by not wearing shoes in the house, not watching where I was going, and kicking doorways or table legs.

I have broken my left foot twice. The first break was caused by tripping on a rock while taking out the garbage. The second was caused by stepping on a dog toy which caused me to fly up in the air and land on my arse.

While going to my mailbox one day, I slipped on the ice and fell into a ditch head first, wounding my neck.

While working as a secretary at a church, I tripped up an outside stairway. In order to avoid smashing my head into the door of the building, I somehow aimed myself under the railing instead and fell head first into the bushes after a three foot spiral. It was an olympic-style dive for sure.

Sadly, I had four witnesses to this tragic event. Not only was my body aching, but my pride and reputation were also injured as I was the joke of the church's ladies quilting bee club, first, the congregation next.

I once fell down my front steps face first, entangling my legs in the stairs behind me. My husband was away on business and I was new to the area, so I called a cab to take me to the ER. Luckily it was just a bad sprain of my right leg; another hit to my pride. You know you are truly alone in the world when you have to take a cab to the ER.

In a previous blog post I did mention a nose injury sustained when a rogue car vaccum escaped my hands and flew into my face -  that was a good one;  and I have actually fallen asleep on a heating pad, gracing my left breast with second degree burns. Imagine my embarrassment when I had to have this injury treated at the doctor's office! Things like this really only happen to me.

I think, though, that my proudest moment was when I went outside through the back sliding glass door to empty the garbage, and upon returning to the house, perceived that slider to be still open, and walked face first into the now-CLOSED slider. I ended up smashing my nose, mouth, chin and forehead, which officially put me in "pancake-face" status. To this day, my son says from time to time, "Hey mom, remember when you walked into that glass door, then you cried? That was SO FUNNY!" Yea, funny to you, Mr. Smarty Pants. Just you wait! Need I remind you that so far at the ripe age of six you achieved a few embarrassing injuries yourself? Like zipping your private parts into your Dr. Dentons, or clipping your private parts into a booster chair seat? Or how about when you got your finger stuck in a whiffle ball for 45 minutes because we couldn't get it off your swollen finger to save our lives? And it only gets better from here, son.

What have I learned from all this? Really only that I need to wear slippers or some sort of steel-toed boot in the house to prevent further toe annihilation; and to never underestimate the power of a closed sliding glass door and its effect on your face. And as I read this, I realize that as a kid I got hurt because:

a.) someone else had something to do with it; or 

b.) I took more risks and was more active. 

As an adult, all my injuries were completely and utterly self-inflicted stupidity or klutziness. Adult Onset for sure. Sadly, as well, my adult injuries were all achieved by just WALKING. Not running, WALKING. 

I really hope that these are not signs of things to come. Should I be worried now that I'm soon to be over 45, that instead of being injured by just plain walking that I may get injured while on the toilet, in the tub, in my sleep, or while sitting in chairs? The prospect of this makes me very nervous. I hear about people dying in their sleep a lot and wonder if it might have been people like me, with Adult Onset Klutziness, who have graduated, later in life to the "Sleep Phase" of the illness, and maybe they roll over and break their necks but doctors give them the label "stroke victim"? What about Elvis? He died while sitting on the John, right? They said it was an overdose, but it could have been just a cover up for a case of  Adult Onset Klutziness! Maybe he tripped over his own undees while trying to stand up from the toilet and broke his neck! Doesn't "overdose by drugs" sound better than "tripping over undees" for a rock icon like him? This really could be happening; it could be widespread, but we're only hearing that these deaths are the result of stroke or heart attack. I'm no conspiracy theorist, but it could be true, right?

Wow, I gotta sign off. I just poked myself in the eye with the pretzel I was eating, and now it's tearing up and I can't see well, and oh, boy, now the salt's kicking in, and WOWSER! Am I in trouble! I see another ambulance ride in my future...(well I can really only see it with one eye, to be honest)....