From the Blog

What CFers Do: Stab Themselves With Hypodermic Needles

Owie!!Hi, I’m Jesse and I’m weird.

OK, you already knew that, but try this on for size. I have a decent-sized list of things that I have visions of happening. Bad things. Worst case scenario things. Here are a few:

  • mis-stepping on the first step going downstairs and tumbling down and cracking my head on the shoe chest at the foot of the stairs
  • bleeding to death from a papercut
  • biting my tongue off coughing
  • busting my jugular out coughing (have you seen that thing stick out?)
  • popping the tube off the end of my port or pulling it out of my clavicle vein and bleeding to death
  • stepping on something sharp that goes clear through my foot
  • ending up in the water doing jet skis or tubing and having a gator eat me or one of those worm parasites climb up my you know what… and bleeding to death
  • stabbing myself in the eye or hand with a hypodermic needle when adding saline to my Colistin vials

Well, that’s quite a strange list, but that last one happened today. Not my eye. Not my hand.

My pinkie AND my ring finger. More precisely, my ring finger through my pinkie finger. Please, allow me to explain before I lose my audience for fear that my stupidity is contagious.

I was holding the vial upside down in my left hand and clasped the cap on the syringe with my pinkie and ring fingers. Perfectly normal. What follows was not.

I pulled on the cap, using my usual micro-resistance so I don’t pull too hard and make some wild movement and stab myself in the eye (see aforementioned list). Apparently I used too much resistance this time (macro-resistance, perhaps), and I drove the needle straight through the outside of my pinkie, under the fleshy part, back out the inside of it, and into the outside of my ring finger… and back out in the blink of an eye! I was like a sewing machine.

It started bleeding from the insertion point on my pinkie immediately and profusely. I soon noticed that my ring finger was bleeding. “Son of a gun! I poked myself twice,” I thought. Not sure those were my actual words in my head, but that’s my story and I’m sticking to it. After squeezing my pinkie for a couple of minutes because it refused to stop gushing, I noticed it starting to leak out the other side when I let off pressure. “Son of a gun! I impaled myself clean through,” I thought, again not sure but sticking to it.

Beautiful thinks I should have left it in my fingers to take a photo of it, but all I have is this lousy photo of my Band-Aid brand owie-strip. At least it wouldn’t have bled until I pulled the needle out.

Oh, and in case any of you are wondering, yes, it really, really, really hurts to do that.

At least I stuck myself with my own darn needle.

Comments

  1. rburkhalter30 says

    I am just trying to envision you typing with your owie strip. I am thankful that we don’t have Cayston since J is accident prone standing still. You’ll have to take pictures of your entry and exit wounds to make up for not getting one of the needle through your finger.

    • Jesse Petersen says

      @rburkhalter30 I’ll give it a shot, but we don’t have our EOS Rebel yet. Macro shots on an iPhone is kinda hard. I can still see them, so I’ll try now and post at the end in the morning.

    • Jesse Petersen says

      @rburkhalter30 Colistin, not Cayston. Cayston is just a rip-top saline. Uploading images to the post now.

  2. Ow, ow, freaking OW! Also- I am glad I’m not the only one with an extensive list of bizarre things I might do to kill myself.

  3. There sure are lots of nerves in our fingers, especially at the ends. Remember that big “Earth and Man” book we had when you were a kid and the picture of a human body with the various parts scaled according to nerve density?That also reminds me of the old Red Skelton mime skit where he pretended to sew his fingers together and then run the thread through his elbow and use the string to make his arm wave. I never imagined you would take it as far as you did. ๐Ÿ˜‰

  4. I have had the unfortunate Cayston cut a few times when prying and tearing the metal tops off of the little bottles. Sliced me good on the pinkie. Now when I have the caps that refuse to pull I get my tweezers out and pry the cap off. Otherwise only the occasional jab from a needle when I am rushing or not paying attentioin. Be careful out there! Ha! We lead dangerous lives!

    Mark

    • Jesse Petersen says

      @Mark M The Cayston caps are way better than the trial caps were. I mentioned it to Gilead in a phone interview and they said I wasn’t the only one who said that. I usually used the tip of a steak knife to wedge it open with a twist instead of a stab.

  5. This looks so painful!! At the same time, I couldn’t help but cracking up through parts of it because this is exactly something I would do (and something I would worry about)! I also have a very strong fear of biting my tongue off from coughing. I also worry that I will literally laugh to death (since laughing causes extensive coughing, which in turn leads to not being able to breathe). BE CAREFUL! I am so glad it was your own needle, though!

    • Jesse Petersen says

      @MeganMurray I think it was one of my best pieces of humor writing. ๐Ÿ˜‰ [โ€œSon of a gun! I impaled myself clean through,โ€ I thought, again not sure but sticking to it.] I’ll try to keep funny outbursts like that to a minimum so I am not the death of you.

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