Ever had a Rambo moment?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

This past weekend I had a “Rambo moment”. I did something that I would not have thought myself capable of. Ever have such an experience?

Very long story short, I was kayaking a local river and had a fisherman ask me to attempt to free his snag. Well, his reel jammed, and although I got his lure free, I wound up with a huge hook buried in my finger. The fisherman wanted to call an ambulance, but I knew what to do and guided him through the process step by step.

I tried to get him to grasp the hook with needle nose pliers and force the point the rest of the way through. He was unable to do it (and began sobbing). So, I had him steady the hook with the pliers and then I gave a quick jerk with my hand and did it myself. He was eventually able to cut off the barb, then I finished my trip.

I am usually not very “tough” and my gf immediately started making Rambo jokes. So, anyone else have any Rambo moments?

2

This is going to make me sound a lot more macho than I really am, but I’ve always been a pragmatist when it comes to doctors and ERs. There’s no need to go through the hassle and expense when I can do it myself.

I’ve done my own stitches twice, once for a gash on my right thigh, once on my left forearm. (Yes, my tatanus shots were current or I would have gone in.) The second and third times I got my nose broken, I set it myself. The third time, though, the bleeding still wouldn’t stop; so I went to the ER. They said the set was good but they had to cauterize it. THERE’s some pain for ya.

I’ve also set and taped more broken fingers and toes than I care to count and I popped a dislocated shoulder back in once.

I have a fair amount of civilian medical and first aid training. I wouldn’t recommend any of the above without it, really, and had anything gone south after the above stunts, I would have certainly sought prompt medical attention.

3

Yikes. You win.:smiley: I’ve sutured a buddy, but never me.

4

I skied a platform down a series of steps on a theatre set stage this summer. I was trying to steady the thing with my foot while it was upright, and as it fell, my foot was pulled on board and since my weight was on it, I couldn’t bail without planting both feet inside first. It went so fast I never had time to bail, and so I skied the darn thing right down the flight of stairs, maybe fifteen feet forward and about seven feet down. Think Legolas on the shield in LOTR movies, only faster and without the archery. When it hit the bottom, my own momentum threw me forward I went straight off the front and lit running, completely unhurt. It was epic. I could never in my life do it again.

5

Yeah, if you count that scene in First Blood where is speech was unintelligible… :stuck_out_tongue:

6

Oh, where to start.

  1. Son put a fish hook into my cheek (at age three). When to the neighbors, iced it, put the hook through and cut it off looking in the mirror.

  2. I have sutured with both butterfly bandages and real sutures on cuts inflicted on camping trips (on me). Spiderwire fishing line works very well.

  3. Put a tourniquet on my leg when I cut my knee open with a chainsaw. Cousin drove me to the hospital, but I walked in and admitted myself. They asked me to have a seat - I said, that’s probably not a good idea. they looked at my leg and skipped that step.

  4. I have also relocated my shoulder when it popped out. My wrists more times than I care to contemplate.

  5. Pushed the four wheeler off me when it (and I) rolled 50 ft down a steep incline, rolling over me several times. Flipped it over, started it back up, drove back to the house and cleaned myself up. Some bruised ribs, some gashes.

  6. Rolled my truck, crushed the roof. Cut my seatbelt off with my Leatherman and walked away, using a piece of shirt to stem the blood pouring out of my sliced scalp.

  7. Oh yeah. At 13, got hit by a car on my bicycle - sprained my ankle badly and had several large gashes. Pedaled about 6 miles back to my house with one foot.

8.Gotten blood blisters under fingernails. Heated up a paperclip with a blowtorch and burned through the nail to allow the blood a way to release.

Those are the slightly interesting occurrences. I’m highly accident prone, in case I didn’t make that clear :wink: Just call me RamBoneHead.

7

What do you do? You must have either a very active job or a very active personal life. :smiley:
The closest I came was more of a ninja moment than a rambo one, but it’s along the same lines. I was biking back from class (college) and made a right at a light. About 50 m further down I came to a stop to make the left into my driveway. Couldn’t immediately make the turn because of oncoming traffic. As I looked toward my driveway, I had about half a second where a car out of the corner of my eye behind me made my brain say “that’s not really slowing down.” As the car hit me I somehow managed to put my hand on the center of the handlebars, push them down and away and use them to vault over the front of my bike onto the sidewalk, landing running. The car came to a screeching halt about 8 feet in front of where I was, the back of my bike completely smashed.

At least I got rid of a shitty bike and got a better one out of it.

8

Mine was more of a ninja moment too, sorry. Once I was walking along a grassy path with a drop-off to my left side of about 6 - 8 ft onto rubble-strewn concrete. Not watching where I was putting my feet properly, I suddenly tripped over some hidden chicken-wire, and stumbled headfirst over the edge. Next thing, I was hitting the floor below hands first, did a forward roll, and stood back up as if nothing had happened. Looking from where I had just fell, I saw I had managed to land on about the only clear square yard of space within about 30 yards. After my surprise had worn off, I was just disappointed that nobody had been around to see my cool move. :smiley:

9

More effective way to remove hooks.

String yank technique.

http://www.aafp.org/afp/20010601/2231.html

10

I relocated my shoulder after wiping out on my Mt. bike; got up and rode one-armed 10 miles to civilization.

11

Yes, what do you do?

12

Definately not as Rambo-esque as some of these but I have done my own sutures. And once had my then-wife suture a scalp wound I had inflicted on myself.

Super glue also make a great closure material for small wounds. Just pinch the edges together, dry with a cloth or paper towel and run a line of adhesive. Hold for a few more seconds until it sets.

re: blood blisters under fingernails. I usually just go with a drill to vent the nail.

13

Did it roll away? :stuck_out_tongue:

14

A ninja and a rambo moment come to mind.

The ninja moment was while I was driving about 80 km/hr and 100 feet behind a pickup truck carrying sheets of plywood. I guess he didn’t have them tied down (stupid!) and the wind caught one and blew it straight for my windshield at an angle. I just did the most minor move with the steering wheel and because of the angle the plywood was flying at I was able to get it to pass just over and past the passenger side (where my fiance was sitting!). Phew.

My rambo moment was during one of those stupid epic trips we seem to have. I won’t go into huge details, but the fiance, his friend Chris, and I (and the dog) ended up about 3/4 way up a 10,000 foot mountain in a snowy avy col on our ski’s. We couldn’t go back up, we had to go down. Down ended up being a 10 foot ice waterfall. I was attempting to try to climb down the icy rock in my ski boots (bad idea) when I slipped and went over the falls on my back, head first. I don’t know what I did or how I knew to relax, but I hit the ground perfectly and gently slid to a stop. No injuries. Just the ‘holy shit that was awesome’ feeling.

To finish up the story, the next drop was about 25 feet. We had to climb out with no rope. We obviously made it, but it was an epic trip for sure.

15

Not very spectacular: I popped some surgical stitches by unwisely having really hard sex a few days after an appendectomy. Stopped at an all-night drugstore on the way home and got some butterfly bandages to close it. Healed fine, although the scar isn’t the neat line it would have been.

16

Not all that Rambo-esque, but one morning I woke up with a broken shoulder. (All I can think is that I had a seizure - I had another one months later, and started on meds, so no more after that.) I got up, dressed myself one-handed, and called a cab to take me to ER. Had a nice chat with the driver on the way, too.

The scalp wounds mentioned above remind me of a story I saw here about a rugby player who came to the bench with half his scalp hanging down, found the team’s medics busy with someone who was really hurt, so rummaged through their stuff for a suture kit, and stitched himself up enough that he could go back into the game. He’s not Rambo, he’s nuts.

17

For those of you who asked, I currently work in marketing and PR for a business call recording systems manufacturer. I don’t get injured much these days.

In my youth, I was a full contact martial arts tournament fighter (in the days before mixed martial arts became popular). That accounts for the nose, toes and some of the finger issues, as well as one shoulder dislocation. I also moonlighted for several years as a bouncer in strip joints and a lingerie bar. That accounts for the rest of the broken fingers and some other misc. injuries.

Both times when I had to stitch myself, I was just clumsy and not paying enough attention when moving around my dad’s workshop.

18

Eeesh. The closest I’ve come is removing board-with-nail from the bottom of my foot. Twice. :smack: Sadly, the two times I had to do this were juuuuuuust far enough apart that the tetanus shot from the first one was too long ago for the second one.:mad:

19

Well, I think the best I ever managed was when I fell off my bike, once, and landed on my chin, on concrete. Saw a couple of white circles flash behind my eyelids. Anyway, concerned that it might be broken, I just reached up and wiggled the sides of my chin with my hand. No awful pain, and nothing was moving like it really shouldn’t have, so I figured it was OK. I was about 11.

I suppose, after that…I’ve had trouble with ingrown toenails for years, to the point that I’ve eventually had to have the sides of my big toenails’ roots chemically cauterized. One side of one nail, however, eventually managed to regenerate enough that it occasionally starts digging in, now and again (not as bad as it was, pre-treatment—I heard that a removed piece of nail was “guitar pick sized,” but that’s probbly an exageration). So, I’ve had to do a little bit of digging out and cutting, now and then, before it got too bad.

Well, one time, I let it go to long, and I ended up with a nice chunk of nail stuck in my toe, and the start of an infection. Worse, it was too painful to cut out.

So, before going in to a hospital, I tried the next best thing…I just deliberately sat in an awkward position in an office chair long enough until the problem foot (whole leg, really) fell asleep, and then got the nail out without the distraction of pain, in the minute or two I’d have until the pins and needles started up. Sterilized nail clippers, a pocket knife, some leatherman pliars…worked fine, and then I cleaned the wound with rubbing alcohol and neosporin.

Healed up nicely, problem solved.

20

I had a an accident that resulted in an immediate pooling of blood beneath my big toenail. The pressure was intense, and lacking a lighter or having access to a drill, I took a self-tapping screw to the nail and manually turned it into the nail. After a little blood fountain, I was fine. I lost the nail eventually anyway.

I’ve reset numerous finger dislocations and my knee twice.