Scar Stories

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

I have three big scars. The one on my left thumb is from where I sliced my thumb open on a can lid two years ago. I was home alone with just my younger siblings, so that was a bit scary. It’s still sensitive to touch and pressure–I can’t open a tight jar lid with my left hand because it hurts my thumb.

The other big scars are on my right knee. There’s one really big scar that stands out a lot when I’m cold. Seven or eight years ago, I managed to slice my leg open on the stair railing in my house. Very fancy railing, with apparently sharp edges. My mom didn’t believe I cut my leg until a friend’s mother pointed out the scar on my leg three months later. Such a skeptic, my mom.
The other scar is a bunch of scars all around my kneecap. About six years ago, my parents remodeled our bathroom and put in a fiberglass bathtub. About six months after this, I was taking a shower and noticed the floor of the tub was awfully slippery–as I started to fall. My knee slammed into the side of the tub and left a big hole. The edges of the hole were really jagged and cut my knee up really bad. (I didn’t even notice until a few hours later because I was too busy worrying about telling my parents I’d broken the new bathtub.) Turns out my brother had generously coated the bathtub with soap. If the tub had been our old metal one, I probably would’ve seriously hurt my knee, so I guess I was lucky.

jessica

22

So many scars, where to start.

Well, most of them relate to my medical condition, Hydrocephalus (which is basically to do with the fluid your brain sits in inside your skull). I’ve had it since birth, and as a result I have had to have a few operations.

When I was three weeeks old they put a valve with a tube going from my skull to my stomach to drain the fluid (it drains naturally in most people). That got me a scar on my head and one on my stomach (right hand side).

At age about 2 I had a problem with the valve and had to have it replaced, more stiches on my head and stomach (in the same places though).

At age 5 I had another problem at which point they also put one in the other side too, more stiches on both sides of my head and stomach, plus about half a dozen on my neck (left hand side).

I fell of a climbing frame when I was 5 too and landed on my head (prolly the safest place to land really) and had to have about half a dozen stiches in the middle of my forehead where a stone got lodged. It is a vertical scar just a little below my hairline but it is not noticable now.

Fast forward to age 19, another problem, this time with the left hand side. More stiches, but only on my stomach.

Then I cut my hand between my thumb and index finger, 2 more stitches there, but no big deal. I have loads of scars on my hands cause I used to work in a bar collecting glasses (mainly) and emptying the bins of all the bottles etc. Me and broken glass, that was an accident waiting to happen (well, about a couple of dozen small accidents as it happens). Apart from the thumb, the only other one of any note is on my life wrist, I picked up a bin with a hole in the bottom and put my arm under it to support the weight, a piece of glass sticking out of the bottom sliced into me, not too deeply (didn’t need any stitches), but it did leave a scar. It is about half an inch away from my vein :eek:

Finally, I had my appendics out when I was 20 or so. They used staples to close the wound too, which I thought was cool.

The scars on my head are visible all the time cause no hair grows over them and I have my hair cut pretty short. The rest are always covered by my clothes. The scars on my head have started many conversations though.

Rick (the patch work man)

23

Beautiful story, in a morbid sort of way.

I have a scar on my left hand from when I was two. Twenty years later, it is still clear as day. From what I was told (being too young to remember it myself), I wanted an apple, but of course it would be too big to eat were it not cut. So, my brilliant two-year-old mind decided not to tell Mommy or Daddy that I wanted an apple - I could get it myself. Well the only knife that was available was a steak knife, which was carefully placed on the middle of the table. I climbed a chair to get it, tried to cut the apple … and was rushed to the hospital in my dad’s beat-up car at over 100 mph. Six stitches later, I was good as new.

When I was 12, I thought it would be a great idea to ride my bike as fast as I could down a gravel road. No problem at first, until that big rock jumped in my way. I went flying over the handlebars, landed on my arms (to avoid smashing my face), and bled like a stuck pig. No stitches, but the scars remain on my right arm to this day.

Always great conversation-starters.

-Dirty Earthworm

24

I’ve got several scars, mostly small and/or ordinary. I’ll skip the really boring ones.

I’ve got scars that I try to hide with a mustache (not too successfully) on my upper lip from surgery to correct the cleft lip I was born with. There is also scar tissue on the roof of my mouth from surgery which (almost) corrected my cleft palate. The plastic surgeon also used a little piece of one of my earlobes to raise the tip of my nose, leaving tiny scars and making me possibly the only member of the SMDB who can touch part of his ear with his tongue.

I have a network of blobby-looking scars on the left side of my chest from an attack of shingles. Fortunately for most people who get shingles, they don’t usually cause scars like that. Fortunately for me, I didn’t get the shingles on my face like some people do.

But the best scar I have is a little scar on my lower abdomen as a result of surgery that made it possible for me to father my daughter.

25

I drank acid when I was 4 years old.

As a result, I have large burns on both legs, from the knees down, as well as a splotch on the left side of my chest. I’ve had reconstructive skin grafts to both my upper and lower lips (the skin came from my neck, so, similar to Doubting Robert, I can say I can lick part of my own neck). I’ve had esophogeal replacement surgery, resulting in six separate surgical scars, the only one of which is typically visible is on my neck (running from just behind my right ear to the pit of my neck).

One incident, 11 scars. And I have about 8 other scars aside from those.

26

Got lots of scars, mainly for being clumsy and careless, and also for not taking care of the injuries, either on time or damaging them.
You know how when you are a kid they tell you not to take out the scabs? I did it all the time, and in those places where I got injuries again and again(mainly the elbow), I know have scars.
Sometimes I know I bumped into something, or got a scratch, but pay little attention, either because I don’t feel much pain or because I am in a class(lab!). Few hours later, the whole area is yellow, oozing pus and of course infected.
Being in the kitchen, I got accustomed to get little scars of hot olive oil. Also burned my arm in a chemistry lab accident, although the scar is fading. Got another scar, almost fading, in my right pinky finger. Taking something out of the oven, I touched the metal upper part of the oven, and some of the hot food fell on the area. I picked out the food, but didn’t noticed until a bit too late that at the end I was not picking out food but skin, since the food was the same color as the dead skin(it was a second degree burn, I had just opened the bubble it forms). Got an ugly violet scar for some months.
I also have 1 scar from a shaving accident 7 years ago. I remember no pain(I seldom have pain from shaving cuts, before I put water), but I do remember that I had to pick out the piece of skin that was stuck in the razor.
When I was four, they had to stitch one of my fingers, but curiously, there is no scar left.

27

<reflects back on scars>

Not an exciting story, but I had basal cell carcinoma on the side of my nose back in 1996… nothing lethal, no big whoop, just like a zit that wouldn’t go away… ever. So, got it removed and have a “character-building” scar thanks to that.

Other medical scars - two well-faded scars on my front side, just below the belt-line, from hernia surgery when I was a wee lad. The miracle of time and pubic hair (TMI?) has rendered them obsolete and of no importance.

Small scar on my left forearm from climbing down the trellis that supported my friend’s alumimum patio roof back when I was about 14 or so… gashed a small, deep wound on a sharp corner and bled profusely. It’s mostly faded.

My wife has a scar running from about two inches below her right wrist all the way up to her index fingers, courtesy of surgery to fix chronic tendinitis. She also has a scar on the same hand, flip side, index finger knuckly from a capsulotomy or something like that to fix the joint which was damaged by being in the brace for her tendinitis due to an incompetent first doctor.

I think that about covers us.

28

Boring surgical scars first - from navel down to hairline - that was the hysterectomy/appendectomy/fix a few other things scar. Then there are the four little ones from my gallbladder surgery - two of them are all but invisible now.

Scars with stories:
[ul]
[li]right kneecap - from an out-of-control dodgeball game - I fell on a hunk of gravel - prolly shoulda had stitches, but didn’t[/li][li]right pinky - reaching into the recycle bin - cut on a can - LOTS of blood but not stitches[/li][li]left eyebrow - hit in the head with a baton where the metal shaft had pushed thru the rubber end - a very bloody accident but no stitches[/li][/ul]

29

Like Jeff Olsen, a bicycle accident gave me some interesting scars. I was visiting my aunt in Virginia (not far from where Jeff says he’s from…hmmm) and she had a bike that I used to borrow–a boy’s bike, so I wasn’t too embarrassed to ride it. I was riding up a hill near her house. It was a pretty steep drop down the street on the other side, but I didn’t think anything of it–till I got to the bottom and saw all the gravel on the street. I thought to myself, “If I just make it through the intersection, I’ll be OK”…right before I fell over sideways and slid about 15 feet.

Now, when I got up from the wreck, I thought, “Hey! I’m not hurt! Everything’s OK!” Then I saw my knee. It looked like raw hamburger. “At least my arm’s OK!” Er, it was slashed open right next to the elbow. “I’ll heal, but the bike’s OK!” Actually, it was bent in half. The wheels were touching each other.

15 years later, I’ve still got two lines on my forearm, but my knee scars have healed. The bike never recovered:D

30

Gosh, when I started reading this thread, I thought I’d have a pretty good scar story or two to post. But after seeing all the great stories (who even cares if they’re true?), I’m not sure I can compete.

Oh, well. Never stopped me before…

When I was around 15, living at home with the 'rents, they had this ancient old back door that had floor-to-ceiling glass. Of course, it wasn’t safety glass. [See it coming, don’t you?] Dadgum thing never latched, being old and somewhat neglected. So being naturally lazy, I always just mashed it with my palm on the way through to open it.

One day, in no particular hurry, I breezed through as usual. Unusually, however, the sucker had somehow gotten itself latched. I meandered through in what my brother (a bit behind me) describes a a spectacular hail of glass, worthy of a Die Hard movie.

I emerged on the other side unscathed, except for a hunk of glass protruding from my wrist. Being 15 and having something important to do (so important nobody remembers), I plucked out the shard and wrapped my wrist in the kitchen towel. I’ll bet that would make Cecil cringe! Sepsis never got a foothold, however, and now it’s only an inch-long scar just below the classic wrist-slash line. Only occasionally do I get to tell a woman the story of how I got it fending off that broken-bottle-wielding madman in the bar in Detroit. Sigh.

31

I have urban combat scars, because I was so totally inept about urban combat.

I intervened in an assault, right outside my apartment door in the hallway. I knew both parties, the woman I was dating and the man she used to date. He was beating on her with his fists as she crouched against the wall. After screaming (to no effect) at him to stop for what seemed an eternity, but was probably a minute or so, I ran back into my apartment to look for a waepon.

The only candidate was a Wilson T200 metal frame tennis racket (what can I say, I’m not into weaponry, and I never even considered something more decisive like a steak knife or claw hammer). I ran out with it and started clobbering him over the head with it (edge on). He turned around, took it away from me with ridiculous ease, and began to beat the crap out of me. The woman ran into my apartment and locked the two of us men out in the hall. Fortunately, the neighbors were coming out, and he knew the police had been called. So he chuckled, and turned to leave.

Just before he got on the elevator, he snapped the racket in half over his knee. He threw the handle, with two jagged metal “tongs” sticking out, at me. It actually went between my legs and the tongs gouged two deep parallel cuts just above and inside my left knee. I needed 70 stitches. I learned later that he was arrested (and spent one night in jail), and needed 20 stitches in his scalp.

I have a small knife scar on my chin from being mugged by a gang of children in 1981. They were unbelievably well organized, and I don’t think any of them were older then twelve. One kid literally leaped on my back and bowled me over, and more jumped in. I was able to get up and was actually dragging two of these kids on each arm. Then another on hit me from the front, and still ANOTHER one went down on his hands and knees behind me so I tripped backward over him. So I had kids sitting on both arms, both legs and my chest. The one one my chest calmly opened up a Swiss Army knife and cut into my face.

The only words exchanged were “Gimme your wallet” after I was knocked down the first time, and “Okay, you can have it” after the knife cut. Had I said that 10 seconds sooner, he probably never would have cut me – he was all business. I just couldn’t believe he would do it.

32

Not surprisingly, I have an 18 or so inch scar running the length of my spine from my surgery, as well as a curved scar (about 4 inches) on my left butt cheek from the bone harvest they took for same surgery.

The interesting part is that they did the surgery to straighten my spine, and my doctor was meticulous about making sure that after the sugery was done and I was put back together, the scar would run completely straight. He did a great job and in the summer it’s hardly noticeable (so I think, anyway).

My ass scar is ugly and I’ve considered having it turned into a tatto of something. I may take a photo and have my friend JoAnn make something out of it (she’s an artisit).

Other then a scar on my knee from falling during a track meet, I am unscathed, as far as I can recall.

Zette

33

I’ve got tons. I’ve got two scars on my eyebrow from the healed piercings that used to be there. I’ve got a thin one down my right cheek you can only see when I tan, from back when I was into self-abuse and gave my face a good raking with my nails one day. I have a weird scar on the top of my head from falling down the stairs when I was a little kid – it runs at a forty-five degree angle to the natural part of my hair, so I have an inch-long mini-part where the scar is if I let my hair fall naturally. I scratched my left forearm a year or so ago, and for whatever reason it’s left a fairly significant scar (even though there wasn’t much bleeding, or stitches, or anything), pointing right to the scar left by the mosquito bite I couldn’t stop picking at when I was a kid. For some reason, the scar from burning myself on the stove on my other forearm isn’t nearly as visible. My upper arms are pocked with a multitude of acne scars, which probably wouldn’t be there if I’d stop picking them. I have a big dent in the middle of my forehead that my mother theorises is from hitting my head on the corner of a table when I was a kid, but I have my doubts.

But my best and biggest scar is the three-by-two inch one that kinda looks like a varicose vein, on the inside of my left calf. It’s from the Club Med in St. Lucia, when I was 12 or so. This particular Club Med is rather famous for the circus it puts on with the kids enrolled in the babysitting-type program that Club Med does. For one of the circus tricks, the head of the whole shebang was going to drive a bicycle loaded with as many of us kids as would fit on it. He declared that I needed to ride over the back wheel, with one foot on either side of the specially elongated axle. I didn’t want to do it. The guy was an asshole, frankly, and insisted. So I climbed on, finding it very difficult to keep my bare legs from slipping and touching the bike’s wheel. Of course, that’s exactly what happened, and the rubber of the wheel skinned a nice chunk off of my leg. The guy continued to be an asshole, passing me in to the tender loving care of some random bystander while he continued to work on his trick. Needless to say, I wasn’t in the circus at all. And to this day I carry this huge-ass scar on my leg. Mleh.

34

I have a scar just above my left ear and cheek. I got it when I was 18 months old, so of course I don’t remember getting it, but here’s the rough story:

My mother had just gotten home from grocery shopping. She was carrying in the groceries and had left the car door open while she did so. I was hanging out in the driveway. The car shifted out of gear and started rolling down the driveway towards the street. The door hit me and I grabbed it and held out, thus being dragged alongside the car. I’ve been told I did not scream or cry, just held on, but my older sister, who was in a swing in the front yard, screamed enough for the both of us.

35

Nothing too unusual for me. Least nothing visible. Firstly the boring ones from “surgery”. A few years ago I had a couple weird skin growths of my neck, inner elbow, and bellybutton. There’s 2 little scars on my inner elbow and in my bellybutton. Nothing big. I think thats all my surgery.

There’s the 2 inch scar on my sole. Stepping on broken tile isn’t wise. It bled. Alot. My mom freaked. Don’t you love motherly love? Probably needed stiches. Nah, course no, mom will make it better with tape and cotton bandage. I’ll just limp for 2 months til it heals.

I’ve got all sorts of them on my knees. Most recent lesson: Don’t luge on a big hill that has lots of little rocks with your skateboard. In Shorts.

And even more on my hands. Bagel Knife. Boy thats sharp. And the bones pretty hard. Just a band-aid. Though it was bone deep and bled alot. Though the bones not too deep where I cut it.
I’m probably gonna have a nice one on my palm when the skin grows back. Curbs and bad angle on bike. Crash. “Ow…shit…”
The usual ones with no idea where they came from.

36

The downright stupid scar :

I fell head-first into a fish pond at a friends house and cut my chin open to the bone. Scar has since shrunk to a small finger-width line on the right-hand side of my chin.

The hyperactive child scar :

My brother chased me head-first into an old-style bed (with the cast iron frames). I have a short scar just below my hairline, that’s healed well. I have no idea how I hit my head, whether i tripped and hit it, or why I was running full burst into a wall (if I’d missed the bed).

The caused by a sibling scar :

My brother threw a knife-edge spatula at me. Hit me just above the knee, and bled everywhere. Cut quite deep, and we had to clean blood off everything before mum came home :slight_smile: I did deserve it, since I was being a completely obnoxious little sister, but my brother was so worried about the amount of blood that he was begging me not to tell mum. I got to hold that one over him for awhile :stuck_out_tongue:

The big one :

I was in a car accident when I as 7. You know the fuzzy black stuff that sticks out where the glass disappears when you wind the car window down ? Yeah, well there’s a bar of metal in there, and it snapped and went through my cheek, into my mouth. The surgeon lost count at 150 stitches, putting my face back together. At the time, if went from my left eye, all the way down to my jawline, and from side-to-side, just missing my lips. Four operations later, I don’t look quite as freaky, and the scar has been pulled into a gash or line, rather than a sprawl of burn-look-alike, and it covers about a third of the area it originally did. I’m thinking of laser to finish the job, one day, but that’ll be when I win the lottery :stuck_out_tongue:

37

When I was 3 I was at the beach and stepped on a broken piece of glass. I remember bleeding, it was one of my earliest memories. My mommy held me until I stopped crying and my daddy put a bandage on it. My brother teased me and called me “Crip” the next day when it hurt me to walk. I still have this cute little white mark on my right big toe. It’s just a white mark about a half inch long, I don’t know if you could really call it a “scar”.

Brigit Maguire

38

Once when I was five years old I punched a window. Now I have a five inch scar on my right wrist.

39

Once when I was five years old I punched a window. Now I have a five inch scar on my right wrist.

40

When I was in track, I was running out to the track after getting dressed. I accidentally ran to close to the gate and a bolt caught me on the elbow. The scar looks like a comet. Not my biggest scar, but I don’t feel like typing anymore.