Age 19, 2-3 stitches in my left thigh following the removal of some sort of subcutaneous lump.
Age 20-something, 2-3 stitches in my scalp following the removal of another sort of subcutaneous lump.
Age 12 or so, 7-10 stitches in my lower lip following the crashing of a moped through a chain-link fence.
I almost severed a finger in a lawn mower when I was about 5 but I can’t remember if I had stitches. I suppose there would’ve had to have been, right?
I had surgery with incisions at the throat and the chest wall about ten years ago but I can’t remember if those were closed with stitches or staples. I do recall that I had two rods embedded in my chest and having them pulled out of me was horrifying.
When I was 4 I stick my hand through a glass door and ended up with about 40 stitches in my left wrist. I still have an obvious scar - it looks like I tried to commit suicide.
A few more here and there from minor surgeries…tonsils, wisdom teeth, gall bladder (laprascopic, so not very many there.)
An unknown bunch after first childbirth (the number isn’t important, my Dr. told me as she worked.) Only 4 after my second.
My husband has them all the time. For relatively minor injuries here and there. He just got one out last week (one stitch. Heh. I teased him a little about that one.) He has never gotten very many stitches at once, but I swear he needs stitches several times a year.
I must have been only 4 or 5. My uncles used to run a landscaping business, and had the rigs for snow plows on the front of their trucks (sans plow, as this was summer). My older cousin was playing with me and my brother by hiding our action figures around the yard; one happened to be just under the front of one of the trucks. Do you see where this is going?
I bent down, picked up the figure, and stood right back up fast, to say “Hey, I found one!” only to smash my forehead into the corner of said rig. My parent’s wouldn’t let me look at the wound in the mirror (damn them!) but I was told I had a flap of skin peeled back from the bone. Very small wound, but deep enough. It, to this day, remains the only scar that has never faded.
The only stitches I had were those when I was a weebaby and the doctors had to go in to operate surgically on the dislocated hip I was born with. While you’d never know unless I told you, my hip still clicks occasionally when I shift in certain ways.
I don’t have a lot of stitches, but I do have a disgusting story.
I had a birthmark on my leg removed, then the stitches removed a couple of weeks after that. Naturally the first thing I did was to have a shower (finally!). As I got out of the shower, I took a look down at my leg- just in time to see the gash split open like a ripe fruit. Seeing a hole open up on your body is scary.
Tons o’ scars, but only 8 stitches, one occasion. First grade, monkey bars. Those bastards wouldn’t let me look in the mirror so I could see my jawbone in its natural state.
What makes it cool is that Mom has the EXACT same scar on her chin; same place, same # of stitches. Got it at the same age, too.
The only stitches I can remember ever getting were for my gums when I got my wisdom teeth removed. I’ve never had a skin injury severe enough to stitch. Never broken a bone either. I had some sort of urethra surgery when I was in first grade, but I don’t remember there being stitches or having stitched taken out.
I had the dreaded gum surgery and had stitches between every tooth in my mouth. That wasn’t fun. Think of having a piece of pot roast stuck between each of your teeth for 10 days. Nope! Not pleasant.
My surgeon used dissolving stitches when I had my wisdom teeth removed, but I ended up coming back a week after surgery to have them removed anyway. The worst part about it was that he didn’t untie all the knots in one of the stitches and I felt the tugging sensation of it being pulled out. Too weird. At least I didn’t have to eat them.
Other than that, I may have had stitches when I had eye surgery as a small child or when I cut the webbing between my thumb and forefinger as an overexcited trick-or-treater on a sugar rush, but I don’t recall what it was like.
Oooh, I remember those from my surgery. Everytime I swallowed I could feel them loose and stringy and wispy in my mouth, it was one of the most physically creepy things I’ve ever had happen to me.
Only two wisdom teeth needed stitches. They must have been the dissolving kind - I don’t remember any creepiness or problems as they went. Mind you, I was on research trips in the southern Pacific (not the nice South Pacific, the stormy, wintry southern end, just before it turns into the antarctic.) I may well have vomited them out rather than swallowing them.
Childbirth - they didn’t dissolve and had to be cut out. Waaa-ay TMI as the idiot doctor had knotted them wrong and they tore whenever I had to crap. Yay.
Thirteen stitches (unlucky for some) in my arm when I was trimming a tree and leant too far over the uncapped corrugated iron fence. 10cm scar on my left arm where I was hanging from the fence until my weight pulled me free. I also got crush injuries on the other arm (protected by my Tshirt sleeve) and a small scrape on my chin where I just missed slitting my throat.
I’d done some butchery and had the surreal experience of looking inside my arm and calmly assessing the injury (Incision of the dermal and adipose tissue. Intramuscular sheath intact.) before gathering up the half circle of hanging skin, smooching it back into place and going to find a neighbour to call the ambulance.
At 20 years old - I had 18 stitches in my scalp when some friends dared me to drink 3 shots of tequila one right after the other and tried to walk down some cement stairs.
At 35 years old - 5 stitches in my left hand from trying to carve a pumpkin. It felt like the knife got stuck on something so I gave it that extra umpf. Bad idea.
At 18 I had my wisdom teeth pulled, but I don’t remember the stitches. There was a drain, but I don’t remember it being pulled out. They gave me some great medication though.
I have no idea how many total. Lots and lots. So many that I’d never even think about going back to have them removed anymore, I just snip them with small cuticle scissors and pull them out myself with tweezers.
Last round was 15 I think, putting my hand through a plate glass window. Ouch.
Dislocated my foot and broke my leg in a shipboard fall. Took about 20 hours to get to a hospital in Anchorage. No big deal. Not much pain. But they used about 40 staples to sew up after surgery. All was well until we got back to Seattle a couple of days after I was supposed to have the staples removed. The skin had grown over the staples.
Went to a local clinic where Brunhilde was waiting for me with a giant needle nosed pliers and a smirk. Worst pain I have ever experienced.
Yank – YOW! – Clink as she jerked out each one and threw it in a stainless steel bowl.
At one point she said ‘That’s twenty’. I wasn’t counting. I was too busy trying to put a permanent crimp on the gurney rail and trying to work up a fart.
When your lying face down and someone grabs a leg, you can’t kick them with the other leg. The only thing you can do is to try to rip one off, but then every muscle in your body is clenched up from the pain.
I walked out telling myself ‘at least you didn’t cry’. Cry hell, I was lucky I didn’t wet my pants! For years, the very thought of a large woman with a pair of needle nosed pliers would make me break out in a cold sweat.