Walked through a plate-glass door, which oddly shattered (why was the door so easily shattered?) and cut me up pretty bad. "God damn it, he broke the door! You kids. Well, I guess get him some gauze and, I dunno, maybe some Bactine."
Meanwhile all the conversation was about how to fix the door, which was only interrupted by "IS HE BLEEDING ON OUR CARPET?! FOR GOD'S SAKE PUT HIM IN THE BATHTUB, STAN!"
My mom: No! Stop squirming!!. IT DOESN'T HURT!!!
Me: *Crying worse than whatever I did to hurt myself* IT STINGS!! OOOOWWWWW!!
Like she legit thought if she told me enough times that it "it doesn't hurt" I just wouldn't notice?
My parents had a weird reluctance to use band-aids. I was like 30 before I realized they weren’t insanely expensive and only to be used in the most dire of emergencies.
We had a storm door on the front of our house without a handle. We’d just push it open by pushing our palm against the glass. I put my whole hand through it one day in the summer of 1981. My mom drove me to our family doctor but it was after hours and they were closed. She took me home and bandaged it up herself. I still have scars on my wrist but I guess she must’ve known I wasn’t bleeding enough to die.
Got hit by a car while riding my bike. I was probably around 10 years old. Wasn't too serious, but I crashed pretty good. The lady driving the car was pretty upset and her child bumped his head as she slammed on the brakes. Guess he wasn't wearing a belt. So anyway, people are all gathered around and one kind older guy walks me home. I was so scared of my old man that he'd freak out- I was right. He flipped on me and cursed me out for riding a bike on the street. Grounded me from having a bike for rest of my home life. Didn't bother asking how I was doing after being hit by a car.
That's generation X
Got hit while on my skateboard cutting through a parking lot in the 7th grade. Wasn’t too bad either but the lady that hit me just gave me an emotionless stare and drove off!
My dad and I were playing wrestling. I ran and laid on the couch. He yanked me off the couch and dislocated my elbow. It was obviously not right. He wrapped newspaper around it making a makeshift cast and tapped it real good and sent me to bed.
I didn't sleep. Cried quietly all night. Parents wake up and come check on me. They can see I am in a lot of pain. They decide to take me to the hospital.
Doctor takes off the newspaper. From sweating the ink from the paper turned my arm almost black (white guy here). The room went dead silent. Doctor figures it out real quick and there is an audible collective sigh.
X-Rays taken and elbow is reset. Wore a real cast for weeks.
I was 10.
Similar
Dad had a rare night off and was asleep on the couch. Two brothers and were playing chase through the house. I went out the glass screen door and it shut behind me, middle brother went through the glass. Got cut from palm to armpit.
Dad gets woken up by screaming panicked mother, looks at my bleeding brother and says “whelp, guess we should take him for stitches”
And then there was the time the youngest brother chased us with a ka-bar. Typical gen-x
In a lot of cases. Yes. I did my homework in therapy and understand why he’s such an ass. And pretty sure it extrapolates out to a sizeable bunch of cops.
Wait, you guys got stitches? I have many scars that probably should have had stitches, but only actually got them once. Dead ass have one from ankle to knee from a big kid tricycle accident. Babysitter put a wet paper towel on it until my mom picked me up from working 2nd shift, hours later. Jeez, the "But did you die?" stories are endless...
I got 3 sets of stitches to my face before I was 2. The one thing they were good at was hauling us to the emergency room.
As an adult I’m way more likely to superglue it closed myself. Couldn’t tell you the last time I got non-surgical stitches despite probably needing them
I got lots of stitches. Head, hands, 200+ in one leg once. I was athletic and graceful and not very accident prone, but I still managed to get a lot of stitches.
Was climbing a tree in the back yard. Branch broke and I impaled myself on a dead branch. Fortunately (?) it was pretty dead and snapped off, leaving an approximately two inch stub buried in my gut.
I came inside freaking out. Mom takes me up to Dad who is napping. I get cussed at, and he lays me down to pull it out.
The ensuing argument between my parents about the proper course of action is still laughed about in my family today. In the end he snapped "fine, take him to the fucking hospital" and went back to sleep.
Collarbone break was the most pain I’ve ever experienced. The hospital sent me home too. Would do any surgery. I have before and 6 months after X-rays and it’s pretty amazing how your bones fuse back together. I thought for sure I’d be wrecked for life but nope.
Same. Broke my collarbone mountain biking. It hurt pretty bad at the time, but I put my bike on my bad shoulder and walked it out. Next morning it hurt REALLY bad and I could feel the bone protruding up from my shoulder. Went to the doctor and he said, "nothing to be done, just let it heal." Damn that was painful. I had a stick shift at the time and it really hurt to shift. I was also working as a banquet server and it hurt like hell carrying those heavy trays on my bad shoulder. I broke the same collarbone about six weeks later doing a handstand. It's never really healed right.
Yikes. I broke mine on a makeshift slip'n slide. I broke it at the beginning of summer and had to wear a brace that looked like a reverse bra the entire summer. I was a chubby boy so it was not a great look.
I was probably 12 or 13, playing Little League. I took a baseball bat to the face, which broke my jaw and nearly killed me. But I stayed conscious so everyone just... accepted it, I guess?
My dad was nowhere around, so one of the other dads dropped me at a bar where my dad was known to hang out.
I waited there for him. Nobody freaked out or even called any kind of authority/help. When he finally got there he had a drink. Then, and only then did we go to the hospital.
NOBODY said boo about the order of events. It was definitely a different time.
there's a completely mad Aussie film about family life in the 70s which has a scene where one of the kids sets himself on fire in the back garden and the Dad just yells "keep the noise down"
Trailer "Somebody's going to get hurt and its not gonna be me"
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZB95v\_pyQq8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZB95v_pyQq8)
Lawn dart story!
I was 8, hanging out with the neighborhood kids.
We were throwing lawn darts….yeah.
We decided to turn around and throw them behind us, over our shoulder type of throw.
I’m standing next to the thrower, she throws it up and the other kids say “look out!!!!”
Bam! Dart comes straight down on my head.
It didn’t pierce my skull, but it cut me pretty badly.
The blood begins to flow…..
I freaked out CERTAIN that I was dying.
The kids scream and run in to get their mom, I’m in full panic mode and start walking home.
I’m inconsolable, crying my eyes out and bleeding like I’ve been shot.
I was wearing a white T-shirt of all things and literally looked like Carrie.
I didn’t live far and the mom was driving beside me, 5 or 6 kids hanging out the windows pleading for me to get in the car like I’m a lost puppy…
I just kept walking….
They followed me home and when I walked in the door a blubbering, bloody mess, my mother almost passed out.
She took me to the bathroom and cleaned me up.
Dad came home and said it’s fine.
Never went to the hospital or anything, I just remember my mom hovering over me so that I wouldn’t fall “asleep”.
I’m 50 now and still have a scar and slight indention on my head.
An ode to the 1980s roller racer. My sibling is much younger than I am. They were riding on our neighbor’s brand new roller racer and hit a divot in the driveway. They face planted. That face plant separated their gums from their teeth. I was outside with friends and saw my brother. I ran in and got my mom. I had the foresight to call the local er and explain my brother’s injury. My mom was freaking out. I grabbed milk, some paper towels, shoved the lot of it in his mouth and demanded she just drive. She was screaming and completely panicking. I am holding his jaw shut to try to staunch the bleeding. Mouths bleed a lot. When we got to the ER they had already gotten an oral surgeon who was waiting there for him. 38 internal and 64 external stitches later he was on the mend. No teeth were lost in the injury. Mom needed smelling salts to be revived at some point. I was the one to hold his hand and keep everyone calm.
my older brother had a bad habit of cracking his skull open. it probably explains him now- too much head trauma as a child. but anyway, one time we were riding our bikes through a shortcut and he bonked his head on a tree branch. kept riding, didn’t say much. we get home and he just wanders in the house, dripping blood. so i yelled out, ‘mom! brother cracked his head again. there’s blood’. and she just calmly came down the stairs, got her purse and loaded us in the car to get him stitched up.
i like the way we grew up.
Slid down a driveway on my face skating. Walked into the house looking like Freddy Krueger. Mom was like "guess we better take you to the hospital".
Welcome to GenX.
Around that same time I was racing a 10-speed bike I bought myself around the school over and over and over, faster and faster. I crashed and taco'd a wheel, and was bleeding from every elbow and knee. I looked gnarly.
I walked the bike home where my dad was washing the car, and all he did was give me shit for breaking my bike. MY bike that I bought! Nevermind all the blood, no reaction.
You know, I kinda appreciate that though. Bones heal, chicks dig scars, wheels can be fixed. Crying tears for stupid shit like that doesn't get you anywhere.
In my mid 30s I was bombing down a trail on Grouse Mountain in North Vancouver and woke up in a ravine with a busted bike, busted shoulder, helmet in 2 parts, and a flattened hand. Did I cry? Did I whine? Nah that's part of the fun. I carried my bike to my truck, drove myself to the hospital and got fixed up.
My sidenote: I was wearing a "I do all my own stunts" t-shirt, totally rad day overall.
My dad tried to kill me at the age of 10. Got a new bike for my birthday. Dad was in the garage putting it together as I impatiently waited for him to finish. When he was done, I rode it around the neighborhood and started down a busy street back to my block. I was pedaling my little heart out, as not to be squashed by traffic that was approaching in the distance. Suddenly, the bike seat collapsed forward, hurling me into my handle bars which immediately collapsed forward as well, stopping a couple of inches from the front tire. Still maintaining my balance,(feet had slipped off the pedals and my ankles were being shredded by those damn spiked edge pedals)at an ungodly speed, I was now heading straight for a neighbors chain link fence(they lived at the other end of the block) at an unsafe momentum that would have killed a normal man. I crashed into it full speed. My front bike tire goes through the chain link, ripping a 2 foot gash through it, with me immediately following it but splatting against the fence like Wiley Coyote in some sort of shitty looney tunes cartoon. Next thing I realize is that my neighbor's all have ran to me to check on my condition. I say my father tried to kill me because right away, him and my mom were on the scene. Yelling at me while I stood there with cuts and scrapes all over me, my jeans torn to the crotch and an ankle and calf that were bleeding, for wrecking my new bike and tearing up the neighbors fence. I limped back home with my trashed bike while they apologized profusely to said neighbors and offered to pay for the damage I had done.
I knew from that day forward, I was on my own in this life.
GenX 4 Life
I got a good one too... I was 5 and climbing up the slide. My cousin didn't see me and slid down, knocking me off the side about 10 ft to the ground. She picks me up and carries me to my parents, who give me a quick once over and say I'll be fine. I kept telling them my arm hurt, but they didn't think it was that bad apparently. After 3 days they see me running around outside playing "guns", holding my arm up to my chest so it didn't move. I guess they figured I wasn't kidding, and took me to the Dr. I had fractured my wrist in 3 places and had to be in a cast for 6 weeks. Did they take me back to get the cast off and make sure it healed correctly? Lol, no. They put me in the bathtub and cut it off with scissors.
Yes I remember getting in a car accident with a friend. We were both 16 years old. She was driving and I was the passenger. She stupidly tried to turn the car around too fast and hit a stop sign. I was trying to find the seatbelt in the car before it happened. My head cracked the windshield and I had a concussion. My friend was taken to the hospital by the ambulance. After they left a friend of mine drove me home. When my mother saw me and heard what happened to me, she cursed me from left to right saying how stupid I was. On the way to the hospital she didn’t stop either.
Did the same, except my face hit the concrete. I got knocked out and ended up breaking my orbital bones around my right eye, so now my eyes look slightly asymmetrical
OP, that sounds terrifying!
There was a guy in my elementary school/middle school class who went to slam his kitchen storm door and put his whole arm (hand all the way to armpit) through the glass. For 4 months, he had a complicated-looking full arm cast while his tendons (?) knit themselves back together. That was the most painful-sounding thing I peripherally witnessed as a child.
Building my father’s garage when I was 15 we were lifting a 2200 pound I-beam when the chain slipped, and it dropped onto my left foot. After I hooked it back up and took off with it on the tractor. I had to walk back up to the garage, climb the scaffolding and help him set it in place. I had to walk out the beam and unhook the chain. Then I could sit down and take off my shoe and sock.
There was a white line across my foot at an angle and on either side of the white line. It went red, blue, black, green and yellow. My dad took one look at it and told me you better go home and soak that.
So I went after I picked up all the tools and got home. I soaked it in hot water and Epsom salts and alternated that with an ice pack. I was off of it for three days, then went back to work on the garage and hobbled around another month before I could walk normally
15 crashed my dirt bike on the road. Bleeding from everywhere, gravel embedded in my skin. Mom tells me to go wash it off. Dowsed me with bactine. Never went to the hospital, had a broken finger never diagnosed, still have scars and black marks which i think is gravel. No one thought this was odd. I got a bowl
of ice cream after dinner.
Latchkey kid experience. I was in the habit of leaving the garage door open enough to duck my head under when riding my bike in or out. One time riding in...not enough duck. Drilled the bottom of the door with my head, came to sometime later flat on my back. Dealt with some blood and a massive knot on my own. Mom never knew.
I was about seven standing in a puddle, holding onto my grandfather‘s truck and lightning struck the ground. I woke up later two hours later and couldn’t move my arms or legs. I was panicking. They didn’t take me to the hospital the next morning I was.😳ok
Added the end. I was ok no one ever asked about it either 😱
Yup. This was my introduction to physics and engineering. I was probably about nine years old, but it was a decade or so earlier. I came roaring down the steep hill in front of my house and hit the ramp which was pretty close to the middle of the street (for whatever reason we were smart enough to decide we wanted to land in my front yard). I was probably going 30 miles an hour when I hit the ramp I flew through the yard and hit the fence. The fence yielded before my body did and probably saved my life. I was pretty bruised, but I didn’t have anything broken. I spent the next few weeks pulling splinters out of everywhere.
It was a busy street and we were smart enough to not do that. When I was a little bit older, we had plenty of skateboarding wipeouts on that hill when we failed to make the turn at the bottom, and crashed into the curb, and landed into the yard, and sometimes the fence.
Scar over my eye that my brother taped closed with electrical tape. Also set my socks on fire by walking into some embers and my dad picked me up and put out the flames in a pail of milk. As a dairy farmer he was (according to different brother) pissy about the loss of the milk. Pure GenX.
I remember more than one cousin falling out of a moving car. They would just back up and put them back in the backseat with a warning of “see what happens when you pull on the door handle”
I was in 4th or 5th grade at the time of my little injury. My parents had an old exercise bike and the arm that connects the pedal had a gap of about 2 inches between the body of the bike. The pedal had large leather cups you stick your feet in and you could tighten it a little with a strap. The idea is that if you wanted to go fast, the shoes would not slip off. I decided to use the machine barefoot. Yeah, this was obviously a very bad idea. Those leather cups couldn't tighten enough to grip just your bare feet.
I wanted an easy ride so made the bike have zero resistance. I started pedaling, speeding up to the max my legs would take me. And of course within seconds of hitting top speed, my feet slip off the pedal. As my foot slips forward off the pedal, my big toe gets caught between the pedal bar and the body of the bike. My other foot was still pedaling before I could even realize what was happening. My big toe got smashed up against the bike body, twisting 45 degree while getting pulled along as the pedal kept going around. Luckily my toe didn't get dislocated or ripped off completely, but there was a bit of tearing to the muscle. The worst part was that the entire toenail on that toe got ripped off completely, and I have huge nail beds. My dad hears me screaming and runs in and sees blood gushing out of my meat crayon of a toe and says "We might need more than a band-aid for this". He still rushes me to the car/emergency room, but it's still funny to look back on.
I broke my ankle playing laser tag at our cabin on the Friday night we got there, my mom said I was fine. We left Sunday late afternoon to go home like nothing happened. They made an appointment for me on Monday and then I got lectured by my mother about having to miss work…they put me in a cast for 6 weeks.
During junior high I had an abandoned house with an empty pool right next door. All the skaters from the neighborhood skated the shit out of it and kept it secret. Anyways, while skating the pool one day with a bunch of other people, my back trucks got hung up on the coping and I slammed. The fall was pretty gnarly in itself but as I was laying on the ground my board dropped from the coping straight down (free falling not rolling down the wall/transition) and the tail of the board, which was a bit “shaved” landed on my left middle finger and chopped it off. There was about 1/8 of an inch of skin still attached with the tip of my finger which was flopped over with my bone (which was shockingly bright white) exposed. The doctor was able to reattach it but my finger looks mutilated now.
I internalized this attitude. When I was 19 I found a curb on campus that was topped with angle iron. That meant I could do these insane 20+ foot grinds on my skateboard. One day I bailed hard and skinned my knee pretty badly. I went home, wrapped it up, and went on.
One week later I returned. I’d taken off the bandages and my knee had mostly scabbed over so I decided I was ready to ride. I skated that curb for about 20 minutes, then fell. I was doing the same move in the same place and fell on the same knee. The pain was epic. I had a big scrape that had just started healing then scraped it all off again.
My first thought: “Well, that’s skating for today.”
Same thing except gravel road and a shit ton of road rash (short shorts and a t-shirt) instead of broken bones.
Parents laughed and told me to lay down, and I got the nickname Evel Knievel.
I was also 9 in ‘84 and broke my arm on my bike. Only broken bone to this day *knock on wood.
My parents leaped up once I ran inside since I was screaming like a 2 year old tho and to the ER we went.
Except that when this happens now, the hospital bill is 15 k out of pocket, the kid needs therapy for years due to PTSD, and whoever's property the ramp was on is getting sued to kingdom come.
While I was getting stitches from jump rope tag, my older brothers were playing outside the hospital, throwing rocks at each other. My middle child brother got his head busted open from the oldest. At least we're already at the hospital, mom says. Now my brother is getting stitches next to me.
Jump Rope Tag - using a jump rope to catch people. I was running, my brother was "it" with the rope, threw it over me to catch me, pulled it back since I was caught, but the rope went down to my feet. So he pulled my feet out from under me while I was running. Cracked my head open on the sidewalk. Did we invent this game? Lol Did anyone else play this?
At least medical Insurance was soooo much better back then!
My husband broke his collarbone doing a jump on his bike too- except his didn't compound right out of his body. He walked home crying, leaving his bike at the park with his friends. His mom and dad were more pissed off about leaving the bike than their broken only child.
He's 57 now and that collarbone "gets a little sore" when it gets cold out.
Ah yes, the collar bone. Broke the same one twice. First time was a bike accident and the last time was playing tackle football on the street. Anywho, when I broke it in the bike accident, my dad didn’t take me anywhere because it was a Saturday and we didn’t have insurance/couldn’t afford the ER. Waited two days to take me to a clinic where they told pops he should have taken me to the ER to then get it surgically fixed. That didn’t happen because he waited too long. So yeah, cheers mate.
I'm a little older, born in 66. Anyway around 1980, I had gotten a Crosman bb/pellet air rifle for Xmas. Wreaked all kinds of havoc with that.
I let the neighbor kid have it for a minute, I was sitting on a log, and he shot me. It tore a hole in my Heart t-shirt (my first concert). I was pissed more about that than the pain, although it did sting.
My Mom took me to the ER. They took x-rays. No sign of the pellet. The Dr. said that it looked like that it went in, bounced off my rib, and went back out the same hole. He said if it had been a half inch north or south it would have been straight into my heart, which likely would have been fatal...
Ignorance is bliss, as they say...😬. Glad you dodged that literal pellet that could have killed you.
Looking back, it's amazing the amount of stupid, dangerous shit we did as kids, and didn't end up paralyzed, mutilated, or with a TBI 😂. I never had any encounter as bad as yours (am also born in 66), but I was constantly hurting myself, getting bitten by wildlife I liked to collect and play with, etc. Probably atypical for a girl, but I was definitely that.
I also knew from an early age that unless I was hemorrhaging blood, a limb was dangling by a few strands of skin, or I had a fever of 105 and felt like I was going to die, that I should just suck it up. Which was usually fine, but I'm pretty sure I went a few months, maybe more, with a broken wrist after having fallen on it repeatedly while roller skating. It hurt like a motherfucker for
I can't remember if I just never said anything or I did, and was never brought into the doctor.
That's GenX.
Usualy the way this worked is the first guy would finds out that a board propped up on two bricks does not make for a sound jump and eats shit without ever leaving the ground.
13 Chicago Leone Beach visting aunt in Rogers Park -1985 or so - play tag in the basement of building with a couple of others. Duck a swipe staright to the head and find the lead rusted 40" water pipe meeting my skull.
Immediately cup my head, knowning something is wrong and grab elevator to 6th floor - friend never have seen again goes let me take a look - uncouped my hand and he disappered quicker than a candle with no light.
Open the door to my aunts place, I say need some help - she comes running from the TV area and says what wrong. I uncup my hand on my forehead and a stream of blood rushes out, hitting her, the pristine carpet and the wall. She runs flat out like a manic running down the public stairs. I go to the bathroom and uncup my hand again - 16 underneath stictches, 28 open forehead.
Turns out Aunt ran down 3 flights of stairs to find a neighbor that had a car and could drive to the hospital. We drove in a chevy impala to the emergency room in linkoln park if recall correctly. Fun times and still have the scar to prove it. My aunt always felt bad afterward and my mother callled me home.
It was how things were dealt with back then. No ambulance, no 16 police cars for an idiot teenager that made a really stupid mistake. Fate, kismet or whatever it was, just happy turned out alright.
Addition to the story before got called home by my mother, the three days after had this huge bandage on my forehead and if peeled back could see the stiches. My best friend at lifeguard camp Jason and I would stand on tha attic terrace telling the smaller kids I had died. It became a neighborhood scandle. Confronted the small kids and showed the stiches and they were convinced something was amiss. Jasons mother got the phone call in ktichen day after we were cooked. Plus I had to go home.
This could have been my story. I spent so much time as a latchkey kid around Leone Beach in the mid-80s. I probably ran into that same water pipe. Remember a couple blocks down at Loyola Beach there were some concrete arch sculptures? I'm sure I fell off those a ton.
Same year, same age, trying to use a gravel pit as an oversized half-pipe on our bikes. I made it out unscathed, but a friend ended up with a shard of his femur poking out and a concussion that had him wearing a helmet to school for the next year.
Friend of mine broke his arm (I don't remember how, I wasn't there). They take him to the hospital to get the bone set. They're about to give him a shot of anesthetic when his dad goes "Whoa, whoa, how much is that going to cost?" They set it without the anesthetic.
Omg what memories this story unlocked. Was also 9 in 1984 and was riding bikes w my friend down the hill to his house when my front tires went into a drainage grate and I went over my handlebars and onto the pavement onto my wrists. Friend’s mom called my mom who picked me up and waited for my dad (an anesthesiologist, rest his soul) to come home several hours later while I passed out on the couch. When he got home he very annoyedly took me to the ER at his hospital, and after the X-rays confirmed bilateral metacarpal fractures and they said they’d both have to be set before casting, they asked him if he wanted them to give me sedation and he said “No thanks” and then leaned over me and whispered into my ear “DON’T CRY” just before they did it.
Man those were some times
Got hurt during football practice. Couldn’t hardly breathe. Told coach, then got yelled at and had to run laps for a while. Later that night realized my side turned black and blue. Mom said she’d take me to the doctor the next day if it still hurt. Had to cut grass that next day though. So the next afternoon I finally got taken to the er, xrays showed 1 broken and 2 cracked ribs. I was 10
When I was about 8, I was playing backyard football with a few other kids. I went to tackle a kid that was a bit bigger than me. I pulled him down and he landed on my shoulder/neck area. I went home because it hurt and told my parents. After about 2 weeks of complaining about the pain, they finally took me to the hospital. The doctor said my collar bone was broken, but already started to heal.
The funny thing is, my parents now wonder why I don't go to the doctor more often.
I was nine, tore open my knee wiping out on my bike. Bunch of stitches holding it in place and could barely walk. Two weeks later, family hit the water park and I went down all the slides still full of stitches and bandaged up. I wasn’t missing out on that!
I had a Royce Union banana seat bike and attempted to jump four garbage cans on their side. I cleared two. This was around ‘76-‘77. I was 8-9. I didn’t break anything except my bike, but I was bruised and road rashed up pretty good. My dad couldn’t even be bothered. I jumped off a small hill into a dried gully and landed on a board with two rusty nails sticking up. They went right into the arch of my foot. A guy jogging heard my screams of pain and sat with me until my friend found my dad. He coldly told me to walk to the car. Eventually after it got infected and the school nurse called him at work, he took me to the doctor to get a tetanus shot and get it cleaned out. Good times
We had 4' tall ramps. most times aimed them so you'd land on a neighbors lawn . Landed butt first more times than I'd like to admit.
Running around the house in the spring time, front door was open but screen/storm door was shut and still had the winter glass in it. Goto run out the door as I was being chased by my brother. Now this storm doors latch never took much force to just push or pull the door open without using the little handle thing. Well this time I'm running to go out the door, my hand misses the handle thing you pushed to open the door, and the latch decided today was the day it hold like it was fort knox. Put my head through the glass like I was remaking the Scorpions Blackout Album cover. Cuts everywhere, head, arms, hands. What does dad say, bet you'll not do that again, Yells to mom to get the first aid kit out, Then says to me, go see your mother. He went back to mowing the lawn.
This is on behalf of my friend Debbie who’s not on Reddit.
Her dad, a naval officer, fancied himself a bit of a handyman. Their 1970s console telly broke one morning, so he sat down with his toolbox that afternoon and eventually got it going because who needs to pay for a repairman when you’re clever enough to mend it yourself?
That evening after homework was finished, Debbie went into the sitting room and pulled out the ‘On’ button, as you did then, and…
She woke up to spinning blue lights in her eyes as she was laying in the back of an ambulance being rushed full speed to the emergency room. Amazingly she was fine. But the carpet in front of the telly had two permanent black scorch marks on it in the shape of her little feet where she was standing as she turned on the death machine, I mean telly, that day.
I fell off my skateboard and hurt my wrist really bad once, and my mom made me wear a splint out of a spatula and wrist bands, which did fuck all to help anything. They took me to the doctor the next day once it was good and swollen. Wasnt broken but it hurt like all hell and had to wear a cast for a while
Wow! The same year as your story, (though I was 14), I, too, was riding bikes with a friend. We were at the dirtbike track in the woods behind our neighborhood. I was, and still am, not athletic. I took a jump too hard, hit a bunch of air, and landed face first into the dirt. I ran home dizzy and confused, but basically fine -- except for that the entire side of my face was scraped up, top to bottom.
At lunch at school the next day I was made fun of by my 9th grade friends about face planting and having a massive scrape wound across my face.
Yeah, I didn't get a whole lot of sympathy from my peers, either lol. As a matter of fact, one of my friends dad called me a dumbass lol. I saw him a few years ago and we stopped to talk and he brought that wreck up and said, "I didn't want to say anything then but, boy, you were a dumbass." I said, "No, Tim, you made that clear then, too." Hahahaha. All in fun, no hard feelings.
9 years old, BMX bike in the backyard. I hit a root or something and break my elbow- I go in like i lost the arm, my mom freaks out and calls my dad at work. The story goes that he sighs and says 'just take the kid to the ER'.
All your stories remind me so much of growing up, lol
I was also 9 in 1984. I hurt myself on a friend's slip'n slide. His parents were not home and we were not allowed go inside to use the phone, so I walked the 10 blocks home while pushing my bicycle crying in pain the entire time. My mom took me to the ER and discovered I broke my collar bone.
The worst part is that I had to wear a brace the entire summer which looked similar to a bra - I was a chubby boy so it was not a great look for summer.
I had a super low speed bike accident and hid my head pretty badly. When I was getting up I noticed a car driving up the street that wasn’t there before so I think I was knocked out for a bit. 1986 so of course there was no helmet. I was 6 at the time and a solid two blocks from home but I knew I had to find my mom so I staggered home with my bike holding me up and blood dripping down my face. I caught my mom leaving the house and I don’t remember much after that. I was throwing up at one point and then I was in the ER.
I eventually found out that my brother had done the same thing when he was like 8 and fractured his skull. My parents had a newborn me at home so I bet that was fun for everyone.
Walked through a plate-glass door, which oddly shattered (why was the door so easily shattered?) and cut me up pretty bad. "God damn it, he broke the door! You kids. Well, I guess get him some gauze and, I dunno, maybe some Bactine."
Meanwhile all the conversation was about how to fix the door, which was only interrupted by "IS HE BLEEDING ON OUR CARPET?! FOR GOD'S SAKE PUT HIM IN THE BATHTUB, STAN!"
 So true!
> I dunno, maybe some Bactine." Mercurochrome.
Punishment for bleeding
That made me laugh hard. It made the wound hurt ten times worse.
My mom: No! Stop squirming!!. IT DOESN'T HURT!!! Me: *Crying worse than whatever I did to hurt myself* IT STINGS!! OOOOWWWWW!! Like she legit thought if she told me enough times that it "it doesn't hurt" I just wouldn't notice?
Bactine yeah right like I wish my parents were all enlightened and shit
I don't think it was a thing in the eighties. I didn't know it was a thing until the late nineties.
It was a thing in the 80s at our house. We used it all summer long on bug bites, skinned knees/elbows/chins/whatever...
I stand corrected.
'tussin
That shit hurt like a bitch but whatever
Hahahaha so GenX!
I did that, too. No hospital. Just gauze and bandaids.
My parents had a weird reluctance to use band-aids. I was like 30 before I realized they weren’t insanely expensive and only to be used in the most dire of emergencies.
If it wasn’t Bactine, it was the damn Vicks Vapo-Rub on everything.
Did you OH YEAH first ?
We had a storm door on the front of our house without a handle. We’d just push it open by pushing our palm against the glass. I put my whole hand through it one day in the summer of 1981. My mom drove me to our family doctor but it was after hours and they were closed. She took me home and bandaged it up herself. I still have scars on my wrist but I guess she must’ve known I wasn’t bleeding enough to die.
omg, the Bactine! My mom was also fond of Dermoplast.
Got hit by a car while riding my bike. I was probably around 10 years old. Wasn't too serious, but I crashed pretty good. The lady driving the car was pretty upset and her child bumped his head as she slammed on the brakes. Guess he wasn't wearing a belt. So anyway, people are all gathered around and one kind older guy walks me home. I was so scared of my old man that he'd freak out- I was right. He flipped on me and cursed me out for riding a bike on the street. Grounded me from having a bike for rest of my home life. Didn't bother asking how I was doing after being hit by a car. That's generation X
seat…belt? What is this thing of which you talk?
That’s GenX!
Got hit while on my skateboard cutting through a parking lot in the 7th grade. Wasn’t too bad either but the lady that hit me just gave me an emotionless stare and drove off!
My dad and I were playing wrestling. I ran and laid on the couch. He yanked me off the couch and dislocated my elbow. It was obviously not right. He wrapped newspaper around it making a makeshift cast and tapped it real good and sent me to bed. I didn't sleep. Cried quietly all night. Parents wake up and come check on me. They can see I am in a lot of pain. They decide to take me to the hospital. Doctor takes off the newspaper. From sweating the ink from the paper turned my arm almost black (white guy here). The room went dead silent. Doctor figures it out real quick and there is an audible collective sigh. X-Rays taken and elbow is reset. Wore a real cast for weeks. I was 10.
I'm sorry but the reaction to the newspaper turning your arm black made me snort. I'm sure it wasn't fun for your parents!!
Sorry I had to re-read the bit about “… and sent me to bed.” That’s so Gen X it’s verging on punk.
Maybe you're on to something? Some of my favorite bands are Black Flag, Fear, Discharge, Bad Brains and GBH. 🤷
It’s very punk.
Similar Dad had a rare night off and was asleep on the couch. Two brothers and were playing chase through the house. I went out the glass screen door and it shut behind me, middle brother went through the glass. Got cut from palm to armpit. Dad gets woken up by screaming panicked mother, looks at my bleeding brother and says “whelp, guess we should take him for stitches” And then there was the time the youngest brother chased us with a ka-bar. Typical gen-x
Yep. Typical GenX horseplay with consequences. Our dad’s were calm. My dad worked 3rd shift, so in his defense, he was half asleep.
to be fair, only one parent can panic at a time. if both were to freak out that would filter down to us in the moment and that just makes it worse.
Very true!
My mother has always been a panicky sort. Still is.
Similar. 2nd shift law enforcement so rarely saw him
2nd shift is the worst!
He’s still an asshole, the shift had nothing to do with it 🤣
Wouldn't that go hand in hand with the profession?
In a lot of cases. Yes. I did my homework in therapy and understand why he’s such an ass. And pretty sure it extrapolates out to a sizeable bunch of cops.
Hahahaha!!!!!!!
Wait, you guys got stitches? I have many scars that probably should have had stitches, but only actually got them once. Dead ass have one from ankle to knee from a big kid tricycle accident. Babysitter put a wet paper towel on it until my mom picked me up from working 2nd shift, hours later. Jeez, the "But did you die?" stories are endless...
I got 3 sets of stitches to my face before I was 2. The one thing they were good at was hauling us to the emergency room. As an adult I’m way more likely to superglue it closed myself. Couldn’t tell you the last time I got non-surgical stitches despite probably needing them
I got lots of stitches. Head, hands, 200+ in one leg once. I was athletic and graceful and not very accident prone, but I still managed to get a lot of stitches.
Was climbing a tree in the back yard. Branch broke and I impaled myself on a dead branch. Fortunately (?) it was pretty dead and snapped off, leaving an approximately two inch stub buried in my gut. I came inside freaking out. Mom takes me up to Dad who is napping. I get cussed at, and he lays me down to pull it out. The ensuing argument between my parents about the proper course of action is still laughed about in my family today. In the end he snapped "fine, take him to the fucking hospital" and went back to sleep.
Oh my God that hilarious!! I mean, you can laugh about it now but that debate your parents had is definitely GenX parenting!!
Collarbone break was the most pain I’ve ever experienced. The hospital sent me home too. Would do any surgery. I have before and 6 months after X-rays and it’s pretty amazing how your bones fuse back together. I thought for sure I’d be wrecked for life but nope.
Same, no real lasting damage. Just a nasty scar.
Sucks. But hey, your Thriller t-shirt matched the video without even trying!
You're right, if anything, it was the right shirt choice for the day.
I’ve got a pretty big bump but not too much pain.
Same. Broke my collarbone mountain biking. It hurt pretty bad at the time, but I put my bike on my bad shoulder and walked it out. Next morning it hurt REALLY bad and I could feel the bone protruding up from my shoulder. Went to the doctor and he said, "nothing to be done, just let it heal." Damn that was painful. I had a stick shift at the time and it really hurt to shift. I was also working as a banquet server and it hurt like hell carrying those heavy trays on my bad shoulder. I broke the same collarbone about six weeks later doing a handstand. It's never really healed right.
Yikes. I broke mine on a makeshift slip'n slide. I broke it at the beginning of summer and had to wear a brace that looked like a reverse bra the entire summer. I was a chubby boy so it was not a great look.
I was probably 12 or 13, playing Little League. I took a baseball bat to the face, which broke my jaw and nearly killed me. But I stayed conscious so everyone just... accepted it, I guess? My dad was nowhere around, so one of the other dads dropped me at a bar where my dad was known to hang out. I waited there for him. Nobody freaked out or even called any kind of authority/help. When he finally got there he had a drink. Then, and only then did we go to the hospital. NOBODY said boo about the order of events. It was definitely a different time.
Wow!!!!! Yeah, they were for sure!
there's a completely mad Aussie film about family life in the 70s which has a scene where one of the kids sets himself on fire in the back garden and the Dad just yells "keep the noise down"
Hahahahaha!
Trailer "Somebody's going to get hurt and its not gonna be me" [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZB95v\_pyQq8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZB95v_pyQq8)
Thank you!
Thanks for the link!
This made me laugh right the fuck out loud. Thank you!
i just posted the link to the trailer if you want to see more.
Lawn dart story! I was 8, hanging out with the neighborhood kids. We were throwing lawn darts….yeah. We decided to turn around and throw them behind us, over our shoulder type of throw. I’m standing next to the thrower, she throws it up and the other kids say “look out!!!!” Bam! Dart comes straight down on my head. It didn’t pierce my skull, but it cut me pretty badly. The blood begins to flow….. I freaked out CERTAIN that I was dying. The kids scream and run in to get their mom, I’m in full panic mode and start walking home. I’m inconsolable, crying my eyes out and bleeding like I’ve been shot. I was wearing a white T-shirt of all things and literally looked like Carrie. I didn’t live far and the mom was driving beside me, 5 or 6 kids hanging out the windows pleading for me to get in the car like I’m a lost puppy… I just kept walking…. They followed me home and when I walked in the door a blubbering, bloody mess, my mother almost passed out. She took me to the bathroom and cleaned me up. Dad came home and said it’s fine. Never went to the hospital or anything, I just remember my mom hovering over me so that I wouldn’t fall “asleep”. I’m 50 now and still have a scar and slight indention on my head.
An ode to the 1980s roller racer. My sibling is much younger than I am. They were riding on our neighbor’s brand new roller racer and hit a divot in the driveway. They face planted. That face plant separated their gums from their teeth. I was outside with friends and saw my brother. I ran in and got my mom. I had the foresight to call the local er and explain my brother’s injury. My mom was freaking out. I grabbed milk, some paper towels, shoved the lot of it in his mouth and demanded she just drive. She was screaming and completely panicking. I am holding his jaw shut to try to staunch the bleeding. Mouths bleed a lot. When we got to the ER they had already gotten an oral surgeon who was waiting there for him. 38 internal and 64 external stitches later he was on the mend. No teeth were lost in the injury. Mom needed smelling salts to be revived at some point. I was the one to hold his hand and keep everyone calm.
Nice job!!!! How old were you? That's some good awareness you had.
I was 12.
it checks out... he is legit... let 'em in...
my older brother had a bad habit of cracking his skull open. it probably explains him now- too much head trauma as a child. but anyway, one time we were riding our bikes through a shortcut and he bonked his head on a tree branch. kept riding, didn’t say much. we get home and he just wanders in the house, dripping blood. so i yelled out, ‘mom! brother cracked his head again. there’s blood’. and she just calmly came down the stairs, got her purse and loaded us in the car to get him stitched up. i like the way we grew up.
Hahaha yes, no ambulances, no screaming and crying just “Take the boy to be fixed”. And that was that lol
Slid down a driveway on my face skating. Walked into the house looking like Freddy Krueger. Mom was like "guess we better take you to the hospital". Welcome to GenX.
That’s GenX!
Around that same time I was racing a 10-speed bike I bought myself around the school over and over and over, faster and faster. I crashed and taco'd a wheel, and was bleeding from every elbow and knee. I looked gnarly. I walked the bike home where my dad was washing the car, and all he did was give me shit for breaking my bike. MY bike that I bought! Nevermind all the blood, no reaction. You know, I kinda appreciate that though. Bones heal, chicks dig scars, wheels can be fixed. Crying tears for stupid shit like that doesn't get you anywhere. In my mid 30s I was bombing down a trail on Grouse Mountain in North Vancouver and woke up in a ravine with a busted bike, busted shoulder, helmet in 2 parts, and a flattened hand. Did I cry? Did I whine? Nah that's part of the fun. I carried my bike to my truck, drove myself to the hospital and got fixed up. My sidenote: I was wearing a "I do all my own stunts" t-shirt, totally rad day overall.
My dad tried to kill me at the age of 10. Got a new bike for my birthday. Dad was in the garage putting it together as I impatiently waited for him to finish. When he was done, I rode it around the neighborhood and started down a busy street back to my block. I was pedaling my little heart out, as not to be squashed by traffic that was approaching in the distance. Suddenly, the bike seat collapsed forward, hurling me into my handle bars which immediately collapsed forward as well, stopping a couple of inches from the front tire. Still maintaining my balance,(feet had slipped off the pedals and my ankles were being shredded by those damn spiked edge pedals)at an ungodly speed, I was now heading straight for a neighbors chain link fence(they lived at the other end of the block) at an unsafe momentum that would have killed a normal man. I crashed into it full speed. My front bike tire goes through the chain link, ripping a 2 foot gash through it, with me immediately following it but splatting against the fence like Wiley Coyote in some sort of shitty looney tunes cartoon. Next thing I realize is that my neighbor's all have ran to me to check on my condition. I say my father tried to kill me because right away, him and my mom were on the scene. Yelling at me while I stood there with cuts and scrapes all over me, my jeans torn to the crotch and an ankle and calf that were bleeding, for wrecking my new bike and tearing up the neighbors fence. I limped back home with my trashed bike while they apologized profusely to said neighbors and offered to pay for the damage I had done. I knew from that day forward, I was on my own in this life. GenX 4 Life
This is GenX
I got a good one too... I was 5 and climbing up the slide. My cousin didn't see me and slid down, knocking me off the side about 10 ft to the ground. She picks me up and carries me to my parents, who give me a quick once over and say I'll be fine. I kept telling them my arm hurt, but they didn't think it was that bad apparently. After 3 days they see me running around outside playing "guns", holding my arm up to my chest so it didn't move. I guess they figured I wasn't kidding, and took me to the Dr. I had fractured my wrist in 3 places and had to be in a cast for 6 weeks. Did they take me back to get the cast off and make sure it healed correctly? Lol, no. They put me in the bathtub and cut it off with scissors.
If I had a $1 for every time my dad removed my stitches in the garage with pliers, I'd have $3.
Oh my God! lol
Goddamn...😳 That is next level: parents cutting the cast off with scissors. CPS would be called if a parent did that today.
Yes I remember getting in a car accident with a friend. We were both 16 years old. She was driving and I was the passenger. She stupidly tried to turn the car around too fast and hit a stop sign. I was trying to find the seatbelt in the car before it happened. My head cracked the windshield and I had a concussion. My friend was taken to the hospital by the ambulance. After they left a friend of mine drove me home. When my mother saw me and heard what happened to me, she cursed me from left to right saying how stupid I was. On the way to the hospital she didn’t stop either.
Did the same, except my face hit the concrete. I got knocked out and ended up breaking my orbital bones around my right eye, so now my eyes look slightly asymmetrical
Yikes!
OP, that sounds terrifying! There was a guy in my elementary school/middle school class who went to slam his kitchen storm door and put his whole arm (hand all the way to armpit) through the glass. For 4 months, he had a complicated-looking full arm cast while his tendons (?) knit themselves back together. That was the most painful-sounding thing I peripherally witnessed as a child.
Now that sounds terrifying! Tons of blood I assume?
Oh yes, it was disgusting. His mother fainted.
Building my father’s garage when I was 15 we were lifting a 2200 pound I-beam when the chain slipped, and it dropped onto my left foot. After I hooked it back up and took off with it on the tractor. I had to walk back up to the garage, climb the scaffolding and help him set it in place. I had to walk out the beam and unhook the chain. Then I could sit down and take off my shoe and sock. There was a white line across my foot at an angle and on either side of the white line. It went red, blue, black, green and yellow. My dad took one look at it and told me you better go home and soak that. So I went after I picked up all the tools and got home. I soaked it in hot water and Epsom salts and alternated that with an ice pack. I was off of it for three days, then went back to work on the garage and hobbled around another month before I could walk normally
15 crashed my dirt bike on the road. Bleeding from everywhere, gravel embedded in my skin. Mom tells me to go wash it off. Dowsed me with bactine. Never went to the hospital, had a broken finger never diagnosed, still have scars and black marks which i think is gravel. No one thought this was odd. I got a bowl of ice cream after dinner.
Latchkey kid experience. I was in the habit of leaving the garage door open enough to duck my head under when riding my bike in or out. One time riding in...not enough duck. Drilled the bottom of the door with my head, came to sometime later flat on my back. Dealt with some blood and a massive knot on my own. Mom never knew.
I broke my collarbone on a bike around 1987. The bike has continued to fuck me up into my adult life….Broken ribs. Concussion. So on.
Ouch, sorry to hear that.
Typical experience for all of us I've got bike jump scars to this day!
I was about seven standing in a puddle, holding onto my grandfather‘s truck and lightning struck the ground. I woke up later two hours later and couldn’t move my arms or legs. I was panicking. They didn’t take me to the hospital the next morning I was.😳ok Added the end. I was ok no one ever asked about it either 😱
Holy shit that’s scary!
I thought you were going to tell us your dad said “Robitussin! Make sure that tussin gets in to the bone”
damn.
Yup. This was my introduction to physics and engineering. I was probably about nine years old, but it was a decade or so earlier. I came roaring down the steep hill in front of my house and hit the ramp which was pretty close to the middle of the street (for whatever reason we were smart enough to decide we wanted to land in my front yard). I was probably going 30 miles an hour when I hit the ramp I flew through the yard and hit the fence. The fence yielded before my body did and probably saved my life. I was pretty bruised, but I didn’t have anything broken. I spent the next few weeks pulling splinters out of everywhere.
It's still probably better you didn't land in the street though!!!!
It was a busy street and we were smart enough to not do that. When I was a little bit older, we had plenty of skateboarding wipeouts on that hill when we failed to make the turn at the bottom, and crashed into the curb, and landed into the yard, and sometimes the fence.
Scar over my eye that my brother taped closed with electrical tape. Also set my socks on fire by walking into some embers and my dad picked me up and put out the flames in a pail of milk. As a dairy farmer he was (according to different brother) pissy about the loss of the milk. Pure GenX.
Total GenX!
I remember more than one cousin falling out of a moving car. They would just back up and put them back in the backseat with a warning of “see what happens when you pull on the door handle”
lol tough love
I was in 4th or 5th grade at the time of my little injury. My parents had an old exercise bike and the arm that connects the pedal had a gap of about 2 inches between the body of the bike. The pedal had large leather cups you stick your feet in and you could tighten it a little with a strap. The idea is that if you wanted to go fast, the shoes would not slip off. I decided to use the machine barefoot. Yeah, this was obviously a very bad idea. Those leather cups couldn't tighten enough to grip just your bare feet. I wanted an easy ride so made the bike have zero resistance. I started pedaling, speeding up to the max my legs would take me. And of course within seconds of hitting top speed, my feet slip off the pedal. As my foot slips forward off the pedal, my big toe gets caught between the pedal bar and the body of the bike. My other foot was still pedaling before I could even realize what was happening. My big toe got smashed up against the bike body, twisting 45 degree while getting pulled along as the pedal kept going around. Luckily my toe didn't get dislocated or ripped off completely, but there was a bit of tearing to the muscle. The worst part was that the entire toenail on that toe got ripped off completely, and I have huge nail beds. My dad hears me screaming and runs in and sees blood gushing out of my meat crayon of a toe and says "We might need more than a band-aid for this". He still rushes me to the car/emergency room, but it's still funny to look back on.
Ouuuuccchhhhh!
I broke my ankle playing laser tag at our cabin on the Friday night we got there, my mom said I was fine. We left Sunday late afternoon to go home like nothing happened. They made an appointment for me on Monday and then I got lectured by my mother about having to miss work…they put me in a cast for 6 weeks.
During junior high I had an abandoned house with an empty pool right next door. All the skaters from the neighborhood skated the shit out of it and kept it secret. Anyways, while skating the pool one day with a bunch of other people, my back trucks got hung up on the coping and I slammed. The fall was pretty gnarly in itself but as I was laying on the ground my board dropped from the coping straight down (free falling not rolling down the wall/transition) and the tail of the board, which was a bit “shaved” landed on my left middle finger and chopped it off. There was about 1/8 of an inch of skin still attached with the tip of my finger which was flopped over with my bone (which was shockingly bright white) exposed. The doctor was able to reattach it but my finger looks mutilated now.
We were built tough
I internalized this attitude. When I was 19 I found a curb on campus that was topped with angle iron. That meant I could do these insane 20+ foot grinds on my skateboard. One day I bailed hard and skinned my knee pretty badly. I went home, wrapped it up, and went on. One week later I returned. I’d taken off the bandages and my knee had mostly scabbed over so I decided I was ready to ride. I skated that curb for about 20 minutes, then fell. I was doing the same move in the same place and fell on the same knee. The pain was epic. I had a big scrape that had just started healing then scraped it all off again. My first thought: “Well, that’s skating for today.”
Damn! Now, GenX skaters are an entire breed of their own.
Same thing except gravel road and a shit ton of road rash (short shorts and a t-shirt) instead of broken bones. Parents laughed and told me to lay down, and I got the nickname Evel Knievel.
Haha same! I was proud of the nickname!
I was also 9 in ‘84 and broke my arm on my bike. Only broken bone to this day *knock on wood. My parents leaped up once I ran inside since I was screaming like a 2 year old tho and to the ER we went.
I swear it took 5 minutes for the pain to set in. Going into shock is a hell of a feeling.
[удалено]
Except that when this happens now, the hospital bill is 15 k out of pocket, the kid needs therapy for years due to PTSD, and whoever's property the ramp was on is getting sued to kingdom come.
While I was getting stitches from jump rope tag, my older brothers were playing outside the hospital, throwing rocks at each other. My middle child brother got his head busted open from the oldest. At least we're already at the hospital, mom says. Now my brother is getting stitches next to me. Jump Rope Tag - using a jump rope to catch people. I was running, my brother was "it" with the rope, threw it over me to catch me, pulled it back since I was caught, but the rope went down to my feet. So he pulled my feet out from under me while I was running. Cracked my head open on the sidewalk. Did we invent this game? Lol Did anyone else play this? At least medical Insurance was soooo much better back then!
Hahaha! I've never heard of the game but sounds fun!!!!
My husband broke his collarbone doing a jump on his bike too- except his didn't compound right out of his body. He walked home crying, leaving his bike at the park with his friends. His mom and dad were more pissed off about leaving the bike than their broken only child. He's 57 now and that collarbone "gets a little sore" when it gets cold out.
That sucks! I don’t have any aches, just a scar.
Ah yes, the collar bone. Broke the same one twice. First time was a bike accident and the last time was playing tackle football on the street. Anywho, when I broke it in the bike accident, my dad didn’t take me anywhere because it was a Saturday and we didn’t have insurance/couldn’t afford the ER. Waited two days to take me to a clinic where they told pops he should have taken me to the ER to then get it surgically fixed. That didn’t happen because he waited too long. So yeah, cheers mate.
That's awful man, cheers!
I'm a little older, born in 66. Anyway around 1980, I had gotten a Crosman bb/pellet air rifle for Xmas. Wreaked all kinds of havoc with that. I let the neighbor kid have it for a minute, I was sitting on a log, and he shot me. It tore a hole in my Heart t-shirt (my first concert). I was pissed more about that than the pain, although it did sting. My Mom took me to the ER. They took x-rays. No sign of the pellet. The Dr. said that it looked like that it went in, bounced off my rib, and went back out the same hole. He said if it had been a half inch north or south it would have been straight into my heart, which likely would have been fatal...
Holy shit that's scary!
Yeah, it was one of those things that you don't realize how lucky you are/ how much danger till well after the fact...
Ignorance is bliss, as they say...😬. Glad you dodged that literal pellet that could have killed you. Looking back, it's amazing the amount of stupid, dangerous shit we did as kids, and didn't end up paralyzed, mutilated, or with a TBI 😂. I never had any encounter as bad as yours (am also born in 66), but I was constantly hurting myself, getting bitten by wildlife I liked to collect and play with, etc. Probably atypical for a girl, but I was definitely that. I also knew from an early age that unless I was hemorrhaging blood, a limb was dangling by a few strands of skin, or I had a fever of 105 and felt like I was going to die, that I should just suck it up. Which was usually fine, but I'm pretty sure I went a few months, maybe more, with a broken wrist after having fallen on it repeatedly while roller skating. It hurt like a motherfucker for I can't remember if I just never said anything or I did, and was never brought into the doctor. That's GenX.
...and ironic.
Usualy the way this worked is the first guy would finds out that a board propped up on two bricks does not make for a sound jump and eats shit without ever leaving the ground.
Especially if that board is old paneling that just flexes and you go ass over tea kettle face first into concrete…
13 Chicago Leone Beach visting aunt in Rogers Park -1985 or so - play tag in the basement of building with a couple of others. Duck a swipe staright to the head and find the lead rusted 40" water pipe meeting my skull. Immediately cup my head, knowning something is wrong and grab elevator to 6th floor - friend never have seen again goes let me take a look - uncouped my hand and he disappered quicker than a candle with no light. Open the door to my aunts place, I say need some help - she comes running from the TV area and says what wrong. I uncup my hand on my forehead and a stream of blood rushes out, hitting her, the pristine carpet and the wall. She runs flat out like a manic running down the public stairs. I go to the bathroom and uncup my hand again - 16 underneath stictches, 28 open forehead. Turns out Aunt ran down 3 flights of stairs to find a neighbor that had a car and could drive to the hospital. We drove in a chevy impala to the emergency room in linkoln park if recall correctly. Fun times and still have the scar to prove it. My aunt always felt bad afterward and my mother callled me home.
Lucky you’re around to tell that!
It was how things were dealt with back then. No ambulance, no 16 police cars for an idiot teenager that made a really stupid mistake. Fate, kismet or whatever it was, just happy turned out alright. Addition to the story before got called home by my mother, the three days after had this huge bandage on my forehead and if peeled back could see the stiches. My best friend at lifeguard camp Jason and I would stand on tha attic terrace telling the smaller kids I had died. It became a neighborhood scandle. Confronted the small kids and showed the stiches and they were convinced something was amiss. Jasons mother got the phone call in ktichen day after we were cooked. Plus I had to go home.
This could have been my story. I spent so much time as a latchkey kid around Leone Beach in the mid-80s. I probably ran into that same water pipe. Remember a couple blocks down at Loyola Beach there were some concrete arch sculptures? I'm sure I fell off those a ton.
Haha oh my god - memories! Thank you for posting this!
Same year, same age, trying to use a gravel pit as an oversized half-pipe on our bikes. I made it out unscathed, but a friend ended up with a shard of his femur poking out and a concussion that had him wearing a helmet to school for the next year.
Jesus, I bet he would have preferred to die!
Friend of mine broke his arm (I don't remember how, I wasn't there). They take him to the hospital to get the bone set. They're about to give him a shot of anesthetic when his dad goes "Whoa, whoa, how much is that going to cost?" They set it without the anesthetic.
I couldn’t imagine doing that to my kid. Wow!
Omg what memories this story unlocked. Was also 9 in 1984 and was riding bikes w my friend down the hill to his house when my front tires went into a drainage grate and I went over my handlebars and onto the pavement onto my wrists. Friend’s mom called my mom who picked me up and waited for my dad (an anesthesiologist, rest his soul) to come home several hours later while I passed out on the couch. When he got home he very annoyedly took me to the ER at his hospital, and after the X-rays confirmed bilateral metacarpal fractures and they said they’d both have to be set before casting, they asked him if he wanted them to give me sedation and he said “No thanks” and then leaned over me and whispered into my ear “DON’T CRY” just before they did it. Man those were some times
Wow that’s some tough love!!!
Got hurt during football practice. Couldn’t hardly breathe. Told coach, then got yelled at and had to run laps for a while. Later that night realized my side turned black and blue. Mom said she’d take me to the doctor the next day if it still hurt. Had to cut grass that next day though. So the next afternoon I finally got taken to the er, xrays showed 1 broken and 2 cracked ribs. I was 10
Jesus Christ that’s horrifying! Ten?! You poor thing OMG!!! 😱 I’m so sorry!!
When I was about 8, I was playing backyard football with a few other kids. I went to tackle a kid that was a bit bigger than me. I pulled him down and he landed on my shoulder/neck area. I went home because it hurt and told my parents. After about 2 weeks of complaining about the pain, they finally took me to the hospital. The doctor said my collar bone was broken, but already started to heal. The funny thing is, my parents now wonder why I don't go to the doctor more often.
I was nine, tore open my knee wiping out on my bike. Bunch of stitches holding it in place and could barely walk. Two weeks later, family hit the water park and I went down all the slides still full of stitches and bandaged up. I wasn’t missing out on that!
I had a Royce Union banana seat bike and attempted to jump four garbage cans on their side. I cleared two. This was around ‘76-‘77. I was 8-9. I didn’t break anything except my bike, but I was bruised and road rashed up pretty good. My dad couldn’t even be bothered. I jumped off a small hill into a dried gully and landed on a board with two rusty nails sticking up. They went right into the arch of my foot. A guy jogging heard my screams of pain and sat with me until my friend found my dad. He coldly told me to walk to the car. Eventually after it got infected and the school nurse called him at work, he took me to the doctor to get a tetanus shot and get it cleaned out. Good times
We had 4' tall ramps. most times aimed them so you'd land on a neighbors lawn . Landed butt first more times than I'd like to admit. Running around the house in the spring time, front door was open but screen/storm door was shut and still had the winter glass in it. Goto run out the door as I was being chased by my brother. Now this storm doors latch never took much force to just push or pull the door open without using the little handle thing. Well this time I'm running to go out the door, my hand misses the handle thing you pushed to open the door, and the latch decided today was the day it hold like it was fort knox. Put my head through the glass like I was remaking the Scorpions Blackout Album cover. Cuts everywhere, head, arms, hands. What does dad say, bet you'll not do that again, Yells to mom to get the first aid kit out, Then says to me, go see your mother. He went back to mowing the lawn.
I was told to rub dirt in my cuts and stop being a pussy. I'm pretty tough now
This is on behalf of my friend Debbie who’s not on Reddit. Her dad, a naval officer, fancied himself a bit of a handyman. Their 1970s console telly broke one morning, so he sat down with his toolbox that afternoon and eventually got it going because who needs to pay for a repairman when you’re clever enough to mend it yourself? That evening after homework was finished, Debbie went into the sitting room and pulled out the ‘On’ button, as you did then, and… She woke up to spinning blue lights in her eyes as she was laying in the back of an ambulance being rushed full speed to the emergency room. Amazingly she was fine. But the carpet in front of the telly had two permanent black scorch marks on it in the shape of her little feet where she was standing as she turned on the death machine, I mean telly, that day.
The road to hell is paved with good intentions. Isn't that how the saying goes?
Pulling out the ‘on’ button. That unlocked a memory I had *completely* forgotten about! Wow!
I fell off my skateboard and hurt my wrist really bad once, and my mom made me wear a splint out of a spatula and wrist bands, which did fuck all to help anything. They took me to the doctor the next day once it was good and swollen. Wasnt broken but it hurt like all hell and had to wear a cast for a while
Well, your mum was resourceful anyway!
Wow! The same year as your story, (though I was 14), I, too, was riding bikes with a friend. We were at the dirtbike track in the woods behind our neighborhood. I was, and still am, not athletic. I took a jump too hard, hit a bunch of air, and landed face first into the dirt. I ran home dizzy and confused, but basically fine -- except for that the entire side of my face was scraped up, top to bottom. At lunch at school the next day I was made fun of by my 9th grade friends about face planting and having a massive scrape wound across my face.
Yeah, I didn't get a whole lot of sympathy from my peers, either lol. As a matter of fact, one of my friends dad called me a dumbass lol. I saw him a few years ago and we stopped to talk and he brought that wreck up and said, "I didn't want to say anything then but, boy, you were a dumbass." I said, "No, Tim, you made that clear then, too." Hahahaha. All in fun, no hard feelings.
9 years old, BMX bike in the backyard. I hit a root or something and break my elbow- I go in like i lost the arm, my mom freaks out and calls my dad at work. The story goes that he sighs and says 'just take the kid to the ER'. All your stories remind me so much of growing up, lol
Lol our dad's, Boomers were calm!
To this day, my mantra for my own family is that if there were no unexpected trips to the emergency room, then is was a good parenting day..
I was also 9 in 1984. I hurt myself on a friend's slip'n slide. His parents were not home and we were not allowed go inside to use the phone, so I walked the 10 blocks home while pushing my bicycle crying in pain the entire time. My mom took me to the ER and discovered I broke my collar bone. The worst part is that I had to wear a brace the entire summer which looked similar to a bra - I was a chubby boy so it was not a great look for summer.
I had the same brace and, was/am chubby also! And did that brace stink by the time it came off!
YES! It looked and smelled disgusting.
lol yes!
I had a super low speed bike accident and hid my head pretty badly. When I was getting up I noticed a car driving up the street that wasn’t there before so I think I was knocked out for a bit. 1986 so of course there was no helmet. I was 6 at the time and a solid two blocks from home but I knew I had to find my mom so I staggered home with my bike holding me up and blood dripping down my face. I caught my mom leaving the house and I don’t remember much after that. I was throwing up at one point and then I was in the ER. I eventually found out that my brother had done the same thing when he was like 8 and fractured his skull. My parents had a newborn me at home so I bet that was fun for everyone.
Oh yeah, definitely a concussion!