Injuries

At this point, it goes way beyond “accident prone.” After my latest injury (assuming I snapped the muscle in my right calf,) I have come to a new conclusion. Weird stuff happens to me.

This goes way beyond clumsiness, since it is not just strange injuries, but health issues as well. The most ironic thing about it is that I am so cautious and I don’t have an adventurous/athletic bone in my body. Just watch videos of our childhood vacations for proof. Climbing on rock formations, a frightened young Ann scoots on her butt up the rocks one by one, while Meg (6 years younger) charges forward yelling back at me to hurry the heck up. I will point to those same videos for documented proof of one of my random injuries in the corn fields of Iowa where I sprained my ankle just standing around (no, you can not see the video, it’s incredibly embarrassing.) Sure, I played Field Hockey, but I sat on the bench most of the time because I was scared of the other players, and because I usually had sprained ankles.

As far as I can remember things started when I was little, when I broke my wrist falling out of a wagon – yes a wagon, the little boxes on wheels that are only 6 inches off the ground. My mom obviously thought it unlikely, too, because she didn’t take me to the hospital for three days. I also started having chronic UTI infections, yielding multiple antibiotics and trips to the hospital when I was very young. Through testing in college I would come to find that the culprit is that I have a humongous bladder and a teeny urethra, which is the perfect storm for UTI’s, fun stuff. At age 12 I had possibly the worst case of Chicken Pox in history. Seriously, my friend who also had them at the same time came over to visit and she was visibly scared of me. You couldn’t touch a place on my face where there was not a pock – I looked like and felt like an ogre. No, actually Shreck was hotter than me.

Had some stitches and I will make that short. Paul angered me so I jumped in the air, hit head on cabinet and bled all the way downstairs to find my mom. Also smashed my giant chin onto side of pool when I lifted myself up on the side to try to shoot down as quickly as possible to the bottom of the deep end. Busted chin, freaked out life guard.

In Middle School, as if braces and a self inflicted hideous perm were not enough, I also caught lice at Summer Camp. Lice that had to be cut individually out of my hair by my mom because my hair was “too fine” to catch the eggs with that little lice comb. Mom and I were up for about 4 hours one night sitting in the floor of my room, proving once again that a Mom will do just about anything for her child. This reminds me that Mom needs an extra big Mother’s day gift this year because I never properly thanked her for that 4 hours of agony she endured so that I could go back to school without bugs in my hair.

Middle School also brought the fated campout in Erin Tracey’s back yard, during which we “snuck out” to meet boys and hide from the useless Anchorage cops. Hiding from cops means that you squat in people’s bushes, bushes that contain poison ivy from which my Umbro’s provided me little defense. What does poison ivy on your butt and thighs look/feel like? You don’t even want to know. It got me out of gym for a week or so, though, so maybe I avoided another ankle sprain and getting nailed in the face with a dodgeball or two.

High school can be summed up in two words. Ankle Sprains. Field Hockey coach hated Ballet instructor, and vice versa because they each blamed the other on my weak ankles. I blame running the cross country course – hated that more than ankle sprains (perhaps subconsciously…..?)

In college I busted my head open on the bunk bed in my dorm room and needed stitches. Of course my biggest concern, other than that I felt my brain bounce off my skull when my head hit, was that they were going to have to shave my hair for the stitches. The nurse had mercy on me and worked around my hair so that I didn’t have to be bald for my next date party. Phew. At UK I also broke my foot coming out of Atomic Café, falling off the side of my shoe because I missed a step. Ok, so it was technically a “break in the pavement.” Whatever, I still broke the damn foot and had to be carried into my apartment by Lindsay’s boyfriend who was sweet enough not to laugh when I broke into hysterical crying as soon as the boys I didn’t know got out of the cab.

More recently I cut my hand, and in the process nicked the tendon, near my left thumb. I was cooking, but don’t jump to conclusions, it wasn’t a knife. I decided to try to fit more trash in the can, so pushed the contents down with my hand, thereby slashing myself with the lid of an opened tin can. Nice. I ran around screaming and bleeding and Samantha dashed around my feet freaking out while I talked to the 911 operator. Hospital visit and hand surgeon consultation resulted.

After this newest injury which resulted from a simple jog up a couple of stairs, I have concluded that I am either being punished for something, or I have just experienced all of my injuries and illnesses in my first half of life and from now on I will have a peaceful existence.

And though I know you are still thinking about it, you absolutely may NOT see that video from Iowa. It is highly classified.