Can You Handle It?
There’s a common trope in movies – someone gets hurt and has to perform emergency medical care on themselves. Think John McClane in Die Hard picking glass out of his feet, Mark Watney in The Martian stapling up a wound, or Dalton in Road House sewing up his wounds all by himself. Moviemakers love it because the idea of treating yourself is particularly cringeworthy to audiences.
So let’s talk, Deadsplinteractionheroes, about how far you could go to fix yourself. Hopefully none of us are bitten by a giant mutant salamander which leaves poisonous spines lodged in our leg.
But are you OK with less intense things? I’m OK with taking a needle and digging out a splinter, although thankfully I haven’t had to do that for a while. I’m not sure if I could sew up a wound, though, except under the most dire circumstances.
Putting in eyedrops makes me a bit squirrelly. My high school chemistry classroom had some of those emergency eyewashing bottles, and I’m not sure if I could use one of those.
Are there other things you could or could not do? Is swallowing big pills hard? Self Covid tests – big deal or no? Ever given yourself an Epipen shot?
Scenes From TV And Movies
Or if treating yourself is too hard to think about, do you have any favorite scenes from TV or the movies?
For example, there’s this scene from Total Recall:
Or you might count this scene:
Do you have examples which you remember and enjoy? Or do you find the trope to be awfully overdone and a cheap way to get a rise out of audiences? Anything is on the (operating) table.
the smell of churros makes me go yuck….but that was beside the point
im not very good with chopped up hands
like that really bothers me…..any other bit of me you can chop up….im not really bovverred
even me third leg
im not gonna be happy about it
but i need my hands man
i can make do without most of the rest
tho…in todays news one of our homegrown celebs needs to have her nose amputated….skin cancer
doesnt exactly make me go yuck… but did make me wonder…..would i prefer to die of cancer….or live without a nose…..
and i honestly dont know the answer to that one
oh but the answer is im not squeamish
my dad asploded once
upper leg abcess
was disgusting
had to tie his leg off with a towel so he wouldnt bleed out
got complimented by the first responders
so yeah..not squemish…just scarred
Holy cow! The closest I came to that was wrapping up a dog leg that had gotten bitten in a fight, but it wasn’t really that bad.
I’d definitely be OK with losing a nose if that got the cancer out. I could get by with a substitute like Tycho Brahe.
honestly…way things are…i might pick the cancer
not making light of shit…ive seen what it does to people
but nowadays whats the point of staying healthy anyways
and i need my nose……it really completes my face
I had a MRSA infection years ago and had to routinely express it once it started leaking after the antibiotics kicked in, so that was an experience. I have dislocated a pinky toe and popped it back in and went about my day – I clipped it on the side of a folding chair and looked down and it was sticking straight out to the side. When I was in high school I stepped on a sewing needle and it went through a toe (in the bottom and out through the top) and I pulled it out with a hemostat. In grad school, I had a bad Bartholin’s cyst that I had to lance and deal with myself over the course of a few weeks (I don’t recommend you google that unless you have female body parts).
I will say this – I am not squeamish about anything so far, but it’s definitely a reflection of growing up low income and not having money nor insurance for much of my adult years. I didn’t have the money for the doctor so it had to get dealt with.
I’m more squeamish about other people’s injuries than my own. When my buddy cut off his finger recently, I had a tough time looking. I have pulled knives, sticks, sea urchin spines & much more from myself without feeling sick, go into just get shit done mode. My wife & my phones got linked where her work photos would randomly show on my phone & I was queezy. She takes pics of things to send to specialists & holy shit! Not ready for that!
i want to say thats normal
but i think it just means we are dudebros
if its me…eh….tis but a fleshwound
if its someone else uhh….you should get that looked at mate
I’m going to guess men in general are worse on the emotional support side too when someone gets a deep gouge chopping carrots.
*shrugs*
what are you whining about?
are you currently dying?
no?
well shut up then
anyways…i dont know what you are talking about,,im a sensitive soul me 😛
Walk it off! Or in the case of jellyfish or sea urchins, “do you want me to pee on that?”
forgot to say….that was me mums voice
nothing like growing up with a doctor
you know..i love me mum dearly..but its safe to say i did not grow up in a kissy for the ouchy culture
wait….how do you get a deep gouge chopping carrots?
your off hand should be nowhere near the blade during that activitiy
you know…put carrot on chopping board….maybe hold the tippy tip if you think its a particularly lively carrot….but i generally assume my carrot wont run away and use it to apply pressure to the pointy end of the knife to make life easier…..especially with bigly carrots
I drove myself to the hospital while having appendicitis (in my car with manual transmission.)
Every gear shift and pedal movement hurt but somehow I managed to make it to the hospital without causing an accident or passing out from the pain. It was a stupid thing to do but it was the only thing I could think of considering that pain I was feeling.
My wife had appendicitis that was pretty ugly. I remember being in the hospital room with her post surgery and the toxicologist doing rotations with residents came in and looked at her chart. He was stunned that she hadn’t felt a more urgent need for care when she came in.
Which reminds me of something I had completely blocked out. The infection had been pretty bad and the visiting nurse described the post op wound care as the equivalent of what a gunshot wound victim needed. And I was the lucky guy who got to do it!
I managed to take care of it too without throwing up. It was all pretty confined and manageable, but in its own way kinda gross.
Everything makes me squeamish. I’m squeamish a lot.