Toe trauma, no drama

My first visit the emergency room in 30 years happened the night of June 6th. After a busy morning and afternoon, I decided to go to the Italiana Fest at Zona Rosa to see some of my friends from work. We stopped at QuickTrip for a cold drink and then drove around ZR looking for a parking place. Riley said I should just park at Dick’s but I wanted a spot in a shaded garage. I found one in the garage that attaches to the only indoor common area in ZR.

We parked and walked to the doors, where I proceeded by grabbing the big glass door too fast and having it roll over my left foot. My first thought was “@#!$^* that really hurt bad!” We continued inside and I looked down and things didn’t look right. I told Riley we needed to go to the restroom where I could clean up my foot. I only made it a few steps when I heard people gawking about the bloody trail I was leaving, and then someone pointed me to the Guest Services desk where they had first aid. The lady behind the desk handed me some tissues, bandaids, gauze, and ointment and I’m sure my face looked dumbfounded. I was starting to feel light-headed so I grabbed them and sat down at a table about 10 feet away.

I wrapped the tissues around my mangled toe so the passer-byers wouldn’t see it. The guest services lady told me if there wasn’t enough paper towels in the bathroom I could hunt down a cleaning lady and she would have some. I was sweating profusely and was pretty sure that I couldn’t stand up without fainting.

Riley was a trooper and was doing everything she could think of to help me. She suggested that I call a nurse so I called my friend Heidi who I'd been chatting with earlier in the day. She is a (non-practicing) nurse and her husband, Jason, is an ER doctor. I told her that I hurt my toe and I thought the toenail had come completely off but I was too afraid to look. Jason said ER would only dress it and give me pain medication, so if I could do that myself there was no need to go. Since I couldn’t even look at it, let alone touch it, I thought a visit to a medical professional sounded like a good idea.

Next, the “first responder” for ZR showed up to help me thru my ordeal. He glanced at my foot, told me to elevate it, wrote up an accident report, suggested I go to Urgent Care but not drive myself, and was on his way. Thanks dude.

As Riley worked with the guest service lady to find an open urgent care center I called a few friends to see if they could come give me a ride. After 3 calls with no luck and discovering that all urgent care centers close at 6pm or earlier on Saturdays, I decided to drive myself two miles down the road to St. Lukes Hospital.

I mustered my strength, stood up and limped to my car, arguing with Riley most of the way that I could indeed drive okay. We made it to the hospital fine and spent only 5 minutes in the waiting room. It was 6:40pm. I notified my softball team that I wouldn’t be playing the next day because I was in the ER.

I was taken to a private room with a bed and cable TV. I laid down and put a blanket over me and Riley and I both sighed a sigh of relief. As we watched NEMO, the nurse, doctor and billings clerk came and left several times. Unable to let anyone touch my wound, the doctor decided to numbing it would be best. Yes, those two shots almost hurt more than the wound itself, but 10 seconds later I felt I could jump up and go run a 5K.

One of my softball team members texted me back and called me a pansy and said they always play with their ailments, so with the beauty of camera phones she was able to see why she needed to find a sub.

Between the doctor and the nurse they cleaned me up nicely and equipped me with the knowledge and materials to take care of my wound for the next 5 days. Riley and I left the hospital about 2 hours after we arrived and went straight to a 24-hr pharmacy to fill my prescriptions for vicodin, motrin, and cephalexin (pain and anti-infection pills).

It has been 10-days since the trauma and it is no longer an open wound. The first 2 days were painful. Days 3-7 got better and only hurt bad when touched. Now it is just uncomfortable as my nail-bed learns to exist without protection. I've continued my exercise on the stationary bike and elliptical in flip-flops. On day 8 I ran barefoot on my treadmill, my feet were sore after.

My doctor says it will take 1-3 months to see the nail start to grow, and another 6-9 months for it to come in fully. There is a possibilty that the nail matrix was damaged and it could take even longer for it to produce new nail plate cells. My goal is to participate in the Smithville Woman's Triathlon on August 1st.