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Last Tuesday, I buried a chisel into my left index finger. Login/Join 
Caught in a loop
posted
Yeah, I know, not my smartest move. Ironically, I slipped while opening another pack of chisels with a dull one that was about to be "retired" because it was a cheap POS.

4 stitches, and partial numbness in the pad/tip of my left index finger. Didn't reach the bone, but I did hit myself just above the crease for the joint.

Ortho guy (not the same surgeon who did all 6 of my carpal/cubital tunnel surgeries, but a competent hand surgeon nonetheless, both employed by Campbell Clinic here) said when they took the stitches out that there's the possibility of the nerve being cut/damaged, or (more likely) signals traveling along the nerve could be simply getting choked out by swelling. My options were to: A) wait it out and see what comes back, or B) let them open my finger back up to visually inspect (and repair if necessary) the nerve (we went with Option A).

While I wouldn't be surprised by ending up with at least some damage, given the pins-and-needles, itching and pain I've gradually begun to experience over the course of the past week (today was the worst by far) I'd say the doc was dead on.

Suddenly I'm glad that "my" surgeon put me on gabapentin for the lingering pain along my ulnar and median nerves. I shudder to think what I'd be feeling without it right now.

I'm also very grateful that I wasn't using one of my "good" chisels.

Now, if the damned wound would stop breaking open and oozing, that'd be great.

At least my insurance deductible was already paid.


"In order to understand recursion, you must first learn the principle of recursion."
 
Posts: 3349 | Location: Memphis, TN | Registered: August 23, 2010Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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The pain fades.
My chisel stopped in the bone of my left index finger.
Pain stopped in about 2 weeks. I think it took a month or so before the tingle sensetivity stopped.
15 years later nothing. Yep I cut a few nerves. No feeling at all in the last 1/2" side of my finger.
 
Posts: 1038 | Location: New Jersey | Registered: August 16, 2009Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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I did that once, still have the v-shaped scar to prove it. It was 40 or so years ago, I was using a very long, very stout, mortising chisel, pushing on it by hand (no mallet), because it pared the sides of a pre-drilled mortise quite well. I literally had my shoulder into it. The left hand was down near the edge to keep repositioning it. Oops. Several stitches. It no longer bothers me, though. I had to look just now to see that the scar is still there.
 
 
Posts: 10778 | Location: South Congress AZ | Registered: May 27, 2006Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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Picture of ShouldBFishin
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Ouch! I hate it when I do stuff like that.

Hope it heals fast.
 
Posts: 1799 | Location: MN | Registered: March 29, 2009Reply With QuoteReport This Post
thin skin can't win
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Hope you heal up ok. And thank you for excluding pics!



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Posts: 12348 | Location: Madison, MS | Registered: December 10, 2007Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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I sawed into my left thumb several years ago. All the way to the bone. Had lingering nerve pain/numbness/tingling/electric jolts for several weeks afterwards. I was concerned for a while that I was going to need surgery, but it eventually did go away, and everything got back to 100%.

Give it time.
 
Posts: 32423 | Location: Northwest Arkansas | Registered: January 06, 2008Reply With QuoteReport This Post
His Royal Hiney
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You shouldn't have done that.

I like sharp things myself. And I get complacent or I don't think. Only after it happens do I acknowledge, "Well, that was a dumb thing to do."

Here's hoping no nerve damage for you.



"It did not really matter what we expected from life, but rather what life expected from us. We needed to stop asking about the meaning of life, and instead to think of ourselves as those who were being questioned by life – daily and hourly. Our answer must consist not in talk and meditation, but in right action and in right conduct. Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual." Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, 1946.
 
Posts: 19582 | Location: The Free State of Arizona - Ditat Deus | Registered: March 24, 2011Reply With QuoteReport This Post
E tan e epi tas
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"Dumbass". This is the exact thing I hear all my inner voices EVERY time I do similar things, which is far too often. Frown

Take care heal up, train for the next time. Smile


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Posts: 7631 | Location: On the water | Registered: July 25, 2002Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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I cut my left index finger off at the second knuckle in 2006. The genius that did the surgery wrapped all the nerve endings into the tip so now if I bump it even on toilet paper it brings me to my knees.

So, could be worse Razz hope you heal up whole!


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Posts: 17916 | Location: Lawrenceville GA | Registered: April 15, 2012Reply With QuoteReport This Post
sick puppy
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what, no pics? Wink Hope you recover completely! at least it wasn't your trigger finger, eh?

Reminds me:
I was opening one of my wife's birthday presents with my knife, package on my leg, cutting toward my thigh, and a friend looked and then started laughing - talking about how he had hurt his back on christmas eve, so the docs in the ER gave him pain killers and muscle relaxants because it was muscular, not spinal or anything too serious. but the next day was christmas, so when he was opening a package (just as I was) he was just slightly-enough out of control with the muscle relaxants, that he slipped and stabbed the knife straight into his thigh (not terribly deep, but deep enough, he said)- but since he was on all the drugs, he just looked at it and laughed. Big Grin



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Posts: 7546 | Location: Alpine, Ut | Registered: February 17, 2010Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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After having suffered many cuts over the years I now head for the Kitchen any time I get something packed on one of those infernal blister packs. Not so I can use a 9 inch Chefs knife on that package but instead so I can use a pair of bone cutting Kitchen Shears on that blister pack. BTW, I've tried tin snips and they are just too bulky. However a set of Kitchenaid boning shears are maneuverable AND have the sharpness and leverage to go through a blister pack like butter.


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Posts: 5621 | Location: Michigan | Registered: November 07, 2008Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Caught in a loop
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To top it all off, apparently today consists of an impromptu rear brake job. Highest quality level Duralast ceramic pads burnt up on me in 20 months and under 20k miles. Metal on metal on one side, the rest have just a few mm left on them. I'm pissed.

I can handle blister packs. The secret to getting it with a knife isn't pressure to stab through, but multiple low pressure passes to fatigue the material, then it just folds when I yank on it.

These were Kobalt chisels. They use some weird packaging where the chisel is held snug in an open cradle of sorts, then there's a clamping mechanism down at the bottom that you're supposed to cut through. Sometimes you can get it without cutting, which is what I tried to do.

I'm grateful that it's healing the way it is. It could have been much worse, it could have been one of the Japanese chisels I've been courting. All of my chisels are shaving sharp, but those things take it to a new level.


"In order to understand recursion, you must first learn the principle of recursion."
 
Posts: 3349 | Location: Memphis, TN | Registered: August 23, 2010Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Caught in a loop
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Well, fuck. Now I'm replacing the caliper too. Today ain't my day.


"In order to understand recursion, you must first learn the principle of recursion."
 
Posts: 3349 | Location: Memphis, TN | Registered: August 23, 2010Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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Man that had to hurt bad..

Got a metal splinter in my index finger many years ago at work. Nurse at work poked at it with a sharp tool, but did not get it.
Went to the Doctor several days later. He got it out. Few days later infected.
Few days later the pain was so great I could do nothing but shake with pain. Back then hard narcotics was prescribed..good for a day.
Blood poisoning set in. Got surgery on it.
The assholes at work gave me a hard time about missing work because of an operation all because their nurse could not get the splinter out.
If my supervisor had gotten me gloves like I had asked for, I would not have gotten the splinter in the first place. I should have been out on workmans comp.

Take care it does not get infected..


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Posts: 2794 | Location: Ohio | Registered: December 18, 2014Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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I, too, have a chisel scar. Base of thumb. Took about 10 years for mostly full feeling to come back. Control and motion were fine, just felt dead most of the time.

Clamps. Wonderful things. My reminder to use one.


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Posts: 2362 | Location: Roswell, GA | Registered: March 10, 2009Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Caught in a loop
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quote:
Originally posted by billnchristy:
I cut my left index finger off at the second knuckle in 2006. The genius that did the surgery wrapped all the nerve endings into the tip so now if I bump it even on toilet paper it brings me to my knees.

So, could be worse Razz hope you heal up whole!


Okay, I got it pretty good, then. No amputations, either planned or unplanned, for me, and no surgeries just yet (hoping not needed; I'm getting really tired of needing surgery - if it happens, it'll be #8 since January 2015).

I like to joke that I have the fine motor coordination of a potato on the best days (really extremely frustrating; most of the time I'm pretty close to normal for most people, which is a few notches before where I was before I started getting carpal/cubital tunnel symptoms, plus now I have a time limit on things like writing by hand and turning a screwdriver), so I need all the sensation I can get.

I'm quite terrified of infection. Mom has MRSA colonized in her back, so I've seen first hand what that can do to a person.


"In order to understand recursion, you must first learn the principle of recursion."
 
Posts: 3349 | Location: Memphis, TN | Registered: August 23, 2010Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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Hope you make a speedy recovery.
Lucky you don't take a blood thinner.
 
Posts: 2422 | Location: newyorkistan | Registered: January 06, 2008Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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quote:
Originally posted by vulrath:
To top it all off, apparently today consists of an impromptu rear brake job...


Replacing the front pads on my truck a few years ago, my thumb slipped while pushing a replacement pad on - right into one of those sharp metal brake shims. I didn't think it was too deep at the time, but haven't had feeling in the tip of my thumb since.
 
Posts: 1799 | Location: MN | Registered: March 29, 2009Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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I spent seven or eight years making solid carbide cutting tools on 5 and 6 axis CNC machines. While drills and end mills can cut you when running wood routers, with their high rake and relief angles, you could plan on getting cut. I finally took and administrative position with the company to save my hands!


"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time by the blood of patriots and tyrants." Thomas Jefferson
 
Posts: 644 | Location: NE Ohio | Registered: February 28, 2006Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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Ouch. A couple of months ago, I got 2 of my fingers tangled with a pair of hedge clippers. It looked like someone split me down to the bone 3/4 of the way around the finger. It's healed pretty nicely, but I doubt I'll ever have feeling in the tip of the worst one again, and I'm not sure if that fingernail will ever come in right again.




"The people hate the lizards and the lizards rule the people."
"Odd," said Arthur, "I thought you said it was a democracy."
"I did," said Ford, "it is."
"So," said Arthur, hoping he wasn't sounding ridiculously obtuse, "why don't the people get rid of the lizards?"
"It honestly doesn't occur to them. They've all got the vote, so they all pretty much assume that the government they've voted in more or less approximates the government they want."
"You mean they actually vote for the lizards."
"Oh yes," said Ford with a shrug, "of course."
"But," said Arthur, going for the big one again, "why?"
"Because if they didn't vote for a lizard, then the wrong lizard might get in."
 
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