bloggedy blog: the personal weblog of a music lover and aging punk wannabe

:: Monday, May 19, 2003 ::

The ring is gone, but the finger remains
The plain gold wedding band I've worn for nearly 18 years was removed from my finger this morning by an RN with a talent for sawing through thick metal. Better to lose the ring than the finger, though, and that was the choice I faced.

How this came to pass: I jammed my ring finger playing basketball Sunday afternoon. I thought nothing of it; I jam a finger almost every time I play basketball. I pulled the finger back into place and kept playing. It didn't hurt any more than previous finger jams. Throughout the evening, I noticed a slight swelling but thought nothing of it.

Then I awoke around 4 a.m. today with a throbbing pain in my finger just above my ring and up into the knuckle. Not a good sign.

I went into the bathroom, flipped on the light, and saw that my ring finger had turned a purplish-red, and the knuckle had swollen to nearly twice its normal size.

Dyann took a look and we agreed she would drive to the emergency room. It was the first time I'd been to an ER since the summer after ninth grade, at which time I required stitches after slicing open the palm of my hand while climbing a fence. Fortunately, this morning was a slow morning in the ER, and they tended to me right away. The RN sliced the ring right off, using a tiny sawblade that looked like a miniature pizza slicer. The doctor inspected his work and the finger, then prescribed something to dull the pain and some other pill, an anti-inflammatory tablet, and sent me off to X-ray. The X-ray showed no fracture, which I think disappointed the ER doc. He wanted to call in an orthopedic surgeon to take a look at the finger, but I told him I'd follow up with my own physician, so reluctantly he told the RN to put a splint on the finger, and then I was released. I took the splint off about 30 minutes ago. (Can't type with a splint.) So now, the swelling's subsided, the knuckle is returning to its normal size, and the pain has mostly gone away. Which is a good thing, because I took the day off in order to do some writing.

As for the wedding band, it can always be repaired.

:: Andrew 07:25 + ::
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