Scars make better stories than tatoos

[lph]

Wow, some great stories here. I have a few small scars, with mildly interesting stories:

My lower lip has a faint but noticable line and a bump inside, from a faceplant into gravel from a bike when I was 16 (story told elsewhere on this forum). Broke two front teeth, pulled them halfway out and incidentally split my lower lip wide open.

My calves have two matching circular dotted scars about the size of a coin. Any horse people recognize those? I rode race horses when I was 16-20, and one race (or exercise race, can't remember) the stirrup straps royally grabbed onto the skin on my calves and abraded off a layer or three. Everyone on the racetrack had those dotted scars.

I have a small raised line on the inside of one knee. I had my own horse, she was unshod, and I was carving off a little off her hoof that had grown too long and started to split. The knife slipped and tore a hole in my pant leg, but I didn't feel anything until I noticed that my FOOT felt wet... Long gash.

And my right forefinger has a distinct triangular scar at the base. I tried to punch open a window (long story, locked out, young and stupid and macho), cut myself a bit, freaked out and jerked my hand back again towards me. Result was a BIG chunk cut out, blood spurting out in a pulse. I managed to stop it, but when I tried to remove the bandage again out came a little pulse fountain again. So I called a dr, who drily told me: "If you stopped it the first time, you can stop it again. You don't need stitches."

And now of course I have a zillion little cat scars from our small but ferocious tiger, but they are temporary.

The only times I've hurt myself semi-seriously (broken bone, kicked in the head by a horse once) I healed up without scars. A friend of mine used to be irritated over how she hurt herself in invisible places while I got "hero scars" - minor injuries that didn't hurt much but were very visible

[Pax]

I have both, tats and scars...I like the tats because I got to pick them whereas the scars weren't voluntary.

I pretty much look like the bride of Frankenstein as far as scarring goes, I have HUGE scars from breast reduction, and then the scars from four knee surgeries/three abdominal surgeries/some small burn scars from my firefighting days/various and sundry scars from a lifetime of sports... I don't mind any of them, I earned them and they are really part of my identity, each one brings back very vivid memories of what I was doing at the time.

[DebW]

Glissade patch on the outside of my right knee from descending Mt. Ranier in 1980. Just a whitish patch of skin 3"x2.5". Only bad part was that the gauze I put over it got stuck, and when a nurse removed it 3 days later, I passed out.

2 inch scar on right outside calf from Earth Day 1975. I was collecting trash from a local pond and something sharp I'd put in the trash bag cut my leg. Got a ride in a fire truck and about 12 stitches.

A couple eyebrow scars, one from surgery to repair my broken xygomatic arch, the other from a silly game of Photon Ball (which involved playing catch in the dark on winter camping trips).

Also lumpectomy scar on right breast but that was a very long time ago and is very faded.

[newfsmith]

My first biking scar acquired at about age 11. I was riding home from school and was coming down a steep hill on a washboarded gravel road when I lost it. I landed on the gravel and managed to drive a piece into my right elbow. My dad had seen me fall, so came in to help me clean up. We couldn't get the half inch chunk of gravel out of my elbow without "unroofing" the overlying skin. After 50 years it has shrunk down to a 1/4 inch by 1/2 inch white scar.

Both knees have shiny spots left from road rash, but my right knee has 2 parallel lines, tatooed by my tights from an early spring crash, it didn't tear the tights but did a good road rash and tatoo.

I have a scar on my upper lip from restraining a dog, it caught my lip with its back foot and gave me a hare lip. The weird part was that I didn't feel it at all. The vet heard the skin rip and told me to let the dog go. We cleaned it up, put a bandaid on it and went back to work. It healed very well, now it just blends in with the rest of my wrinkles.

My recent faceplant on a car trunklid left me with a little scar inside my lip, but it means I can't whistle anymore. That's probably a good thing, I never could carry a tune.

My arms are so covered with cat scratch scars that at my first physical with my new MD she thought I was a cutter.

Surgicals: 2 abdominal & 2 lymph node biopsies.

[mimitabby]

sheesh, i am in awe of all of your scars.
Mine are hardly visible and not worth mentioning.

[Running Mommy]

Yep, I was on my brand spankin new specialized allez dolce back in the day when I took my first "clippy pedal" tumble. I have a perfect triple ring tat on my upper calf. I might add that my calves are HUGE, so they make a great billboard for scars.
I also have some cancer scars. They were from the freaking treatment!! I was taking an anti cancer drug and developed these nasty wounds on my calf. My doc told me that they were basically a burn from the inside out.. UGH... Or something like that. All I know is cancer SUCKS!! Right knotted?!
My body is pretty much a scar fest. When I was 17 I was in a car wreck and broke my left femur. They did surgery to insert a rod, so I have a big scar on the side of my upper thigh.
And then when I was 18 I was thrown out of a car (another acident) careened down the center of 880 in oakland like a rag doll. Road debris was imbedded everywhere so my arms and and legs have lots of little round scars.
And then there is my c-section scar. But that is a good one!!
Dang, now that I think about it, my body is like a road map!!

[Pax]

...Dang, now that I think about it, my body is like a road map!!

Excellent analogy, our scars make a fascinating road-map of our lives.