Not for the faint of heart!

You know those commercials that used to be on for that one product that dealt with toe fungus...the one where the little gremlin looking guy walks up to a toe and lifts up the nail and you cringe because that seems as though it has to be one of the most painful things in the whole world...yeah well I am here to tell you...I have felt WORSE!!

Let me tell you a little tale about a dog, a ball, and the demise of the prettiest big toe you ever did see!! It goes something like this, Ben and I were up at his parents cabin for a visit, our time together was drawing to a close and it is usually about this time that I start warming up to the dog. It was a hot summers evening, dinner was in the beginning stages, Ben and his mom were out talking flowers on the porch. I was also there, however, not partaking in the flower conversation, nope the only one paying any attention to me was the dog. You see, the dog has this ball and he is making it very clear that he wants me to do something with it that results in him running after it. Well, he has been playing with this ball for awhile now and I am not about to touch it with my hands, so the next logical thing in my mind was kick this ball that was at this time thought to be soft rubber ball. Since I wanted the dog to be gone, chasing this ball for as long as possible, I wound up and kicked that ball as hard as I could...so hard that it cleared the front portion of the yard, disrupting no floral life...so hard that it took my breath AWAY!! For this ball was no ordinary ball, it was no soft rubber ball, no...this ball was incredibly HARD PLASTIC!! NOT a ball made for KICKING with BARE FEET!! This fact I was made aware of AFTER the fact by Ben and his mom and by the UNBELIEVABLE PAIN that shot through my toe and into my pancreas...yes I believe even my pancreas hurt at that point!! There were no tears, if I remember right there was no yelling...for there was NO AIR!!! After a few days the throbbing subsided, the blood vessels around the toe became less inflamed, and the purplely color had even started to grow on me! Now, I know that it was only a matter of time before the nail actually fell off, but I thought I was going to have a little while longer with the one body part I love most, my beautiful foot!! The other night as Ben and Kaylynn and I were all going through our nightly routines of brushing teeth and washing faces, I decided I wanted to turn on the TV and watch the beginning of the Late Show. I didn't bother to turn on the lights in the room, for I knew right were the TV was, problem was I did NOT know right were the pile of traverse curtain rods were on the floor and I hit them HARD with of course that precarious toe and this time there may not have been tears but there was screaming!!! The screaming was followed by a mad dash to the bath tub since there was now a brown fluid leaking all over my foot. Well, I guess you are dying to know...this is what I saw...

Yeah, it was only connected by the bottom right hand corner, and after much convincing (more like telling Ben) and a phone call to Ben's dad (the "am I gonna lose the nail?" expert), it was decided that the nail needed to come the rest of the way off. Now, I knew that I could not do this to myself, though I desperately just wanted that thing off at this point, I had some sweet talking to do to get Ben to step up to the plate. Kaylynn documented the story with photos (which I am sure you are thrilled about). So there we sat, the three of us on the edge of the bath tub, Kaylynn on my left with the camera, and Ben on my right with a look of "Please do NOT make me do this!!" Hey, he's a strong man just give it one good yank, or two, or apparently THREE strong yanks and it was off and again more brown nasty!! Well, now what do we do?? Another call to Ben's parents only this time to his mom the nurse, to which she was disappointed to find out we had no gauze and no medical tape. Apparently what she wanted was a big ol' bandage...well, we may not have gauze and medical tape but a big ol' bandage we can do. With a little imagination, a lightday pad, and some 2 inch masking tape, we have ourselves a big ol' bandage (yes I made Ben sign it)!!


Just to set the record straight as far as those commercials go, they have no idea what a nail bed looks like...this is what a nail bed looks like!!


You are welcome!!