injury

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Twice Is Too Many Times For Me

They say lightning never strikes twice, but I’ve heard of people getting struck by lightning more than once.

twice is too many times for me

I remember golfing with a buddy when we were on the 16th hole down in a valley when the warning siren blared throughout the whole course. With our lightning rods – I mean umbrellas – raised, my friend Mike began walking up the steep cart path. 

I turned to say something to him and saw a flash of light that almost blinded me. The worst part, however, was the sound of the thunder that boomed about a second after the lightning. 

We knew it was close, looked at each other, said in unison, “Let’s get out of here!” and started running. 

No one wants to be hit by lightning, or even get close to it … but it does happen. 

In Canada there are an average of over 2 million lightning strikes per year, yet only 100 to 150 people are injured each year by lightning. That tells me that lightning is not all that accurate. Still, it claims about 9 or 10 lives per year. 

It’s rare to be struck by lightning more than once, but don’t tell that to Roy Sullivan. He was struck seven times!

Well, my golfing lightning story was the closest I’ve ever come, but something happened the other day that reminded me of being struck by lightning twice. 

When I was in college I got injured playing hockey. I was skating up the ice with a good head of steam and scooped at the puck along the boards. The plastic strip at the base of the boards had a join right where the blade of my stick made contact with the puck. The join wasn’t even and acted as a full stop for my stick. 

I drove the butt end of my stick into my upper thigh and it lifted me right off the ice, until the stick broke in half and I came crashing down. 

It was probably the most pain I’ve experienced in my life.

I’ll never forget it. I had clipped a small artery, just missing the main artery in my leg by a couple of millimetres. The result was a hematoma about twice the size of a golf ball that appeared in mere seconds. 

I ended up having surgery to tie off the artery and drain the blood. 

Fast forward 40 years later. … Last week I was skating with the puck and went to go around a guy right by the boards. It was tight, yet somehow the blade of my stick wedged into a gate – how it got in there, still amazes me.

All I know is the butt end of my stick hit my upper thigh and I was flying in the air.  

I had a déjà vu moment as I landed on the ice.

Thankfully it wasn’t serious this time, just some bruising and tenderness for a few days.

All I can say is, I hope I’m not the Roy Sullivan of hockey rinks.

Here’s the thing: There are some things that we don’t want to have to experience twice, or want another chance at. But God gives us multiple chances to respond to His invitation to begin a relationship with Him through His son, Jesus Christ. Don’t wait for another chance to come along. Put your faith in Christ today.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What is something you hope you will not experience again? Leave your comments and questions below.

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My Old Ways May Be Coming Back

I hope it’s not true, but I wonder if I’m back to my old ways. 

my old ways may be coming back

This morning I was taking apart a speaker that wasn’t working, and the tool I was using slipped and struck my hand.

Immediately it hurt, but it wasn’t until a couple of minutes later that I saw blood. I realized then that it was more than just an ouch; I had cut myself. 

Normally that shouldn’t be a big deal. But where I struck my hand brought back some memories. 

Somewhere in my forties, I became a little clumsy.

There was one time that I was cutting off the bottom of a door in our basement so that it would not rub on the carpet. The door was big and I didn’t have a table to place it on. So I just propped the end of the door up on my leg and held it there with my left hand.

I’m not sure why I chose the particular saw I used, but it was very toothy and came to a sharp point at the end. I had other saws but I chose that keyhole saw. 

While I was sawing my way through the door, the saw slipped out of the groove and struck the base of my index finger. 

I flung my hand off the door, sending blood up to the ceiling.  Three ceiling tiles were ruined in the process that day.

I realized the cut needed more than a bandage; it needed stitches. Down to emergency we went. Lily drove; she was very concerned. 

When it was all said and done, the doctors said I was fortunate that I didn’t cut a tendon or a nerve.

Anyone can have an accident.

Three months later I was cutting some fibre board for some sliding doors in another part of our basement. 

My tool of choice that time was a utility knife.  

As I scored down the length of the board, the knife slipped out of the groove and sliced into the top of my finger – same left hand index finger. 

This time Lily didn’t bother going to emergency with me. I did get more stitches.

No one would give me anything sharp to hold for some time after that. It was a running joke. 

But those were my old ways. I’m way more careful now … well, until this morning. 

To take that speaker apart, I was using a tool that was like a screwdriver but the end on it looked more like an ice pick. It’s called an awl, and it’s used for piercing and punching. And that’s just what I used it for. 

It slipped off the speaker case and pierced into the skin between my thumb and finger. 

You guessed it – on my left hand, just below my index finger. 

This time I’m hoping to avoid the emergency room, but my old ways may be catching up with me. I now have a hole in my hand and I haven’t been able to stop the bleeding.

I think I’ll get it under control. 

Here’s the thing: I find that it is so easy to go back to my old ways. It’s like they are second nature. When those old ways are destructive or harmful, you need to consciously replace them with new ways. You may also have some old ways that God wants you to replace with new ones. Don’t just fall back to them. Ask the Lord how you can replace those old ways with something that is beneficial, good and pure. 

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What old ways do you need to replace? Leave your comments and questions below.

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Some Injuries Tempt You

When it comes to injuries, I’ve had my fair share … but I’m tempted to ignore some more than others.

I’ve had injuries where there was nothing I could do but wait until the injury was better before I resumed activity. 

I think of the many times I’ve hurt my left knee – I have a torn ACL (anterior cruciate ligament). Before I knew what that was, I had injured that knee many times. 

My surgeon went in and cut out a portion of my cartilage and decided that I could treat the ACL with a brace – not a cheap, off-the-shelf kind of brace, but one that was moulded to fit my knee exactly. It was pretty pricy and, over about 25 years, I’ve had two made.

When I injure that knee, I’m out of commission. I hobble around for a week or two, but know my knee won’t be stable again for another few weeks.  

There is no playing hockey, no exercise involving my legs at all. I can only sit around and get out of shape. 

But there are other kinds of injuries that tease you a little. You get hurt but think, “It’s not that bad; I can still keep going. I just won’t go as hard as normal.” 

… In theory that’s great, but in reality it doesn’t work out that way.

Recently, I pulled a groin muscle playing hockey. It didn’t seem that bad; it was more of a nagging kind of pain … you know, one that you can play through. 

“This injury isn’t going to sideline me,” I decided. I played hockey a few days later with the idea that I would take it easy and not skate too hard.

The problem was the game was fast. There were a lot of young guys on the other team so our team had to work to keep up.  

Without thinking, just keeping pace with the level of play, I found myself skating pretty hard at times. In fact, I could feel a little pain when I took off quickly or tried to out-skate a guy on my heels. 

I could do it. It was the kind of injury that wasn’t going to hold me back. 

But I paid for it the next day. It was sore to walk without a limp. Even getting in and out of the car required some delicate manoeuvring. And when I slipped on an icy patch of sidewalk, I thought I tore the muscle more. 

This injury that wasn’t too bad, and had tempting me to keep going, had just gotten worse. Now I was looking at having this nagging injury for a very long time – maybe all season. 

So, I’ve made the decision that I’m going to stop skating until this thing gets better. 

I might miss a week of hockey, but it’s better than playing with that nagging pain every time I move a certain way. 

Here’s the thing: There are some things in your life about which you think, “I can keep doing this; it’s not that bad; it doesn’t hurt me, or my witness; it doesn’t cause pain to anyone else.” You may think you have it all under control, but the reality is you need to stop it. That thing will just nag at you and will, at some point, become a problem that forces you to stop. Listen to the Lord’s voice quietly telling you to stop now before it gets worse.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What might you be doing that’s not that bad, but you really need to stop doing? Leave your comments below.

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I Knew He Was Out To Get Me!

I find myself wondering what goes through people’s minds when they do something that just seems wrong.  I wonder that a lot when I drive … like the person in front of me the other day who slowed down to about 10 km/hr just to get into the other lane. What were they thinking?!

It happens often to me, so maybe it’s me and not them … or, maybe everyone is out to get me.  Ya, that’s it.  People are trying to mess with me … Ok, enough of that nonsense.

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This week I was playing hockey and a guy just smoked me (hit me really hard).  Out of nowhere he knocked me flying.  I never saw him coming.  Lying on the ice, I had that thought, “What was he thinking?  This is NOT contact hockey.”  In fact, I said it out loud a few times, “What were you thinking?!”

When I’m in my car, I never get an answer to that question.  On this occasion, I did.  He said, “You turned right into me.”  I couldn’t believe it!  Even if I did, he should’ve stopped or gone around me.  But no, he decided to run me over from behind like a freight train!

I was sprawled on the ice – not hurt, just annoyed.  As I got back to playing, I noticed the guy.  In the old days, I would have marked him and stuck it to him later in some way. But, I’m pretty chill now, and put it out of my mind.

I did notice, however, that he was pretty big, but not all that agile out there.  I figured he had a head of steam behind him and when I turned to the net, he either couldn’t stop in time, or didn’t have the maneuverability to change direction.  I got shmucked in the process.

As I kept playing, I started to notice that my knee was a little sore (not really bad, not enough to stop playing, just enough to notice).  I wondered if it was going to be worse after the game.  But I kept playing.

Later on after hockey, as my knee WAS getting worse, I realized I wouldn’t be able to do my exercises that day.  That was upsetting since I had just stopped taking one of my medications to determine if it was causing some muscle pain I’m experiencing.

This was an official trial, by the way.  A nurse had suggested I stop the drug for a week to see if the symptoms went away.  Here I was, one day in, and I wasn’t sure I would be able to exercise much for the next week.  The trial was a bust.

Hey, maybe people are trying to mess with me!  Just kidding … I started back on the drug the next day and will resume my trial when my knee is feeling a little better.

Here’s the thing:  When a few things happen, we start to wonder if there is a conspiracy out there.  Sometimes, we over spiritualize by thinking we’ve done something wrong and God is punishing us, or Satan is trying to get us.  We make up scenarios in our minds about what is happening, and they’re always bigger there.  In reality, mostly it’s just life.  It’s not an act of God, or Satan, or a conspiracy against us.  So, the key to dealing with things that happen is to depend on God THROUGH them.  Don’t point a finger, blame, or make things up; just trust Him through it.

Until Next Time!

Pastor Paul

Question:  When life happens, how do you keep yourself from creating theories in your mind? Leave your comment below.