What's the dumbest way you injured yourself that required a trip to the hospital or clinic?

In high school there was a piano that needed to be moved from one building to another. One of the guys had a pickup truck so we decided to use that. I didn't want the piano to move around and get damaged in the back of the truck so I volunteered to stand at the back of the piano in the bed of the truck and keep pushed it into the back of the cab so it wouldn't move. The driver started nice and slow and everything was fine. UNTIL he had to make a gentle turn, again going nice and slow. Somehow the piano must have shifted and pushed me out the back of the truck. BUT not all the way out of the truck. It seems that my leg got caught on the piano but my head bounced a couple times on the pavement, so I was told. The last I remember was beginning to make the turn, then the next thing I remember was waking up in the ER. Our campus had open air corridors (the school was on Clark Air Base, Philippines) and a big football player named Bull, who was helping with the move, ran through 5 or 6 corridors to get to the office. I still have the scar on my leg where it caught on the piano and I wonder if my neurological issues may be related to the accident. Young & Foolish!

RN here. Two months ago I was walking by a construction area by my home and one foot went into a six foot hole. Now I have a hand that doesn't work. Nerve damage. I have two patients and an agency waiting for me to get better. There's no replacement for me. Home care nurses have evaporated around here.

Were to start. I do a lot of stupid things and learn from retrospective reviews. The trip to the clinic ones are extremely rare, fortunately. Mostly they just involve me going around saying ow ow ow for a bit or patching them up with a band-aid. So, how about a leveling-up short list?

Not going to the clinic worst two.

Being hit in the head with a train. Yup, I was picking up something at the side of a freight track while a freight train was slowly rumbling along it. I cought the sight of a step coming at me and leaned back just in time to be hit in the forehead with it. It went BONGGGGG! no kidding, the two I was with thought it was hilarious. So did I. Pulling back fractions of a second later, it would have killed me.

The bicycle crank incident. For some reason, I decided the ultimate tool to remove the retaining ring from the crank case would be a driving rod and a heavy ball pein hammer. Through some feat of uncoordination I managed to bash my thumb with the hammer really hard. I felt like I was going to vomit, stumbled around, and went to the bathtub, ran the thumb under warm water, and put a wet, cold towel around my head, fought passing out for around an hour.

Escalating to visiting the clinic.

The roto-tiller. After rototilling a lawn for new earth and planting my wrists hurt. The next day they hurt a lot more and were swollen. I went to the clinic and found out they were sprained. A week of anti-inflammatories and wrist supports followed. Do not till too deep at any one time. Lesson learned.

The mighty hammer. Tennis elbow, anyone? Sounds funny, but it hurts like hell. I was driving in roofing nails for an afternoon with one hit. It was fun, but came with a painful price tag and a trip to the clinic.

The heavy toolbox. This thing has everything needed to repair anything in a house it weighs around 25 pounds. For some reason, I decided to through safety to the wind and become a stupid monkey. I leaned to the side and with one hand took hold of the toolbox and lifted it off the floor, straightened up, lifted it to the workbench all in one motion, and went on to repair, I think it was a sink. I felt a bit strange, had dinner, walked the dog felt more strange. Lifted the toolbox off the bench, put it back underneath. By this time, the strange feeling had become very uncomfortable. The next morning I got up and started my day. I went to mop the floor and couldn't lift the bucket out of the sink, ouch, so I started walking to the hospital. I found myself waving around like one of those air blower wavey stick men. Yes it hurt a lot. A bus stopped and gave me a lift. I spent 3 days on my back taking muscle relaxants and 3 more getting back on my feet.

Those are the worst to date. To be fair, all of these happened in my teens and twenties.

Slipped over at an outdoor pool.

Decided to rest my slightly sore tailbone and backside by sitting on a sun lounger, where I stayed too long and misjudged the strength of the sun, leading to sun poisoning.

Tore my rotator cuff playing pickleball.

I can’t even finish the story. One of the most pitiful injuries I had. Ended up having to do PT for 6 weeks.

My stupidest ER trip was probably the time I was using acetone to clean permanent marker off of something and somehow ended up splashing myself in the eyes with it. Acetone + eyeballs = searing pain and burning.

So I landed myself in the ER having my eyes flushed out with Morgan lenses. 10/10 do not recommend.

…Also got prescribed erythromycin ointment for my eyes after that and found out I was allergic to it. So on top of burning my eyes with acetone, they ended up almost swollen shut from the antibiotic ointment. 😅😂

My stupidest ER trip was probably the time I was using acetone to clean permanent marker off of something and somehow ended up splashing myself in the eyes with it. Acetone + eyeballs = searing pain and burning.

Holy fuck. As a lifelong auto repair technician and car / truck / motorcycle / gun enthusiast, I definitely feel your pain. As someone with astigmatism, this is why I opt to wear glasses. With all the crap I get splashed or sprayed in my face on an almost daily basis, contact lenses just aren't an option.

Sports injuries aplenty over the years. Last November I lifted my escooter up an 8" kerb on my door step. Messed my back up good n proper for 3 weeks. Fuckn ouch n then some. Female doctor had to help me onto & off of the gurney. I felt a right twonk.

I went through a period where if I called to make an appointment with primary care, she would open the appointment with "What did you do now?" I think the dumbest was when I didn't move my feet off the couch and someone sat on my ankle and it twisted. Sprain #2 of 4 in a year.

It is all related to my kink. At age of 9, we were regularly playing doctor with my cousin (a girl year older) and our neighbor friend (boy same age as me). The “action” usually happened in the tool barns either our friend’s or our backyard. We used those facilities as temporary hospitals.

One day I got suspicious because my cousin went to visit that boy alone. I was jealous and wanted to know if she not started some medical “black business” without my presence. So I decided to spy on them. I could not just walk in, so I used our mulberry tree which was extending over grandma’s summer kitchen and from that roof I could listen and sometimes see what was going on. However, during the climbing phase of the secret operation, I chose a dry brunch, and it broke. I fell into grandma's open garbage container and ended up with a sprained ankle, but more seriously I broke my right clavicle. Grandma listened to my arrival in the container and rushed to help me as I was in pain. She got so angry when she discovered what I did. I was thinking she will spank me hard, but she helped me out and called mom who arranged a trip to the children’s hospital what was on duty that day. There I got two injections, and they fixed my clavicle with the old-fashioned method using plaster. It means I was half disabled for 5 weeks.

Coming home I was locked to the bed for the first week and developed the usual “hospital” constipation. Mom (she had to work) gave full authority to grandma to control my recovery process. I never received so much of suppositories and enemas within a given period of time in my whole life. Sometimes two enemas a day.

Adding some irony to this experience of course my darling cousin played with our friend without me. So, all of my efforts were unnecessary, but in the end once more I was experiencing grandma strict and hard way of administration. Mom and aunt were way softer.

Caught myself in the head with a fence post driver when I didn’t realize how fast the post was sinking. Looked down then back up trying to figure out how all that blood was dripping from the trees before realizing what had happened 🤣 I was just a tad concussed. ER closed it with six staples after my neighbor drove me in.

Fortunately I learned my lesson using a fence post driver that day and it was the second of four concussions in my life so all is good now😁

I recently, forced my biggest toy up my anus. This was a mistake, I know now. It burst through my colon wall. Hospital ER visit. I had to tell the DR. what I felt went wrong. He stated to me it was not his job to judge, but to make me better. 7-12-2024 Emergency surgery to close colon. I was full of shit, literally. When I came too, I had an ostomy bag attached to my belly, surgeon recommended I use smaller dildos and take my time. After all there is a limit to what you can put up there. I was forced to keep this bag for 12 weeks. Terrible thing it was. Had the Hartman's reversal surgery 11-18-2024. I am now back to normal, somewhat so. I had a s1-t11 fusion surgery May 13, 2025. This was not related to my mishap with my favorite anal toy. I still have private anal play. I just have more respect for my anus. Now when I doesn't feel right, I stop. I no longer force the issue. This was by far the DUMMEST thing I have ever done to myself that ended up in the ER.

Biceps tear after driving kart.

I was running around my house chasing my friend. Cut my toe open on a floor vent. Had to go in to get my toe glued shut!

Me and my little brother were fighting and he took a swing at me and I swung back to get away from it and I hit my head on the bedframe. It hit me right above my eye. Blood everywhere. Had to go to the ER. I was probably 11 or 12. They wanted to talk to me alone to make sure it wasn’t from my parents hitting me, lol.

They used surgical glue to close it. I still have a scar but luckily it is also right where my eyebrow begins so you can’t see it.

Biceps tear after driving kart.

I discovered a biceps tear when I had an X-ray for a shoulder injury. Doc said;they could staple it back, or I could just live with it. I chose to live with it. Just more careful lifting weights, curls. Sort of have a Popeyes bulge in my tight arm! 😀

Threw my knee out of place by sitting down on the toilet. After investigations, it turns out I have a condition called PVNS in my knee, too much synovial lining of my joint. The stupidest thing I've done however was to fry some sausages in a pan that had a loose handle. I absolutely deserved for the pan to give way on lifting so I poured hot oil over my foot. I'm much more sensible these days. I still have a scar on my foot.

At one point, I had a walk-in closet that I had converted into a small recording studio. I had one keyboard that I rarely used, so I had it on a high shelf. Apparently, it was sticking out a bit off of the shelf. I went to close the closet door a bit, and I heard a scraping sound from above. I looked up just in time to get smacked in the face by a falling keyboard. It almost knocked me out, but then I noticed I was bleeding badly from my lip. I went to get some ice to put on it, but realized I was out of ice. I knocked on the door of my upstairs neighbor, to ask if she had any ice, and she took one look at me, and drove me to the ER.

I am a very accomplished handyman. I can build almost anything. Three personal houses, an airplane, boats, etc. etc. Recently I was replacing the motor in our electric dryer. The last step in re-assembly is an awkward reach into the bottom of the machine to put the belt back on the spring-loaded idler pulley.

I had already done this twice as I made final adjustments. Just once more ……. Zap! In my haste to finish, I had forgotten to unplug again and with arm inside the machine up to my elbow, I touched hot terminals. Involuntarily, I jerked back and snagged my wrist on some sharp sheet metal. I took a divot out of my wrist about an inch around and a half inch deep. Major wound.

Stupid, careless fool.

I was riding a bike, turned my head for a split second, hit the front bumper of a parked car, and landed on the hood. The car was not damaged, but I had plenty of bruises and embarrassment.

Being the klutz I am there have been so many times.

In college I lived in a high rise dorm and a bicycle was the favorite form of transportation, Yes could expect them to get stolen and out I came and my bike was gone. I bought a bike , which I am sure had been stolen, that the brakes did not work on. I set about fixing the brakes, got on to test them out and the front brakes grabbed before the rear, over the handlebars I went and messed up my right shoulder. Yes people were watching ole crash in action.

Last summer we identified several unsafe boards on our deck that needed replacing. Well we never got around to it, one night my right leg went thru one of them. My left leg was bent at a weird angle, I could not move yelled for hubby to help me, no hub. After some time I was able to move a bit and worked my way out of the mess I was in. WIth the jagged edges I was lucky I never cut my self badly. My right leg was bruised from above my ankle to my upper thigh while my left leg I could not support myself on, nothing broken, 3 days on crutches and 4 days on a cane.

As a drunk teenager I decided to attempt juggling, for the very first time, with knives. Of course I dropped them almost immediately, and one of them stabbed me just above my knee.

It went in pretty deep and took me a few minutes to work up the courage to take my jeans off to inspect the damage. No blood, so I just grabbed a bottle of rum, poured a small amount on, went on with my life.

Years on I wonder how I could ever have been so reckless.

Except for a laboratory incident at one of my former jobs, I never actually ended up on the ER,

Did have a few emergency visits to my dr though.

The wierdest/ dumbest thing:

Tripping over a curb, trying to grab hold of anything to break my fall, managed to grab a thorn bush (the one with those 3-pronged thorns), entered at the palm-side of the tip of my thumb and was blocked by the nail on the other side.

Took a while before they got it out, the wound cleaned and checking for stuff like nerf damage *(it went pretty much all the way through the tip of my thumb)

Fell off a porch when I was 4 years old and fractured my arm.

I jumped off my brother's sailboat into 4 feet of water, landed on a jagged rock and tore open an instep. It didn't require stitches but I did go to the ER to get it cleaned out and treated.

This past March, in a temper, I huffed out of the house at 11:30pm to pull the garbage bins to the curb for early-morning trash pickup. Kid #3 has been derelict in household duty recently - teenagers! - and should have put them out before bed, as it is their chore.

Earlier in the day, weather had been beautifully warm. I detest winter; this is, of course, my bane as a southern transplant who finds herself stuck in New England (some of you may remember that I was privileged to relocate back to points south for a brief 2-year period a few years ago… I was in my glory). So when we had a gorgeous unseasonably warm sunny day, I had been thrilled to be up & about in my compression warm-up pants, t-shirt and sneakers.

Recall my temper. I headed out in warm-weather clothing and footwear, onto the porch at 11:30pm in a huff, paying no mind to the fact that the temp had plummeted to the more customary seasonal temps around here… and all the snow melt that had occurred that day on the porch, the front cement steps, and the front walk…. Long story short, my feet very cartoonishly (and painfully!) went “whoosh!” out from under me and I slammed down on the cement edge of the porch, then slid down and slammed again onto the cement step.

In review: swoop… slam!.. slam!

Broke my tailbone.

Getting up off of sheer ice with horrible traction would have been comical if it had not been so shocking. It was a task. No one knew I was outside and it was freezing, so getting up from such a down position was not easy, involved more slipping and sliding. I managed to push myself up and off of my backside, and then pull myself up using the grab bar on the porch post. Once in my feet, I skid over to the porch cabinet for ice melt so I could reattempt the entire task and get the trash out, but did not recognize the ice melt (it was a different brand than usual and the packaging looked more like the birdseed I put out than the ice melt, so in my panic, I did not investigate further). Then I ambled back into the house and with difficulty for downstairs without assistance to enlist DH’s help.

I was mortified. I was super uncomfortable. And I knew the next day or two would be painful. I was not prepared for the mobility issues once the inflammation cycle kicked in.

Pain - I can handle it so some degree and have not felt a 10/10 pain at all after this injury (compared to my two 10/10 experiences in life thus far) - but nothing prepared me for the muscle spasms when I was on my feet. Not to mention that I could not rise from a seated position for several days without assistance. And sitting was uncomfortable. Plus, add to all of this that I am 51, a bedside nurse, and a stubborn donkey….

I went to urgent care 48 hours later for muscle relaxers, a 7-day course of anti-inflammatory meds, and a “well, you could have bruised your coccyx or broken it, the treatment is the same, so it’s up to you whether or not to get it Xrayed.” The consensus is basically that healing of a fracture just really takes longer, yadda yadda, so the PA and I agreed no XR was necessary at the time, and I went home with a note to return to work in seven days and the promise that if I needed an extension on the leave, I would return for one at that point.

So natural consequences of my temper quite literally sent me to urgent care.

10 out of 10: do not recommend.