Dremeling your eyeball; or Big fun at the emergency room on a Saturday night

Mark Williams

Mark Williams

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First of all, I'm okay.

What a pain in the ass. I'd been working all dang day in the shop with no problems or saftey concerns at all. I am rather reckless at times but nothing near the magnetude of my former GWI days (grinding while drunk):D

Had a great day in the shop. All the components of a project just fell into place and I was happy.

Deb and I invited some friends over for dinner. 11 lb sirlion tip roast (drool) Deb is an awesome cook. I had showered and gotten cleaned up for company. After dinner my buddy wants to see the shop.(sneak a cigar without his wife knowing).
After coming in from the shop, my eye starts bothering me. Like a dumbass I just rub the heck out of it. it keeps getting worse and worse. I finally go look in the mirror and right next to my cornea i can see a BIG metal splinter poking out. Of couse being the brontosaurus type person I am I just get my handy dandy magnet and try to get it. Nogo.

My friends wife works at the hospital and called to ask if I can just put a patch on it till monday. They cut her off in mid sentence and have to come now. It 11:30.
To make matters even more fun, our car doors are frozen shut.When we try to leave.After much beating, kicking and depreciation, we get the car open.
About 4 am the ER doctor comes in with the eyeball looker machine. I just laughed and told him he wont need it to see this thing.
I think "Whoa" was his comment.
He numbed the eye with some drops and commenced to scrapping my eyeball with a swab.He said "I think I got most of it" but I'll have to get the rest with a burr" "Burr, as in dremel?".....
Anyway, he went to dremeling my eyeball with a friggin dremel tool:eek: Needless to say I was not happy with someone using a power tool on my eyeball. He did a good job. It only felt like he was trying to push my eye out the back of my head.
They gave me some salve and some Vicodine. I questioned the vicodine but he said "you'll understand when the drops wear off".
I do understand.:)
It's really ironic after doing everything I've done all day to get some crap in my eye from just getting it on my hands and transferring it to my eye.I guess it could be worse. sorry for the long winded post.
 
Damn,Mark! That had to be worse than miserable! I hope you heal up quick,too.Being a one eyed maker would be rough.
 
OUCH! That had to hurt. Seems really strange that they would take a dremel to your eyeball :eek: Would think that it would do more damage than good.
My dad got a sliver in his eye once a long time ago while using an angle grinder. Drove himself to the emergency room. They numbed his eye, said look to the 10:00 position and popped his eye out! Took the sliver out (was in the side towards the back I suppose) popped his back in and sent him home :eek:

I like eye protection very much after hearing all these stories!
 
Mark,

I had a near identical experience a year ago. When I told the doc that I did not need the pain killers (since I deserved a little pain for what I did), he put them in my pocket and giggled while he walked away...later on I was quite glad that at least he had some common sense!

I am happy to hear that things turned out ok for you too. Slivers in the eye just scare me to death...

Take Care
Dean
 
Dang Mark! Just the thought of a dremel on my eyeball makes my butt cheeks pucker....:eek:

Thank God...It sounds more like a pain ...and not any real damage.

-Rob
 
Yikes! :eek: I can handle pulling nails, pieces of wood, shards of steel out of my body no problem. But when it comes to my eyes, the slightest irritation turns me into a sobbing 6'3" 2 year old. :rolleyes: I just went to double-check my saftey glasses. Well, at least you got some fun drugs out of it. :p

Tim
 
OUCH!

kind of a funny story though. (after knowing that you're alright) :( :)
 
Mark,

That hurt just reading it. Fortunately, I tend to wear safety glasses and keep my shop area cleaned off and swept. (Unfortunately, I might have considered tweezers before the doctor.)

I'm glad you're ok and not as stupid as I might be. ;)

Pam
 
Mark, they only used a dremel? I would have told them to put that sissy tool away and get out a 9" side grinder.

;)

I had the same type thing happen. I was running a 9" angle grinder with a North respirator, safety glasses, and ear plugs. A little sliver of steel bounced off of the respirator, and up under my safety glasses.

Something was bothering my eye, but I let it go.

Two days later when I just couldn't take the irritation anymore, I went to the Optometrist. He said I had a nice sliver in my eye with a rust ring around it. Maybe a good reason to stick with stainless ;)

After numbing my eye and putting dye in it, he sat me down and cut it out with a tiny scalpel. He had to scrape it a little to get the rust out. Personally, this seems like the best way to go about it with the least damage. My eye healed up very fast.

Glad you're okay buddy.
Nick
 
Back when I was operating a bulldozer for a living, I had the same thing happen. We had a big gas-powered side grinder that we had to sharpen the blade with twice a day. I made the mistake of doing it once without glasses and got a piece of steel in my eye. The doctor was able to take the steel out with little problem, but the steel had rusted in my eye and the doctor sent me to the eye doctor. So in go the drops and the eye doc says, "don't move or you'll be blind forever." And he proceeds to stick this grinder in my eye to cut out the rust spot. Not a very comforting moment.
 
yeahup the wait and see game
like Nick,, days later when I just couldn't take the irritation anymore I mean Daaaays later I when in
and the Doc said well it's just about rusted out now so he got me some drops and sent me home:confused: :)
 
Hey Mark, glad to hear you are doing okay now. I had a bout with glass and grit this past summer after riding my motorcycle with only my glasses on. I'm such a dumbass!

Then there's my old man... with a huge clot in his right eye after a 13-day bender (according to mom), and his blood pressure skyrocketed and he popped a vessel in that eye.

Anyhoo! Wear yer damn safety-glasses, or we gonna have to come down there and staple 'em to yer face! :D :D :D
 
Its only a matter of time for me. I refuse to use any type of saftey glasses and the only exception I ever make is to use sun glasses when pulling steel from the HT oven.

RL
 
Originally posted by rlinger
Its only a matter of time for me. I refuse to use any type of saftey glasses and the only exception I ever make is to use sun glasses when pulling steel from the HT oven.

RL
Click to expand...

Roger, PUT ON THOSE DARN GLASSES! You make some nice looking knives, I would hate to see one side of them look worse than the other! :D

Craig
 
Last summer I got either 6k shavings or Ti shavings in my eye. Washed it out with visine real well but it kept burning. At 11pm I couldnt take it any more and went into the emergency room. The Doc swabbed my eye after it was numb, used the dye and the black lite. He twisered out a few pieces of metal.I had to wear a patch for a day after that and then eye drops 3 times a day for a while. It did burn for days, also had blurry vision for the better part of a week. I "was" wearing eye protection while I was working but the best I can tell is I had some shavings in my eye brows. I had to go somewhere during the day and while driving down the road a gust of wind came thru the window and thats when the shaving went into my eye. From then on I use the air hose in the shop and blow myself off before leaving the shop so I dont have to go thru that anymore. Best of luck for a speedy recovery. ;)
 
It's amazing some of the hairbrained things we can do in a knife makers shop, and all it takes is one little piece of steel to bring us down:D

Boy-Howdy Sandy, I get the full line of orders from Deb before I go into the shop..

Make sure you wear your safety glasses......Yes Dear.
Make sure you wear your gloves..............Yes Dear.
Make sure you wear your apron...............Yes Dear.
What are these brown stains on my counter top? Yes Dear.:D
Is the garage on fire........................Yes Dear.
 
Originally posted by Swivelknife
Deb can't let you out of her sight for a minute and you are in trouble. Sandy
Click to expand...

Sandy!! new name old face... well kind of:D :D
Swivelknife
I kinda like that:D
 
My eight year old son accidentally poked my wife in the eye about six years ago and scratched her cornea. Occasionally, she still can feel the "scab" as some roughness when her eyes are dry. For the first few years afterwards, if her eyes were dry and she opened her eyes quickly, like when waking up, it would rip the scab off and her eye would hurt again. She would then have to put some kind of ointment on it for a couple of weeks. Take care of your eyes please. I don't think that any of us want to be reading posts asking about what so-and-so is doing now that he can't see well enough to grind anymore. It's not a good way to make your work more exclusive.

Phil
 
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