Remind me not to buy a seesaw for my kids...

JPINFV

Gadfly
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There are two extremes here that I can illustrate from personal life.

My brother was one of those kids that needed to have a helmet strapped to his head and a pillow stapled to his butt. The injuries I can remember include:

Riding his bike into a parked car. He was not a little kid and had been riding a bike for years; just tried to play chicken with a parked Jeep. He jammed his two top teath up and almost lost them. He never could explain why he did this. Maybe he thought it would swerve first...

Pretended he was a whale at Sea World and (in our built in pool) tried to beach himself by swimming underwater as fast as possible and when he reached the end of the pool, tried to "jump out" like a whale would. Well, since he didn't use his feet to push off the bottom, and since he didn't have flippers... he feel short and only his head beached, cracking hard agains the concrete. He lost a chunk of fleash from his chin; a chuck that was never recovered and still has a scar on his chin.

Playing on a late 80' / early 90's home gym, he tried to climb it without using his feat... he fell short and literally feel azz first. He feel on a bolt and was left with a hexagon scar on his azz that could very well still be there.

Playing around at a friends house, he jumped on a wood burning stove (dunno why) and his right forearm landed on the top, resulting in second degree burns. He didn;t tell anyone for several hours because he didn't wan't to leave his friends house. He eventually told someone and went to the ER, but the resulting infection had so nice halucinations assosiated with it. He woke up at one point and started screaming for "his green". "Where's my green? I need my green?" Still not sure what that meant, but it was funny as hell.

He jumped off a rock in Arizona (we all were) and broke his foot. Again... never told anyone because he wanted to keep playing on the rocks.

Literally, from the age of 5 to the age of 15 he visited the ER more times than Tim "the Toolman" Taylor. He broke bones, had serious preventable infections, and injuries resulting in some serious scars.

When he reached 16, the odds were elevated and it is a miricle that he is alive still. He was stupid enough to video tape most of his idiotic "adventures" that usually involved explosives and high speed; things that really make for some awesome EMS calls...

I know why he did it...
 

Bane

Forum Ride Along
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Play grounds should be made for adults. That is the real danger there. Have you ever tried playing on a playground in your twenties? I ended up with a concussion from a slide, and a nice deep scar. Little kids are fine they bounce.
 

medicp94dao

Forum Crew Member
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My wife is a teacher ( bless her soul ) she keeps telling me all the horror stories of kids on the play ground getting hurt bumps, bruises, scrapes etc.... i just cant help but think back when i did the exact same thing. yea it hurt for a lil bit.... but i never did the same thing twice lol:wacko: i survived and so will my kids god willing... i miss most of those toys
 

DV_EMT

Forum Asst. Chief
832
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lol... we should pull out pull up bars too... I got a concussion from on of them... clotheslined... really bad headache too :p
 

Theo

Forum Crew Member
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I ran smack dab into a pullup bar in 6th grade, right between the eyes. Split me open and gave me a knot I still have to this day. A trip to the hospital? Nah, here's some ice kid go back to class. I can still remember the gasp of horror from my classmates when I took the ice pack off to remove my jacket.
 

Captn' Tuddle

Forum Crew Member
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When I was a kid I would always manage to somehow get my shirt caught on the swing. Most of the time the shirt would just rip but there were those few occasions where I went to jump off only to get yanked back and fall on my butt...ah the good ol' days.
 

bunkie

Forum Asst. Chief
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Oh the bars. You know those ones that dangle and are usually shaped like a triangle or circle? I was skipping those two at a time, when I was like 6? Went to get up on the landing, footing slipped. Fell off, smashed my chin on the landing and bit through half of my tongue.
 

Seaglass

Lesser Ambulance Ape
973
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Should we ban mulch from playgrounds too, because a kid in my class became seriously injured after falling and having chunks go up her nose and mouth? How about sports like baseball? I know another kid who suffered a broken wrist that never regained fully functionality.

Outdoor things that are good for you and fun tend to come with risk. Most of us survived.
 

bunkie

Forum Asst. Chief
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I'm not taking it, and posting as a literal we should ban things. Just kind of sharing my horror stories in good humor. *shrugs*
 

Seaglass

Lesser Ambulance Ape
973
0
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I'm not taking it, and posting as a literal we should ban things. Just kind of sharing my horror stories in good humor. *shrugs*

Wasn't directed at anyone in particular. Just a comment on the general bubble-wrap mentality that I keep seeing in the real world.
 

firecoins

IFT Puppet
3,880
18
38
So during my 24 yesterday we were walking through the ER bored as heck (1 call the whole day)

We come up to one of the rooms with an 8yo f that got injured on her seesaw.


Bilateral compound tib/fib.


Ouch.

Hey....don't get a buy a see saw for your kids.
 

bunkie

Forum Asst. Chief
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Wasn't directed at anyone in particular. Just a comment on the general bubble-wrap mentality that I keep seeing in the real world.

I get ya. I'm a shake it off kind of person. My kids fall down/bump into something I have them walk it off after a quick kiss and hug. No CT's and foam padding for them. My 3 year old has proven to me that children can survive just about anything. :lol:
 

Michael Sykes

Forum Crew Member
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Yeah, my grandson has survived about everything. Broken forearm, other wrist, other thumb (all at different times), and got his foot caught in a moving treadmill belt when he was 4. Burned his ankle to the bone. They had to do a graft off his butt, but now, at 16, he's fine.

I remember trying to "walk off" a broken knee when I was 14; the kids thought it was cool when it bent the wrong way. I didn't think it was so funny.
 
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