9 toes

Our family is a bit famous for some of the accidents we find that come our way. We've had several involve cars, there have been ones with pick axes, fires, lots of stitches, several broken bones. But the one we're probably most famous for is the time Brittany got her toe cut off from a door while at school. Here is the cool, awesome, groosome, story...

Brittany was trying to go into a classroom at school during lunch break. One of the boys in the class decided that he didn't want Brittany to come in so he was closing the door to keep her out. She put her foot in the way to prevent him from doing it (in the side with the hinges....I don't know why there, but she did) and he closed it anyway.... all the way shut. She screamed and screamed but he wouldn't open it up for her for about 15 seconds. When he finally did, she ran down the hall to the office. The secretary had her take off her shoes (which were lace up shoes, not sandals) and socks to take a look. As she did that it was more than obvious that her toe was in big trouble. It dangled by just a small piece of skin, being cut between the bottom of her nail and her top knuckle. Within seconds she was surrounded by staff members trying to help and not knowing at all what to do. The secretary tried to call me at home, but little did we all know I was actually pulling away from the school, having just dropped Jenna off for Kindergarten, and then heading into town for some shopping. So she tried to call me on my cell, but John had taken it so he could call into the post office during work, at the time we only had one cell phone. She tried to get John to stop in the middle of his route and come and take Brittany to the hospital. But the secretary wasn't very clear on the situation and John thought she had just hurt it, possibly had it broken, but what can you really do for a broken toe anyway? So he told her that he couldn't come and that he was sorry. She tried to call me again, but of course she couldn't find me. One more call to John and this time she told him, quite urgently, that her toe was in fact about to fall off. So he called the post office and told them the situation as he scrambled to make it to the school. In the mean time Mrs. Barney, Jenna's kindergarten teacher, asked Jenna if she knew where I was going after I had dropped her off. Taking a guess she said Wal-Mart (where else?) So she used her cell and called a lady from our ward who works there, and asked her to page me and have me call her back. Once I heard what was going on I ran to the hospital. (after checking out since I didn't realize exactly what was going on either. No one said it was falling off, just that it had been hurt.)
To make this already long story a little shorter, I had a friend come and get Savanah for me since she wasn't allowed back in the E.R. John stayed for awhile, and we were able to find someone to help give her a blessing, but since I was there and things were being taken care of, he left to finish up. We had several nurses and doctors come in and out,and every time they would look at it, screw up their faces and not say anything. Which in my opinion is worse that saying what they think. They decided the best thing to do was to clean it and wrap it until we could make it into the orthopedic surgeon a few days later. As the doctor was rinsing it, the dangling piece fell onto the bed. Not that the end of the toe could have been saved anyway, there just wasn't enough tissue. So now she was left with a really stumpy toe, with about 1/4" of bone sticking out the top.

The next few days Brittany was pampered like crazy. The boy who had caused the accident, brought over flowers, candy, a huge stuffed bear, books.... her friends bought her some flowers, and she was the new superstar at school.
When we finally were able to make it to our appointment I had myself worried sick that she would need skin grafting, or maybe that they would have to trim her bone. We took off the bandage at the office and I was stunned to see that her toe was growing back. It still looked groady, but there was definite toe growing back. We were told that she would never have a toenail on that toe since it had fallen off and you need the cuticle, and nail bed for a nail. But low and behold, there was a definite cuticle, and nail bed there. We continued to go back every couple of weeks and the toe got better looking every time. I began to wonder if maybe I had made it worse in my head that it really was, but I have talked to several people where were there in the office (some of them quite traumatized  and they too are certain that there is no way that she should have a nail. But a nail she did have. It wasn't ever the best looking nail, and it took a lot of effort to try to keep it looking somewhat normal. But at least there was a nail.