It’s been just over three months since I almost accidentally killed myself.
No. Really.
This is a close-up of the leg on my stepladder that collapsed, resulting in my fall.
On Sunday, October 23, 2022, I was working on dismantling an old, chainlink fence on our property when my accident occurred. I was on a ladder, disassembling the fence with a Saws-All and bolt cutters. Because I was using power tools, I decided to wear a safety helmet with ear and eye protection (little did I know how important that would be).
The ladder I grabbed for this job was a light-weight, aluminum stepladder – just one of several we have around the house and property. This one was the most convenient to my location and I didn’t think twice about using it. That was a definite mistake.
I’m a big (too big) guy. And there’s no doubt in my mind that even though I wasn’t standing on the top step of the ladder, my weight was more than the ladder was built to handle – safely – and I paid a pretty severe consequence because of that.
None of that crossed my mind, of course, as I was eight to ten feet up in the air, wrestling with the metal tube the served as the top of the fence. That’s when I felt something shift underneath me.
One of the legs of the stepladder I was standing on collapsed. And in an instant, I was on the ground. Or, to be more precise, on one of the large stones located at the base of the now-collapsed fence.
It wasn’t the fall that hurt. It was the landing.
This limestone block serves as the base of the chainlink fence I was dismantling. This is where I landed when I fell in October of 2022.
I came down on my back – or, to be more precise, on my right scapula. I landed squarely on the stone and heard a crunching sound that sounded more like someone stepping on a bag of chips than of bones breaking. Who knew that’s what breaking ribs sounded like?
Fortunately, I didn’t lose consciousness when I hit the ground. I was lying in a tangle of wild rose bushes, brambles, burrs, sticks and pieces of chainlink fence – hoping the worst I had done was knock the wind out of myself. I tried to breath in and knew immediately I was worse off than that. The stabbing pain in my chest and back told me the ribs weren’t just bruised (I’ve felt that before and this was way worse than that).
Little did I know, I’d also shattered my right scapula and punctured my lung. Looking back on it now, the punctured lung explains why I was having such a hard time taking in a good breath. And the broken ribs were just giving me a preview of how much pain and misery they could cause for months to come.
I needed help.
Who ya’ gonna call?
Once I realized there was no way I was going to get back on my feet and shake things off, I decided to call out for some help. My wife, Caroline, was working on a project on the other side of the house and our oldest son, Christian, was inside. I gave out a yelp and then a yell.
Would anyone hear me? I wasn’t sure how long I could go or just how loud I could be given I wasn’t able to take in much of a breath.
Fortunately, I heard the power tool Caroline was using suddenly stop. She yelled something back to me, but to be honest, I couldn’t understand what she was saying. Panic was starting to set in and I kept trying to reassure myself that things would work out. I yelled, as loud as I could, that I’d fallen and that someone needed to come and help me.
Caroline, very wisely, called Christian and told him I was in trouble.
Chris, our oldest child, has always been a bit impetuous. Always willing to jump into things if he feels it’s the right thing to do, it’s a personality trait that served him well in the 82nd Airborn (where he loved jumping out of perfectly good airplanes) and not-so-well at other times. In this case, however, his approach to life – and his training as an EMT prior to his military service – served me well.
The twisted and broken stepladder, post-fall.
He ran out of our house and made his way to where I had been working. He dug through the brambles, tossing the broken ladder aside and helping to clear the brush around me to check things out. All the while, he was on the phone with 911, getting volunteers from the Riverdale Volunteer Fire Department and EMTs from Medic mobilized to cart me off to a nearby emergency room.
You gotta love it when a plan comes together
As many of you know, I served my city of Riverdale as its mayor for four years. It was fun and I learned a lot. I had the good fortune of getting to know our local, volunteer fire department and a number of other professionals and volunteers from throughout the county who work on emergency situations involving public safety, public health, disasters, etc. I count the folks at MEDIC/EMS among them.
When my personal disaster hit, the EMTs who arrived (within minutes) of Christian’s call worked flawlessly with our local first responders. Despite having to drive up and down a driveway that more closely resembles the lunar surface than it does an actual driveway, they still had my IV in and were working on helping me achieve some level of comfort by the time the ambulance rolled out of my driveway and onto State Street.
We were at the hospital in a matter of minutes – despite my request we take a side trip through the Whitey’s drive-through. More importantly, the emergency room staff at Genesis East were attentive and efficient. From my perspective at least, everything worked the way it was supposed to – from first response to emergency care.
I shared this experience with my friends on social media once I’d finally made it out of the Emergency Department at Genesis East and into my room on the 5th floor of the hospital, surviving an evening and overnight stay on heavy medications and the watchful eye of a one-of-a-kind night nurse (more on that later). As I posted to Facebook …
Well, yesterday was quite the adventure.
I was working in the yard and had a stepladder collapse under me while I was taking apart the chain link fence around the tennis court. I fell about 6-7 feet and landed on my back, right shoulder and head on the concrete curb surrounding the court.
I was wearing a helmet, so no concussion, but I broke 4-5 ribs, my right scapula, and punctured my right lung. I spent the night in the hospital and may need surgery. I meet with the doctor later this morning.
I’m sore and can only breath in short breathes, but I’ll be okay.
Special thanks to Christian (first on the scene and made the call to 911), the Riverdale Volunterer Fire Department, George Miller, Dale Hupp, Randy and Bruce Bowers, the EMTs from Medic, and the staff at Genesis East for scraping me off the pavement and starting the process of putting me back together again. (I’m sure there were others at the scene, but those were the only ones I can recall).
More to come, indeed.
