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I got to thinking about why we hire out our yard work yesterday after a friend made a post about a childhood bicycle accident and her recovery from that experience. Here's what happened to us. One day, I'm minding my own business and possibly reading fic in which Ron Weasley cries every third page, and the next, my husband is scrabbling at the front door like he can't open it. Annoyed, I open the door for him, and he collapses onto the living room floor clutching his leg which is now missing a section of its former topography. California has fallen into the sea, my friends. Apparently, while riding the mower around a crape myrtle, the mower got hung up in the tree, and repeatedly slammed him into a branch that had conveniently broken off to more closely resemble a spear. Multiple times of the slamming. The wound itself is about half an inch deep and is roughly the size of three quarters together. It is the bizarrely vulnerable and hideous color of muscle; it would make a great shade of lipstick.
He's clearly in shock as we go to the ER, but he manages to joke with our elementary school-aged kid, who has to come with us because we have no friends or family to leave her with. He's in the ER for forever because the wound is dirty like a gas station bathroom. He's got bits of tree and leaves and lord knows what else driven deeply inside his leg. They see him instantly but clean the wound for hours.
Here's the the kicker. His wound doesn't look like it's that huge of a deal. It's gross, it clearly hurts, infection is an issue, but it's not like he got shot or exploded or nearly beaten to death by a ninja lady. It's more than a minor injury, but it's not major.
And yet, it takes 8 months for the wound to close. To close! To stop being a wound! And this is with weekly wound care visits and some weird seaweed wrap he had to pack into the wound like the worst spa treatment ever.
The takeaway, my friends? TV and movies seem to get shock down pretty good. Josh was totally able to carry on a conversation, keep on a brave face for the kiddo, even make some black jokes about the situation. But where they seem to drop the ball entirely is the degree to which a physical injury impacts a character's life. I can buy that people can continue to commit extraordinary feats while injured; there's plenty of real life examples to back up that idea. But what kills is me is when a character receives a horrific injury that is completely healed the next week.
I know why TV and movies don't often depict the aftermath of injuries accurately. Because that aftermath is boring. It's all, "Don't forget to buy more gauze!" and "So help me, if you try to play volleyball and tear that thing open again, I'm filing for divorce!" And it keeps you from going through the Gate or piloting a space ship or working the beat--kind of a deal breaker for most shows.
This is why I love fic so much because very often, h/c does get the aftermath of injury right.
So what do y'all think? Tell me your hilarious stories of injury and injury aftermath depicted terribly in media. Tell me which media gets it right. Give me some recs to the best h/c fic.
Or you know, feel free to tell me how you lost your big toe. That works too. :)
He's clearly in shock as we go to the ER, but he manages to joke with our elementary school-aged kid, who has to come with us because we have no friends or family to leave her with. He's in the ER for forever because the wound is dirty like a gas station bathroom. He's got bits of tree and leaves and lord knows what else driven deeply inside his leg. They see him instantly but clean the wound for hours.
Here's the the kicker. His wound doesn't look like it's that huge of a deal. It's gross, it clearly hurts, infection is an issue, but it's not like he got shot or exploded or nearly beaten to death by a ninja lady. It's more than a minor injury, but it's not major.
And yet, it takes 8 months for the wound to close. To close! To stop being a wound! And this is with weekly wound care visits and some weird seaweed wrap he had to pack into the wound like the worst spa treatment ever.
The takeaway, my friends? TV and movies seem to get shock down pretty good. Josh was totally able to carry on a conversation, keep on a brave face for the kiddo, even make some black jokes about the situation. But where they seem to drop the ball entirely is the degree to which a physical injury impacts a character's life. I can buy that people can continue to commit extraordinary feats while injured; there's plenty of real life examples to back up that idea. But what kills is me is when a character receives a horrific injury that is completely healed the next week.
I know why TV and movies don't often depict the aftermath of injuries accurately. Because that aftermath is boring. It's all, "Don't forget to buy more gauze!" and "So help me, if you try to play volleyball and tear that thing open again, I'm filing for divorce!" And it keeps you from going through the Gate or piloting a space ship or working the beat--kind of a deal breaker for most shows.
This is why I love fic so much because very often, h/c does get the aftermath of injury right.
So what do y'all think? Tell me your hilarious stories of injury and injury aftermath depicted terribly in media. Tell me which media gets it right. Give me some recs to the best h/c fic.
Or you know, feel free to tell me how you lost your big toe. That works too. :)
