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I was married only a couple months before this. My newlywed husband and I had been at a friend’s house, soaking in the hot tub, drinking a few beers. On the way home we got into an argument. It was over a hypothetical poker game, and somehow, between the beers and the hot tub and the heat of the summer, it escalated into a full blown yelling match.
We pulled into our apartment building, in downtown Birmingham. We had a large deck facing the driveway and parking area. We got out of the car, still screaming at each other. My husband was much larger than me; about six feet tall and weighing in at around 200 pounds or so. I am 5’4” and 120 pounds soaking wet. He made it out of the car first. As I came up the back steps leading to our back deck, he stood in front of the door way. He told me that I was not coming into HIS house.
The rage overtook me. How dare he try and block my path. I lived here. I paid half the bills. I owned half the furniture. I would be damned if some man was going to tell me I wasn’t welcome in my own home. My first instinct was to kick him. Hard. Maybe in the groin. But he was much larger than me, and I realized the alcohol was clouding his judgment, and he was already angry. What if he kicked me back?
The apartments and houses in this part of Birmingham are typically much older homes. Full of charm, but with old home problems. The door on the back deck was a glass paneled door, and if often stuck; meaning you had to push with authority at times to get it open.
It was hot. I was wearing brown leather Eddie Bauer sandals. I reared back, and kicked at the wooden frame portion of the door, right past where my husband was standing, second panel up, probably close to 18 or 24 inches from the ground. I missed. I hit the glass.
The door burst open. I immediately crashed inward and landed inside the house, just past the dining room table. The lights were off in the house. That’s when I felt it. It hit my stomach. A strange, sort of nauseating feeling, like I was about to pass out. I immediately knew something very bad had happened.
“Bart,” I said. “Something’s wrong.” He had walked past me in a huff making his way toward the kitchen. “Whatever,” was his response. He turned the kitchen light on. Just then I saw every bit of color leave his face.
It’s a strange moment when it happens. Everything that was just a second ago, so very important, all of a sudden, didn’t matter anymore. He grabbed one of his t-shirts that happened to be lying close by and wrapped it around my ankle. Blood was pouring everywhere. “Can you walk?” he asked. “I think so,” I said as calmly as I could. He said he was going to get the car and I would meet him downstairs. The walk down my steps was surreal.
Once, years before, I was driving a car and the front axle went out. I could turn the wheel as hard right as I wanted, and the car only drifted in whatever direction it felt like. It was the same sensation. My foot floated and twisted loosely in my shoe. I was turning the steering wheel, but the tires weren’t moving. I assumed it was from the blood pooling in my shoe. My foot just can’t get any traction.
We lived two blocks from St. Vincent’s hospital. We came in damn near sideways. Bart jumped out of the car in front of the emergency room doors. He told me to sit tight; that he was going to get help. As I sat there, I could feel the life drain from me. I knew if I waited any longer (it felt like eternity) I would surely bleed to death. I opened the car door. I hobbled slowly from the passenger seat. I felt dizzy. Small black specks were starting to float in front of my eyes. The nauseating feeling in my stomach grew more severe. Had to make it. I started trying to walk. I limped, half-dragging my useless foot and faced the sliding glass doors in front of me. They didn’t move. My dizzy head couldn’t stand there any longer and try to figure it out. I spotted more doors off the right. I dragged-limped over to them. They opened. There was a long hallway. The dark spots got bigger. I laid down - right in the middle of the hallway. At this point I realized it was either lay down or fall down. I chose to lay. A nurse spotted me. “Honey, are you alright?” she asked as she leaned over me. All I could do was raise my head, point at my foot, and say “I cut myself. My ankle.”
I could see, out of the corner of my eye, my poor husband, followed by a medical team and a gurney, making their way to our car. I can only imagine their confusion, as they approached an empty vehicle, passenger door open and a trail of blood leading to yet another door. They hoisted me onto the gurney and started to wheel me into the emergency room. “BP 66 over 22!” I heard the nurse to my left yell to her cohorts. I shot straight upright on the bed. “Is that my blood pressure?” I asked, completely wild eyed. “Yes!” She practically yelled her response at me. “Well, that’s not good,” I informed her, just in case she was unsure. “I know,” she responded, “now lay back down.”
And that’s it. That’s how I completely severed my Achilles tendon. At the time, I had no idea. I just thought I had cut myself badly, possibly severing an artery or something. It was later pointed out, while laying on a hospital bed, (by my husband, to the doctor on staff), that hey, that Vienna sausage looking thing coming out of my leg, looks like it might be a tendon. It was. I’ve not eaten a Vienna sausage since then, by the way. They stitched me up, and I met with a surgeon the next day. I had a tendon repair surgery, and spent about six weeks in a cast, followed by a couple more months in a walking boot, followed by a few more months of incredibly painful physical therapy, to learn how to use my foot again. I now have permanent surgical staples in my ankle holding my tendon together; reminding me on a daily basis that if you’re going to lose your temper and put your foot through a glass door, you should probably be wearing boots.
