We’ve all injured ourselves in dumb ways at one point or another in our lives, right? Okay, it’s confession time: when I was 12, I broke my hand…punching my brother in the head. Let’s just say my parents were not thrilled.
I still haven’t lived that one down.
AskReddit users opened up and shared the dumbest ways they’ve ever been injured.
1. The grape incident.
“Threw a grape in the air to catch it in my mouth.
It fell on the floor and I bent down to pick it up and smashed my face into the window sill.”
2. Shower disaster.
“Showering at a hotel in a small stall with a slippery tile floor. Bent over to wash my feet, my butt hit the tap handle. I slipped, put my hands out to save myself and violently slammed the glass shower door open. I bashed my forehead and bridge of nose on the tile floor, had a major nose bleed and a giant goose egg on my forehead.
I don’t have bangs to cover that up. I thought I had escaped without the black eyes I expected after bashing my nose, but 2 days later I woke up with deep purple swollen eyelids. Luckily I had packed my seldom used makeup to cover the worst of it and I wore a hat in the day time. I’m still shocked the shower door didn’t shatter when it hit the wall.”
3. Ouch! That’s not good.
“I was in the 4th or 5th grade but I jumped down an entire flight of stairs.
Landed hard and hurt my foot. Walked on it for a day or two afterwards turned out I shattered my heel and broke my ankle.”
4. That is brutal.
“Tripped over a storage ottoman trying to jump over it all slick.
Got my toes wedged in the latch and broke my foot in 2 places.”
5. Time to tape the toes together.
“I live in Minnesota so I am used to kicking snow off my boots by slamming my toe part of the boot down on the ground.
Well, it was summer and I happened to get my running shoes absolutely covered in mud, so I instinctively slammed my toes down on the pavement and broke my toes.”
6. Right into the shin.
“Stabbed myself in the leg with a piece of metal.
It was really thin and tapered at the tip so when you swung it you would hear this really cool “Whoosh” sound.
I swung down way to hard and it went right into my shin. Bad times.”
7. That is odd.
“I got out of a long, hot shower and noticed a thread dangling off of my shirt, and when I tried to pull it out it just neatly sliced through several millimeters of my finger.
It was so minor I can hardly even call it an injury, but getting cut by a shirt is definitely the stupidest I’ve had.”
8. Funny but painful.
“Was helping husband replace the bathroom fan, so I was standing on the side of the bathtub.
I had this plastic hook glued to the shower wall to hang a loofa on. I went to get down and slid down the wall and hooked my butt cheek to the wall.
It hurt so bad but was also hilarious. I’m in my 40s and this happened recently.”
9. Getting old is no fun.
“I dropped something behind my couch, leaned over the back to pick it up and cracked a rib.
Was in pain for a week. Getting old is hell.”
10. Could’ve been worse.
“To try to get a cheap laugh out of my ex, I threw a hammer as hard as I could at a tree.
The hammer bounced off the tree, and I turned just in time for it to hit me in the small of my back.
Miracle I’m not paralyzed.”
11. An epic tale.
“When I was a kid, maybe 10 or so, I had recently discovered that the feet on my prosthetics could be unscrewed and moved into different positions, so I “borrowed” and Allen key from my dad and took it to school so I could unscrew my feet and show my friends at recess…non of them were as blown away by this as I’d hoped, pretty sure they were just used to this kind of thing by now haha.
Anyway, the bell went to tell us to go back to class and I very quickly tightened the feet back onto the prosthetics, put my shoes back on and started making my way back to class. As I was walking with a group of my classmates I started to notice my legs felt wobbly. I looked down and with every step my feet were turning outwards slightly. A normal person would have come to the conclusion “oh, I didn’t tighten the screws up enough”.
But not me, I jumped to the conclusion of “HOLY SHIT I CAN CONTROL MY FEET LIKE A ROBOT”. My excitement quickly turned to dread when I realised I don’t know how to control feet (been an amputee since I was a baby) and they kept turning until one was pointing sideways. Despite this I kept trying to walk and after a few more steps the foot just fell off and I managed to slam the now footless prosthetic down, which jarred my knee and hips and caused me to slip over and face plant into the corner of a cement mini wall (one of those waist high walls).
Being a self respecting 10yo I started bawling my eyes out, which caught the attention of the new teacher. It’s her first day and the only disabled student is in pieces, (the foot got thrown backwards when it fell off) with a bloodied nose, screaming like a banshee. She didn’t really know what to do since I couldn’t get back up, so she gave me some tissues for my nose and made a very confused call to the maintenance man asking if he knows how to fix prosthetics so I can get to the school nurse.”
12. That is messed up.
“Walked onto a manhole cover that was not placed on correctly.
Ended up in the hospital and had to to have 3 surgeries over 4 months.”
13. Not a good idea.
“My friend saw a jellyfish on the beach then kicked it. Like on purpose and knowing what it was.
They had to go to the ER.”
14. Watch out!
“Riding my bike home in 5th grade slowly alongside my walking friends.
Friend : Drew look where you’re going
Drew : naw dude I’m good at biking I can do it with my eyes closed
Friend : no really dude, look out
Drew : naw man, I’m good
Instantly crashes into a parked car, mess up my bike chain, have to drag my bike home in shame and explain to my mom why my knee and lip are bleeding.”
15. Walking from now on.
“Thought I could walk my dog on a leash while riding my bike. Dog saw a squirrel and yanked me off my bike. I broke a few bones in my hand.
Doc was like “what did you expect would happen?” “
16. Undone by a paper bag.
“Bending over to pick up a paper bag. A completely empty paper grocery store bag. It was standing upright, not even laying on the floor. I barely had to even bend down to pick it up.
Somehow this triggered a cosmic alignment between two vertebrae and nerve cluster because suddenly I fell to the floor in crippling pain, could not get my back straight and had to crawl to the living room so I could lay on the carpeted floor and try to stretch it out. I ended up fucked up like this for days and had to have physical therapy to slowly work out the pinched nerve. I was basically walking like Quasimodo for a couple weeks.
People would assume I was in an accident or lifting some boulder like Hercules or saving a child pinned under a car. But nope. I was undone by an empty paper bag.”
17. This person is definitely accident-prone.
“Wow, so many options.
Most recent. Working under my truck on a slight slope while on a creeper. Grabbed the undercarriage and yanked hard to slide to the back, forgot about slope and used excessive force. I probably would have wound up in the street, had all 250lbs of me not been decelerated by the top of my head hitting the differential. Woke up and it was darker and my neck was sore. I also had a horn like a unicorn (big lump). 2 weeks on concussion watch and wearing a hat to conceal the lump.
Most memorable. 8yo me finds a weird blue light bulb in the creek. Has what looks like mica inclusions in the glass and steel wool instead of a filament. 8yo me goes into the closet with a 9v battery and 2 wires to find out what it looks like lit. I hold it between index and middle finger and apply the wires. Eureka! Like a flash I realize. It’s a flash bulb. I am now blind, in a closet, 2 fingers melted to a hot flash bulb. Keystone Kops antics ensue.
Strangest. Talking to my sister on the landline in the kitchen. I have raccoon hands, always touching things, picking things up, etc while talking. At one point I wind up with a peanut butter cookie and an open flame. Even I don’t know how I got there, lol. Peanut butter cookie winds up on fire. I try to throw it into the sink, miss badly, cookie breaks up and flaming pieces fall on my bare feet. I learn there are a LOT of nerve endings on top of my feet. Screaming somehow communicates problem to sister, who I can hear laughing on the dropped handset.
Bonus. Forgot the cookie lesson regarding nerve endings. Barbecuing in a Weber kettle. In flip flops. I spread out the pile of briquettes once they were ready. Bottom vents were open and hot embers fell on my feet. Poured beer on my feet and increased the vocabulary of nearby children.”
18. Please don’t ever do that again.
“I was separating my eyelashes (because mascara) with a safety pin.
Stabbed myself in the eyeball.”
Wow. Those are pretty…dumb.
How about you? What’s the stupidest way you’ve ever injured yourself?
Don’t be shy! Tell us in the comments!
