Ow ow ow.

[eyesroll]

I smacked myself in the arm with a hot cookie sheet (see my other post). It didn't hurt too badly Saturday -- I put some cold water on it, followed the drill -- but today it's all blistered and hurts like hell. It's gonna scar.

An inch and a half long, half-inch wide.

I burn myself almost every time I do bulk baking or cooking, but this one's a doozy.

So...what are your battle scars?

[OldLeftieLawyer]

1. Ask your physician

to write you a prescription for Topicort (it's available as a generic now, which works just as well), and keep a tube of it in the kitchen. It's a corticosteroid ointment, and every time I hit something hot with my bare flesh, I slather the stuff on.

Within five minutes, it's like it never happened. The cold water and stuff just don't work. Remember the old wives' tale about putting butter on a burn? That doesn't work either.

[kestrel91316]

9. Yep, works for me, too. When I get a kitchen burn I do the cold water

thing for about 10 minutes, then put some hydrocortisone cream on it - JUST ONCE. As a veterinarian I know all too well how steroids can delay healing, so I do not keep putting it on. It also works great as a one-time treatment for sunburn (over small areas, not the whole body).

[wryter2000]

2. Sorry

I was really upset one night (a friend had just told me that her husband -- now ex -- had almost beaten her to death). I had my metal oven thermometer in the oven. I got it out with a gloved hand and promptly put it in my other, unprotected, hand. It all healed, but it did blister and hurt like hell.

I ususally cut into my fingernails with my knives. Not my fingers, just my nails.

[eyesroll]

3. I do that too!

My nails are pretty short now so it hasn't happened in awhile.

I've cut my fingers on occasion -- usually a little nick. Once, my hand slipped when I was cutting up a chicken with poultry shears and I put a big gash in my thumb. I should have gotten stitches but didn't, and eventually it healed.

[eleny]

6. Me too!

I'm reminded of the Frugal Gourmet's admonition to tuck in the fingers of the hand holding the veggie or whatever when slicing. Of course I do forget from time to time and slice a nail. It always gives me the willies.

[livetohike]

4. Oyster knife scars - two of them

and they needed stitches each time :-(.

Burns too numerous to mention. Usually from taking cookie sheets out of the oven and hitting the top of my hand on the rack.

[Stinky The Clown]

5. Yeeeowch! I feel lucky. I'm stain resistent!

I got a hot pan burn about 6 months ago on the back of my finger. Cooked it! It was thru a few layers of skin and very painful. The doc wanted me to see her, but when I heard they wanted to give me a tetanus shot, I begged off. I'd rather be burned than get a shot!

But I'm lucky, too. I have very few scars and none of them are burns. I guess being a crusty, mean old SOB is the reason. :)

[fortyfeetunder]

7. Barbecue burns

I've started using that mesquite charcoal in my Weber kettle, and those guys burn white hot! It's obvious now I need some rugged and insulated barbecue tools. I've burned arms and hands on the grill. Any more and I might as well slather some BBQ sauce on them.

[SW FL Dem]

8. I have one of those scars.

I hit my forearm on the edge of the crockpot. I thought I had turned it off. It blistered and hurt like hell. I did put the neosporin scar solution on it as soon as it healed. It's been a few years, the scar is still discolored but isn't raised.

[LiberalinNC]

10. I dropped a very large knife, sharp edge (point of knife) into my foot,

the knife landed standing straight up. I have a scare in between my two toes. This happened w/ I was about 10 years old - so the scare is over 30 years old.

[bearfan454]

11. OUCHIE !

Yikes.

[bearfan454]

12. I have had hot grease splatter and land on my foot when I am

barefoot. That will make you dance.

[calico1]

13. About two years ago I (stupidly)

used a very sharp knife to get off the plastic wrap around the top of a wine bottle. The knife slipped and I stuck it in my index finger of the hand holding the bottle. Cut went down to the bone and I had to get stitches. It took a whole year before that part of my finger stopped feeling numb from the damage to the nerves. I thought I'd never get it back.

[Sanity Claws]

14. Lavender essential oil or aloe vera

Surprisingly, it's an antispetic. The legend is that someone burned himself and placed his hand in lavender oil by mistake, instead of water. The hand healed completely.
Aloe vera is also good for burns. It may be too late to use now but it is excellent to use at the time of the burn. A Just don't be afraid to cut off a leaf to get all that good goozey stuff on the burn.

[Stinky The Clown]

15. Aloe vera is a real miracle plant

We used to have a pot of it, but we have black thumbs. Our house is a dead zone for any plants. We can kill philodendrons.

We were in Florida for a few days this summer. Sparkly got a really bad sunburn. Some aloe did the trick. For maybe the first time in her life, she tanned after she peeled. All with no pain ... just lotsa itching.

[Sanity Claws]

16. I used it for a sun burn too

I was in Costa Rica and did not appreciate how you can burn in 20 minutes when you're near the equator. Yup, I was by the pool reading about 20 minutes. Later that day, we were in San Jose and went into a market that sold herbs and others plants for medical purposes. He sold me this huge aloe leaf and when I got back to my hotel, I cut into it and smeared the stuff over my thighs which by this time were beet red and hurting. The next day I felt so much better. It truly is a great plant.

[Dora]

18. I'll vouch for the lavender & aloe

Whenever I get sunburned, I mix a few drops of lavender with pure aloe vera gel, and apply it liberally.

The next day the burn and my discomfort has faded.

[mandyky]

17. I used to be a short order cook

cleaning the grill at closing one night (with gease and a pumice stone and then the screen thingy) my hand slipped and most of my fingers on one hand got terrible grease burns. I had to go to get fingerprints to join the Army that week - OUCH!! Not that bad of scars but what pain. I also worked in a pizza place and part of the frame of the oven fell on my hand - what a blister and a scar - a nickel sized scar on the back of my hand, and it turns purple in the cold. I hate burns! LOL

[catnhatnh]

19. At 14 years old....

my Dad spent an afternoon instructing me with a very sharp knife and a fid how to splice ropes ,since I was to work the summer on my Uncle's oyster boat....I finished that afternoon with 3-4 obviously amateur but servicable eye and line splices and a left hand that should have bled to death all on it's own.....37 years later I still have 5 small scars and warm memories of that day....