Reminds me of when I was 12 years old and got a “splinter” in my leg. Actually, it was an 8 1/2” piece of Douglas Fir from a parent built school playground slide. The sides of the slide were exposed wood. Not too smart design huh? Well, one afternoon I slid down and my pant leg brushed against the side catching the rough wood and drove an 8 1/2” chunk of wood 3/4”thick tapering to a point into my upper leg just under my hip. It went in and shattered into multiple pieces. After the required surgery and stiches (5 total) and after I healed I told my parents I still felt something in there. After three months a lump appeared and we went back to the doctor. He gave me a shot of xylacane in my leg and made an incision right then and there. He pulled out a three inch long, thick as a pencil piece of wood they had missed the first time. I was lucky to had not gotten any infection. He sewed my back up and I was fine. But as you might imagine: I hate splinters. I kept those pieces of wood for years and showed off my “splinter” to friends like it was a trophy.
I had a little splinter in my finger years ago...one of those little ones that you can't seem to find, and doesn't always bother you, but still often does too...after weeks and weeks it got less and less irritating, to the point I forgot about it until about a year later...it started to bother me again and I started to mess with it again...seemed like there was a small lump there now...kept fooling with it until one day I went after the "lump" with a needle...out popped a white hard thing (left a nice round hole in my finger for a while too) it looked like a little white stone...about 1/4 to 1/3 the size of a BB...looked kinda like a pearl...I figure it had to be that splinter that I never found...my body encapsulated it somehow? I dunno...I kept it, probably still around here somewheres
When I was a teen I got a big Hawthorne thorn in the outside of my thigh. It had broke off and about an 1/8th " was sticking out. My Dad pulled it out with a pair of pliers. It went in around 1 1/2" . I never felt it go in.
Odd that the mri clearly showed the thorn and the doctor did surgery and didn’t remove it. Sorry you had to deal with that for a whole year! Glad it’s over now. Did the foot heal quickly once it was out?
If I didn't have to deal with the thorns after removing it for probably an entire summer or two.. I wear boots around that tree, and my tractor tires have been slimed heh. Keeps the neighbor in his lane too.
I think it was under the ligament? He got to a point where he stopped and didn't wan't to cut more. He was pulling on something that was making my toes move so I think that was ligament. It seems like it was pretty close to the bone and was parallel to the foot structure, if anyone was going to cut any more, it was going to need to be a much more in-depth surgery. He cut out any dead or damaged tissue which was actually great, I really liked the doctor. He did find an encapsulation in that area and removed that. He said that it fell apart when he got it out- entirely mushed organic material. We didn't really think the story had ended because we didn't see a big splinter but after an hour of digging, removing an encapsulation and a bunch of dead tissue, he stitched me up. It was the right thing to do. I didn't really know if he got it or not. It would heal over and looked great, then it would open up and refuse to heal, this went on for maybe 3-4 weeks and I was expecting the stitches to heal in about 2. It was just a little slower than I had expected but it was making progress. I tried to take good care of it but I probably should have taken it a little easier. Finally, I needed to split some wood and my dad was over to help so I just decided that I would be a little hard on it and change the bandage after chopping. That's when it came out. My foot was a little wet from being in my boot and the splinter slipped right out. Once it was out, the incision healed over in 3 days, it was amazing.
The old man that lived in my house before me called himself "hawthorne" and had 30+ of them planted on the lot! WTF?! I don't get why anyone would do that. Thankfully, there was a giant windstorm a few years back that brought down most of them. There were 8 left when we moved in and they are all down now.
We have Hawthorn back in our woods along with tons of Honey Locust. I've gotten bitten by them, but never like that. I'm very careful around them and give them plenty of respect. Both species are great firewood and both species have taken out several tractor tire tubes... Glad you finally got that out of your foot, but sorry that you had to go through all that.
Amazing how the body heals. Maybe the operation provided the route the thorn needed for its final exit Glad it’s now a memory. That must have been disturbing to watch him wiggling your toes
