Brush with death
Friday 3rd July 2009
I'd just got home from picking up my daughter, Jasmine, 5, from nursery when my mobile rang. 'Katie?' a stranger said. 'I'm Brian. I work with Paul…' Oh hell. He'd only been in his new job five minutes, what on earth had he done? I'd waved my boyfriend, Paul Hancock, 25, off at 6.30am that day last June, for his first day as a cavity wall technician. He'd called at lunchtime to tell me things were going OK. But things obviously weren't OK now. 'Are you sitting down?' Brian asked. 'There's been an accident with a broomstick. Paul's been impaled through the backside.' I burst out laughing. 'That's a good one,' I chuckled. But Brian didn't laugh. This really was serious. 'We've called an ambulance,' he said. 'Meet us at The Royal Albert Edward Infirmary in Wigan.'
I felt so confused. How on earth had Paul been impaled on a broomstick? I don't drive, so I called Paul's stepdad, Ged Hill, 40, who lived up the road, to give me a lift. We left Jasmine and her sister, Phoebe, 20 months, with my mum, Pauline Talbot, 45, and after picking up Paul's mum, Karen, we sped to hospital. We were frantic by the time we got to A&E. After 40 minutes, a nurse came to see us. 'Paul's OK, just a bit uncomfortable,' she explained. 'We won't know the full extent of his injuries until we've done more tests.'
We followed her to a ward. Paul was lying on his side in bed. The doctors had cut off his T-shirt and trousers, and he was deathly pale. 'Oh love. What happened?' I cried. 'I don't know,' Paul said, his voice shaking. Then, I saw something propped up against the wall next to his bed. It was a wooden yard brush with a round end. 'What's that?' I gasped. 'That's the brush I was impaled on,' he winced. The top 12 inches were bloodstained. Had it gone in that far? I looked from Paul to the bloody brush and clapped my hand over my mouth in horror. 'Am I going to die?' he wept to the doctors and nurses. No one answered.
He was sent for an ultrasound and X-ray. 'Everything looks fine so far. But the location of the injury means there is a risk of infection,' the doctor explained to us. Eventually, the strong painkillers Paul had been given took effect and he was out cold. I didn't want to leave, but I had to get back to the kids. That night though, Paul was rushed to theatre. His heart rate had dropped and his temperature had shot up. 'I'll call when we know more,' a nurse explained over the phone. I was beside myself until she called at 2am to say that Paul was back on the ward and stable. They'd put a camera inside him and there was no sign of internal bleeding or infection. Talk about relieved. But I didn't sleep a wink all night. All I could think was how on earth had Paul got that broom up his backside.
The next day, he was well enough to tell me. 'I remember being on the back of a work lorry,' he said. 'I jumped down and next thing I knew, I felt a terrible pain between my legs. I felt really sick and when I looked down, the broom was sticking out of my bum. I pulled it out.' 'You did what?' I cringed. 'It was instinct, I wasn't thinking,' he shuddered. He thought he must have fallen at the same time as the broom and landed on top of it. At 6ft 3in and 19st, the impact had been huge. 'It was only stopped from going in further by my feet hitting the ground,' he winced. It made my eyes water just thinking about it. Brian had found Paul on the ground in agony with the broom sticking out of him and had called an ambulance. The broom had gone just to the left of his anus, piercing his flesh and running parallel to his colon until it stopped.
The wound had to be packed with a gauze wadding every day to make it heal from the inside out and his whole back was black with bruises. It was two days before he could lie on his back, and even then, only if he put most of his weight on his healthy buttock. He was understandably in a lot of discomfort. On the third day, I took Jasmine in to see her dad. She insisted on wearing her nurse's costume 'so she could make Daddy better'. Bless.
Five days later, Paul was allowed to come home, but he still needed a community nurse to visit every day to change his dressing, and whenever he went to the loo, a nurse had to bathe his bottom to prevent infection setting in. When I saw the wound, I was shocked. I'd expected there to be a hole, but it looked more like a stab wound.
Paul's friends visited to wish him well but, to be honest, most of them thought the accident was hilarious! 'Hope you don't get too much stick,' they'd joke, or 'Heard about your brush with death…'
Happily, he was able to return to work after three months, although, almost 13 months on, he's still the 'butt' of a lot of jokes. But now, we've learned to laugh along. He's now back working with his old employers at a local container depot. He hasn't offered to sweep up at home since, though. Well, who can blame him!