The One with the Pepper Spray...

Everyone knows that one of my all-time favorite TV Shows is "Friends," I absolutely love it! I've seen every episode at least 3 to 10 times and no matter how many times I've seen them, they still make me laugh out loud--literally. I've noticed (since I've been recording them daily on my DVR--another one of my favorite things in life!) that all the episodes are called "The One...."

"The One with the Tea Leaves," "The One After Rachel & Joey Kiss," "The One Where Chandler Takes a Bath," "The One with Monica's Thunder," "The One Where Eddie Won't Go," "The One Where Ross Is Fine." See, every single episode is named "The One..." so, I've decided that I'm going to start calling SOME of my entries "The One," and today....well, today is....

The One with the Pepper Spray......

Truth be told, this entry could also be titled "The One where Sarah is a dumb-ass". But, I digress.

I got up today and had a lovely morning. I was feeling kind of blah and just frustrated in general. Not about anything good or imparticular, mind you, just kind of down. Anyway, I watched a few cooking shows, enjoyed a cup of coffee, called Grandma and meditated. Of course, I felt better after I meditated. I always do! Then I decided to go pick up my paycheck from work and surprise Colin at his work. Yesterday, he wanted to go to the Antique Market and so I thought I'd be nice and surprise him. And all would have gone as planned....if only I hadn't had my little accident.

Yesterday, Colin and I went to the Swap Meet. I bought a bra, a pair of socks and some Pepper Spray. I got the latter as a means of self-defense. I'm a physically small person and I think it's a good thing for women to carry some sort of self-defense with them. So I bought the Pepper Spray in its cute little case on sale and walked out.

Fast forward to about 1:10pm today, and well....that Pepper Spray, it wasn't so cute anymore. It was downright PAINFUL!

Let me tell you how it happened:

I was sitting outside Colin's work waiting for him to come out. I pulled out my Pepper Spray and decided to see if the trigger pump worked properly. There was not a single person within 30 feet of me and I was bored, I would NEVER have "tested" the Pepper Spray if someone had been even remotely close to me. I'm not THAT stupid. But, since no one was around, I wanted to make sure the trigger worked so that in case of emergency, it wouldn't fail me in my time of need. Hopefully, by the grace of God, I will never HAVE to use it. But, just in case, I thought "I'd better make sure it sprays." Kind of like you would test Hair Spray before you buy it. Same pump/trigger function. Anyway, I had the Pepper Spray in hand and opened it up, I went to spray it AWAY from me and lo and behold, a BLAST of WIND comes up and blows the Pepper Spray back into my direction and RIGHT on to my face and into my left eye. OUCH!

Now, allow me to clarify that I did not spray myself intentionally, BUT...the damn wind decided otherwise. Normally, I like wind, this afternoon--it was my nemessis.

So, the Pepper Spray goes directly into my left eye, which imemdiately shuts and I think "Oh Shit!" My eye is watering and BURNING! Hey, it's called PEPPER SPRAY for a REASON! Then I feel the area around my mouth (Thank God my mouth wasn't open!) and my nose being to burn. I cough a bit and have a moment of "oh my god, what do I do now?"

My eye starts to water something fierce and then I begin to FREAK OUT! I wasn't sure if I was going to be blinded (literally) by this stuff, if it was going to do permanent damage to my eye or what. I just didn't know so I became scared. Very scared. I run into Colin's work and head for the bathroom to try and wash my eye out--and holy shit--water made it WORSE--10 x's worse!

So, Colin comes out and I tell him to Google the number for Poisin Control on his phone and call his mom. I call my mom too. My mom says to flush it with water, so does Poisin Control, his mom says to try milk--I think "okay, but why?" (Not that I cared, I would've tried anything at the point.) She says that milk will COOL the effects of the pepper spray and cut down on the insineration that is taking place on my face.

Have I mentioned before how much I LOVE my mother-in-law?! Well, I do--and I especially loved her today! What a godsend her tip was! MILK--God Bless the MILK!

By the grace of God, again, Colin works next door to a Wal-Mart--normally, I'm not a Wal-Mart fan. But today, I didn't care. Colin runs into Wal-Mart, grabs some milk and we head back to the car where he proceeds to pour the lovely, COLD MILK in my left eye and onto my entire face! And oh Hallelujah, the RELIEF!! The milk totally helped!

Now, if you didn't know WHY my husband was pouring milk in my eyes and on my face, as I'm leaning BACKWARDS out the driver's side of my car--well, it probably looked QUITE ODD! I'm positive some people were walking by going "what the hell?!" But, I didn't care how it looked. All I knew is the milk was helping a lot!

So, it dawns on me that the burning is reduced by the milk, but only when it's on my face directly, so I head back into Wal-Mart, make Colin buy another carton of milk (he'd gotten a tiny milk before) and purchase 2 clean wash cloths.

I take the milk and the washcloths into the bathroom, start pouring the milk over 1 of of the washcloths and immediately put it on my face. Ahhh, more relief!

I must've looked even MORE ridiculous doing in the bathroom, but hey, I was inside a Wal-Mart and we all know what kind of crazies go there. Sorry, but it's true.

Anyway, after my third or fourth milk facial, I head to the eye doctor (also in Wal-Mart), and tell them what happened. They just looked at me, sort of perplexed like "okay, is she crazy or stupid?" Yeah, I know, I told you this entry could've been named "The One Where Sarah's a Dumb-ass" But, they were very kind and gave me a thing of eye drops for FREE! God Bless them, seriously! I walk out with my eye drops and instructions to put them in my eyes every 10 minutes or so for the next few hours, and twice daily for about a week. That's a can do!

The drops helps, but my face is still burning. My left eye is totally fine now, I mean, it's stinging, but it's no longer THROBBING with pain.

I walk back to my car, convince Colin that I can see just fine and drive home with no problems. So I do. I get home and take a shower and am reminded that as much I love water--right now, it is truly my enemy. Water SPREADS the heat, the pain and the BURN! Milk cools it! (Normally, I hate milk, but today it was my best friend!). I endure the burn in a cold shower and make sure to wash my face, hair and hands WELL!

You have to understand that after milk dries, it becomes filmy. Milk is very perishable and has natural sugar in it, so after a while, it becomes sticky....and then it becomes sour. I was willing to be sticky, I was not however, willing to be sour. Thankfully, the shower took care of that.

After the shower I did feel better and ended up having a pretty nice day. My eye still hurts a bit, but it's more irritated than anything. The only part that's still burning is the right side of my right hand, where most of the Pepper Spray went.

The good news is that PEPPER SPRAY WORKS--and it works VERY well! The very best news is that it didn't leave permanent damage. Thank you, Lord! And if I ever was in a situation where I HAD to use it, it would definitely give me the time I needed to run away.

I wouldn't severely damage the other person, but it would definitely stop them in their tracks. If it was sprayed into BOTH eyes, oh my gosh, it would be (and would have been today) so much worse. The other good news? Colin was REALLY calm and forgave me for being a totally freaking out BRAT while I was imperil. Thank you, Colin. The bad news? I was in writhing in pain and we never did it make to the Antique Market.

Oh well, maybe tomorrow. Apparently, we weren't supposed to be there. God has a funny way of keeping you where He wants you--and he certainly has a sense of humor! LOL!

I definitely had angels around me today and what could've been a horrible situation wasn't that bad after all. I learned that Pepper Spray does indeed work, that I need to be WAY more careful with it, and that I can (and have to) laugh at myself.

I will be laughing at this story for years, and I'm sure others will too! "The day that Sarah was a dumb-ass and stupididly sprayed herself with Pepper Spray."

My goodness, what a day!

One last thing, what surprised me is how CLEAN my left eye actually felt, and how CLEAR my sinuses were. That Pepper Spray just cleared it ALL up! But, next time, I will find another way to clear out my sinuses. And hopefully, one that's a little less painful!

Thank You, Lord, for keeping my safe today, for giving me something to laugh about, for putting me next to the people and resources I needed to help myself and for sharing your sense of humor with me.

In Light N' Love,
-Sarah Liz :)