Barefoot on the Boardwalk

At the beginning of the summer of my freshman year in high school, I took a trip to the beach with one of my friends. We walked barefoot on the boardwalk, and I ended up with a splinter in my foot. I tried to pull as much out as I could, but we drove home since it was still fairly painful. We cleaned and washed it, and didn't think much of it for the week. 

By the next Saturday, my foot had started to swell, and a red area had started to spread around the area the splinter had been in. We took a trip to the doctor to have it checked out. They flushed out the wound to get rid of any remaining pieces of the splinter, and told me I was good to go and it should heal soon. 

The next week it was still inflamed and red, and this time when we went to the doctor they drew a line around the red area and said if it spread outside of that line to come back. It rapidly spread, so we returned for them to do a minor surgery to open and clean the wound. I was put on crutches with an estimated recovery of 1-2 weeks. During this time we were told to daily clean and open the wound to make sure that no germs or bacteria were staying in the area. It was an incredibly painful time for me. 

After 2 weeks of what felt like torture, the area was still in awful condition. They took me in for a second extensive surgery that required me to be under an anesthetic. 

By this time they had conducted a number of cat scans, x-rays and the like to make sure that none of the splinter remained in my foot. All of the tests revealed nothing, which was why our doctor was so surprised she nearly fell out of her chair when she discovered a 3-inch piece of the splinter that was stuck to the side of one of my tendons. 

She brought it out to show my mum, and told her that it was a miracle that they found the splinter when they did. She said if it had been in my foot for even a week longer there would have been a chance they would have had to amputate my foot to keep the infection from spreading to my heart. All of the nurses in the surgery agreed that there were angels watching out for me that day, and gave my mum and I the chance to tell them about Jesus. 

And so, God winks... ;)

by Chloe Lukasiewicz