Submitted by punkkshifter t3_10wupcm in tifu
This happened about 2 years ago, but I think it’s high time I tell my most shameful work story.
So I’m a cook, working the sauté station on a weekday night.I have glasses but think they make me look dorky so I don’t wear them often. Took a steak in a pan out of the oven and worked it on the stove top for a minute before transferring the steak to a cutting board to rest. About a minute later my chef tells me the pan is on fire (because i had forgotten to turn off the burner) and the pan is in flames with all the oil/steak fat.
I respond immediately by taking the first pan in sight, which happened to be the stack fresh from the dish pit. Since the bottom of the pan was wet, (usually smothering a fire like this foolproof) the water on the bottom met with the oil and vaporized. The edge of the pans perfectly lined up to hit just my eyes, vigilante mask style. It was horrible. Thankfully didn’t scream, but jesus did that hurt.
My chef saw and immediately ran to the dish pit to fill a huge bowl of cool clean water, then dragged my ass there and dunked my head in telling me to blink for a solid minute (thank you chef) After about 10 minutes of the saline wash we had at work and the amount of pain I got a ride to the hospital.
So got to the ER and got both eyeballs flushed with a liter of saline each, which involved me being strapped to a table inverted so my feet were in the air and my face was by the ground with thick ass plastic bitches in my eyes to give the saline wash. (Bonus points cos the basin to catch the saline got fucked up and spilled it all over he floor, and when the cleaning guy came in, just looked at me with a mixture of fear anxiety and hope asked “is that water?”)
Got transferred to another hospital because it was 11 or so at that point and I needed to see an eye specialist, so one ambulance ride later I was in a hospital stall deal, crying in pain, with nurses coming every so often but not enough since i wasn’t given any pain medicine besides numbing eye drops strictly administered by the nurses. At this point nobody was saying anything reassuring about my vision, which was very concerning. I honestly thought I’d have severe permanent damage to my eyes and vision.
Eventually I got discharged (after like 6 hours and at 3 in the morning) with a shit ton of meds and saw an eye specialist the next day who gave me more stuff to put in my eyeballs, a medicated contact lense for the eye that got the worst, and those good good numbing eye drops.
Ended up with burns not only on my corneas, but my eyelids, the corners of my eyes, and below my eyes. one of the burns actually looked like a huge cat eye. Needless to say, quite painful to happen and to recover from.
3 weeks off work, most of it spent in the dark, and getting new glasses because i didn’t wear them at work. My vision is significantly worse than before, but nothing the glasses can’t fix. Lesson learned.
TL;DR Burned my eyeballs at work with a stupid mistake without my glasses and spent 6 hours in the hospital and 3 weeks off of work for it, now the glasses are needed cos my vision is shittier.