It is summer here in Sacramento, and a couple of weeks ago, I moved my water distiller from my kitchen to the top of my washing machine in my attached garage to keep the house from getting so warm (it takes 5 hours to distill 1 gallon of water). A couple of days ago, around noon, my water distiller was making a gallon of water, when I decided to do a load of wash. This meant having to move the distiller in the middle of the process, which I have never had to occasion to do. The distiller has a handle on the top, but the top detaches from the water reservoir. In my haste, I lifted the distiller using this handle, and in the middle of the move, the water reservoir disengaged from the part with the handle. The entire gallon of boiling water spilled directly on both sets of bare toes. I’ve never had anything hurt so much.

I had to take a minute to think, then went into the bathroom to run my feet under cold running water in the bathtub. For the rest of the day, I had to cover the burned area with ice wrapped in baggies. Whenever I needed to add more ice to the bags, I could hardly withstand the pain in the burned toes. Luckily, they did not blister nor did the skin come off. I took some time out at 5 p.m. to get on my CHI machine for 25 minutes. I could barely get through it. Then more ice for the rest of the night. I went to bed that night after taking some extra strength Tylenol, wondering how I was going to get to work the next morning, and if I could get to work, what shoes could I wear that wouldn’t hurt me.

I slept soundly that night, and the next morning I woke in amazement to no pain, and I was able to go to work with strappy sandals. The area that was affected was still pretty red, though. What a miracle! The toes that were burned are now turning dark, and the skin around them will probably eventually peel, but not an inkling of pain.

-Nanette (Sacramento, CA)