Normally, when I injure myself, the seconds following the injury are generally filled with lots of expletives, hopping up and down and flailing of the injured body part.   On this glorious Spring morning when I threw up the window and crushed my bird finger between the frame of the lower window and the frame on top, there was no cursing, only a grown man laying on the ground with alligator tears in his eyes, not wanting to look at the damage.  The pain was breathtaking.

When I composed myself enough to look at the damage, I saw through my watery eyes a big chunk of skin below my fingernail hanging on for dear life, blood coming from the quick of my nail and my nail turning purple.  After a few minutes of shock, I managed to get to a sink, get the thing cleaned with Betadine and wrapped in with a bandaid.  I then battled through a couple waves of nausea, cold sweats, and I nearly passed out.

It has been four hours since the event and at the moment, I am in a wait and see mode, however, I know that if I need to go to the doctor or nearby minute clinic, the visit will count toward my HDHPs deductible and I can pay for it out of my Health Savings Account if necessary.  I put some money in the HSA earlier this year, so the money's there if I need it.

Now the Anti-HSA folks would probably point to me and say, that I am a classic example of why Health Savings Accounts are no good, because would say the HSA keeps people from going to the Doctor.   To them, I say Bull Spit!  Stupidity and/or poverty keeps people from going to the doctor.  If this thing starts to look, smell, or become more painful than it is right now, I'll go in.  In the old world of traditional insurance, having paid thousands of dollars in premiums and "it only costing $40" (what a crock) to go see the doctor, I would have felt like I was not getting the value of my insurance if I didn't "run myself in."

Now this is a total tangent, but once my nausea passed I couldn't help but think about The Greatest Generation, other veterans and our fellow Americans serving in the armed forces in Iraq and around the world who have been injured while protecting me.   Makes one small albeit painful finger seem pretty meek in the scheme of things.