More Than One Way To Skin A Rat

My leg is still looking a bit nasty, but I gather that's just part of the healing process. I'm on the 5th day since the incident involving my right leg grinding along a 2 ft swath of asphalt and all appears to be progressing well. Showering isn't nearly the ordeal it was a few days ago…I no longer wince from the pain of water hitting the damaged skin.

Fortunately, it was a very small section of my lower leg. It baffles me how competitive cyclists deal with this type of stuff on a regular basis, not to mention on a typically larger span of affected body parts. Pretty much explains why they keep their legs & arms shaved to a smooth, shiny luster. Nothing like having to mess with pesky hairs while treating a nasty bout of road rash.

Which leads me to the worst part of this entire fiasco. Saturday was bad enough, considering I made the grievous error of thinking burn cream would be an apropos topical cure for the road rash. After a day of having that junk on my injury, I can only surmise they call it "burn cream" because it burns like pure hell. So, Sunday, I have to clean off the residue from this crap…a painful endeavor nonetheless. Then came the inevitable…if I were to decide on a proper course of treatment, I would have to attempt shaving the damaged skin.

Yeah, I went there. Hurt like hell, too.

To get things rolling, I lathered it with some hypoallergenic soap and went to town using a beard trimmer. Ever so gently, I brushed the trimmer as close as I could without touching the skin surface. A handful of times, my lack of a steady hand got the better of me and pain would shoot down the nicked skin. Eventually, I got it short enough to liberally apply a triple-antibiotic (like Neosporin) with little concern of having errant hair mix itself with new flesh. Nasty, nasty, nasty, eh?

The dressing has to be changed every afternoon, which is a chore in and of itself, but I surely don't want heavy scabbing to occur. That would just prolong recovery, which would make me both cranky and itchy. Bad enough I'm cranky on a regular basis.