ah, the bleeding toes

I need to learn my lesson and get my toenails clipped by a professional pedicurist. Almost every time I cut my toenails, especially over the past five years, I've ended up with one or more bleeders. Normally, I just shrug, wipe away the blood (if it's not bleeding too fast and hard), and bandage the toe(s) up. Within 24 hours, the bleeding stops, and I go on with life.

Yesterday was a bit like a low-grade horror movie. I clipped my toenails, noticed a single bleeder, bandaged it up, sat at my computer desk, and forgot about the toe. I then got up after some time and walked over to the kitchenette for whatever reason, and as I walked back to my desk, I finally noticed the studio's floor, which was covered in big, gloopy tracks of dark, venous blood. How had I not noticed this while I'd been sitting at the computer? How had I not noticed the tracks I'd been making on my way to the kitchenette? 

I saw that I'd been bleeding from both feet. Figures. More angry than horrified, I grabbed at my conveniently located container of wet wipes on the computer table and wiped down my feet (choosing to concentrate on them first, as opposed to the floor), removing the blood-soaked single bandage. I then grabbed some conveniently located Kleenex and dried my feet off after the wipe-down so as to have dry skin for the many bandages I would be applying. I noticed, during this wipe-then-dry procedure, that enough time had passed for most of the major bleeding to have stopped, but there was still some ooze. I bandaged my feet up, then turned my attention to the studio's floor, which looked as if someone had been murdered.

Turning again to my wet wipes, I mopped up the major spillage all across the floor. It was lucky, what with cardboard boxes being stored under the computer table by my feet, that the boxes had somehow miraculously survived being bloodied. With the major blood pools now sopped up, I brought out the weapon I normally bring out in cases of floor spillage: my Swiffer-like rectangular mop (a Sweeper), which can hold either wet or dry mop-sized sheets. I chose the wet sheets, obviously, since this was a heavy-duty occasion. As I mopped the floor and got rid of the remaining traces of blood, I watched my now-bandaged feet to see whether I was leaving any new blood tracks. Nothing, thank Cthulhu.

I chucked away the blood-soaked Swiffer wipes,* sat back down, and finally took stock of the situation. I'd never had that much post-clipping bleeding before, and while I've often thought about visiting a pedicurist (there's one in the building I used to work at), I now realize that—unless I wise up and watch some YouTube tutorials about how to properly cut my toenails—I need professional help.** So in a few weeks, when the time will come once again to clip my toenails, I might finally bite the bullet and see a pedicurist for the first time ever. Or will I be stubborn and keep trying to clip my toenails myself? Only the Shadow knows.

As to why I hadn't noticed anything while it was happening: (1) when I'm at the computer, I'm usually consumed by whatever is happening on my monitor's screen, and (2) I have severe diabetic neuropathy in my feet, which means I don't feel much down there to alert me to problems, anyway. It's a bit like the leper's plight as he starts to lose his peripheral nerves. If I'm not careful, I fear something will get infected, and I won't look down until it's too late, and something will have to get amputated. That's at least part of the reason why diabetics lose feet, legs, and fingers. Also, (3): while walking toward the kitchenette, I was focused on my destination, not on the floor, which is why I didn't notice anything until I had turned around and started back to the computer.

__________

*Unnecessarily pedantic note: I'm using "Swiffer" the way other people might use "Xerox"—as a generic term, not because this was literally an all-Swiffer operation; the wipes I normally use, for example, are off-brand Korean products that work fine enough. The metal-and-plastic mop itself was and is indeed a Swiffer (but Korean knock-offs do exist), and I have other actual Swiffer products as well (e.g., for dusting). But the combo of products I used for this cleaning project was not 100% the literal Swiffer brand.

**I have in fact, watched some toenail videos, and they all say the same thing: don't cut a curve around the nail. Instead, cut straight across and leave the "corners" of the nail a bit longer than the nail's front. When you cut the "corners," you encourage the nails to curl downward and become ingrown as they grow, which leads to much unhappiness in life.