its ok to laugh about it NOW.
I did this Thanksgiving night during the LSU game. We were starting to get our game plan together for Black Friday shopping and my mom came across some handguns in an Academy ad. She's been wanting to get a gun for herself so she was asking me the difference between a revolver and a semi-auto. I proceeded to pull out my wifes carry pistol (.380 semi-auto) and my grandmothers revolver (.22 magnum). I unloaded each gun completely and set the bullet on another table in a paper plate. So a few minutes go by while Im showing them how each one works, but the keep calling my wifes gun a 38 special, so I had to explain that is wasn't a 38 special. I went to the other table and grabbed th eclip for the .380 and pulled a round out to show them the size of the .380 round compared to a 38 special.......this is where the magic happened. While we were talking about it (just being distracted by talking about the guns), out of habit I placed the round back in the clip and shoved that bad boy right back in the gun (never even realizing I did it). Then my mom asked one final question, "How easy is it to load the first round in the chamber?" So I showed her how easy it was!! But I never leave an "unloaded" gun cocked. So I pointed it towards the ground and away from everyone behind me and attempted to dry fire it. Now why I had my hand in front of it.....I dont know, but I do know that that bullet found my hand in a hurry.
The good news is that the the bullet didnt ricochet all over the house and hit anyone else, the bad new is I destroyed every pie and cake that was in the way. We found the bullet stuck in a cake my mom made.
Unfortunately I had an audience when it happened including my 2 kids ages 7 and 3. My youngest was playing on my wifes phone and just looked up to see what the noise was and then continued to play on the phone, my oldest however just witnessed me do the exact same thing I have warned him about since I started him out with guns. He was freaking out, but thankfully I was not in any pain at that moment, so I was able to assure him that I was going to be ok and that I was just gonna go to the hospital to get a few stitches. Luckily, I was in the Houston area and happened to be referred to one of the best hand surgeons in the country while I was in the ER. He was able to repair the broken metacarpal for my pinky finger, repair the lacerated tendons and ligaments, and he put in a nerve graph that I had damaged to severely to repair. Iam still going to Physical therapy, but I really have gained almost all function of my hand and fingers, so I can still fish and carry on with all my other daily routines.
Really tho, I made out like a bandit on this. It could have been so much worse. If I can take any positives away from this, my kids and everyone that was there hopefully learned a lesson on how fast and dangerous firearms can be no matter how safe you think you are being. It only take a simple distraction to make 1 big mistake and luckily I will make a complete recovery with full function and I didnt lose a part of my hand I just have a couple of gnarly scares and a good story to tell.
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