Gag Reflex
2007 Personal Account
A story to make parents shudder...
Some friends were hanging out in Andrew's basement, joking around, playing video games, eating. Andrew was irritable that night. He chose to to deal with the situation by threat. If certain named people did not stop bothering him, he said, as he loaded his Tippmann 98 custom paintgun, he would shoot them.
Although Andrew assured everyone that the safety was on, and he wouldn't shoot unless annoyed, one guy was not reassured. He jumped on Andrew and wrestled for the gun. Andrew threw him aside, and (as he later explained) "to prove the safety was on," he opened his mouth, inserted the barrel of the paintgun, and pulled the trigger.
His eyes widened as the paintball fired into his throat at 300 feet per second. He fell to his knees, coughing blood, but refused to let anyone call an ambulance. His throat was so swollen that he had difficulty breathing. After two hours, he recovered long enough to kick everyone out of his house, and suffer in private.
Andrew couldn't eat for three days, and couldn't talk for a week. Once he was able to open his mouth, he realized he had blown his uvula clean off. It was gone! And he had no gag reflex, either.
His uvula does appear to be growing back, and he shows no symptoms of long term damage, which is rather lucky. We all tease him about it from time to time. The best part of the story is that his parents never found out!
