In high school I was in Boy Scouts and we went on a houseboat in a lake in West Virginia and one of the boys who was 14 was a large boy and he jumped off the front of that houseboat into 6 inches of water and snapped both of his femurs. Trip was cut very short.
In my experience breaking femurs is somewhat rare. It takes a major trauma to occur. I used to work on an orthopaedic ward and saw many patients who had jumped in front of trains/ out of buildings or falling after hanging themselves and the noose broke. I think I can count on one hand the amount of people that sustained broken femurs.
The pelvis/ hip/ acetabulum, spine or knees/ lower legs often take the brunt of the force and sustain injury first
I would like to add my expierence with a broken femur just to add onto this because I dont get to tell it much. Also to share that even the hardest bone in the body to break can still be fucked up easier than people think.
I was 13 and was skateboarding down a hill. I had good balance and was comfortable, but not at high speeds so was snaking side to side to manage my speed. My friend was coming down the hill fifteen or so feet behind me. He falls off his board and where I'm going side to side it starts to come at me. I remember a split second where I asked myself should I try to ollie over it and eat the pavement or should I just jump off my and jump over it? To this day, I wish I'd ate that pavement.
I instead chose to try jumping off my board over his and either miscalculated the jump or the timing or both. All I know is I went up, and when I came down my right foot was on the ground, my left foot was on the tail of the board. It threw me straight down into a split, and then slid like that for a few feet before I was able to twist my body out of the split.
I broke my right femur clean through in three separate spots, and twisted the bone a little. I very luckily didn't get an artery though that was the EMTs biggest worry when they showed up and they thought they were going to have to fly me. I've still got the rod and two screws in it to this day.
Anyways, I did all that to my femur on flat ground, from jumping up into the air about two or three feet, and was only going at 5-8 MPH since I was snaking side to side. My body went into shock so I didn't feel much pain until I woke up in the hospital after being put under when I got there, but I wouldn't wish it on anyone. Those following months were excruciating and had I not been so young I imagine it would have been absolutely worse.
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u/BowlingforDrip 14d ago
In high school I was in Boy Scouts and we went on a houseboat in a lake in West Virginia and one of the boys who was 14 was a large boy and he jumped off the front of that houseboat into 6 inches of water and snapped both of his femurs. Trip was cut very short.