Man who had both his arms chopped off in freak farming accident made shocking recovery
Kit Roberts
Featured Image Credit: InForum
A farmer who lost both of his arms during a horrific accident made an astonishing recovery.
Farming is a highly dangerous job, particularly when operating heavy machinery.
And North Dakotan farmer, John Thompson, found this out in an awful way when he was unloading pig feed with a grain auger.
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In 1992, John was working as usual when his t-shirt snagged on an uncovered power takeoff (PTO) shaft on the machine.
The then-18-year-old was home alone at the time of the accident, and woke up with his dog licking his face.
In a shocking moment, John realised that both of his arms had been torn off in the accident.
Somehow, he managed to walk 100 yards back to his home, turned the doorknob with his mouth and used a pencil in his teeth to dial on the phone to get help.
He then sat in the bath so he wouldn't get blood on his mom's new carpet.
After going to hospital, John was reportedly told by a medic that he 'shouldn't be alive', as there was practically 'no blood in you'.
You might think that this would have been an extremely painful experience, but John recounted that the moment of losing his arms he didn't feel anything.
Recounting that day, he said: "I was just doing that, standing around playing with the dog and somehow I got too close to the PTO shaft.
"My shirt wasn't tucked in and they figure my shirt got wrapped up in the PTO shaft. I still remember spinning on the shaft and then my arms just finally came off, didn't feel a thing."
He added: "It's said when I got to the emergency room at the first hospital that all my nerves were hanging out of my right arm, if they touched that it sent me through the roof but otherwise I didn't have anything."
But not only did John survive an accident which could very easily have killed him, he went on to make a full recovery.
Yes, including getting his arms back.
John was put onto a plane bound for Minnesota, where his arms were surgically reattached.
He was then placed into a medically induced coma to help him to heal properly.
But things were far from over. During his coma he got a blood infection, and had to undergo further surgery.
Ultimately, however, the procedure was a success, and he was able to regain the use of his arms in an astonishing recovery.
After leaving hospital and undergoing rehabilitation to help him to get used to using his arms again, he lifted weights to rebuild his strength.
He did say that he has lost some of the fine motor skills, as well as some memory problems around the accident.
But he does remember his first ever plane journey, which was the one he took to hospital, and joking that his arms felt cold.
At the time, they were in a box of ice being preserved.