When a Kitchen Accident Changes More Than Your Health

From time to time, I share stories from people I work alongside whose experiences highlight the realities of health, recovery, and the impact life events can have on work.

Josh, founder of Josh Does Therapy, has kindly shared the story below in his own words.

Kitchen Accidents

On 14 January 2016, I was finally diagnosed with Crohn’s disease. For those unfamiliar with it, in my case it means that the left side of my large intestine is permanently inflamed. At the time, all I knew was that I was exhausted, in pain and relieved to finally have a name for what had been happening inside my body.

I spent two weeks in hospital, hooked up to drips, monitored constantly, poked and prodded, waiting for my body to stabilise enough for me to go home. I remember thinking that once I walked out of those hospital doors, the worst was behind me. That chapter was closed. I was wrong.

On my first day back in the kitchen, I was told the faulty gas oven had been fixed. What I wasn’t told was that a pipe inside the oven the one designed to safely release gas back into the system had been bent. For fifteen hours overnight, the oven had been silently filling with gas, even though the gas had been switched off at the wall.

When I tried to light it, the pilot was stuck. That should have been a warning sign. But in kitchens, you push on. I pulled it out, placed it back, lit a splint and reached inside the oven.  The explosion came instantly.

A flash of light. The oven door slammed down onto my head. I was thrown backwards into the service fridges. My hair was singed, my arm blistered, and my eyebrows and eyelashes were gone. In hospital later that day, a nurse told me that the fact I hadn’t shaved for three weeks had likely saved my face from skin grafts. Laziness, it turns out, can sometimes be protection. Physically, I healed but emotionally it took much longer.

I wasn’t covered financially at the time, so I received £150 statutory sick pay for my hospital stay. I was fortunate to have an owner who paid me in full for the time off caused by the accident. But the real cost wasn’t financial.

For a long time afterwards, I couldn’t light a gas oven. Even in new kitchens with brand new equipment, I would ask other chefs to do it for me. Any unfamiliar noise would send put my body into flight causing mini panic attacks. Some laughed, others belittled me and few scolded me. That’s often how people respond to things they don’t understand.

We talk a lot about resilience, strength and “getting on with it”, but rarely about the invisible scars people carry into work every day. Knowledge is power yes, but understanding is compassion.

I’ll leave you with this quote- ‘Let’s change the world with one random act of kindness at a time”.

If today that kindness is directed towards yourself and you’d like to begin to understand your own experiences rather than judging them, then starting at home a great place to start.

You’re welcome to drop me an email at josh@joshdoestherapy.com where we can arrange the best time to have a free 15 minute introduction call to discuss whatever you’d like.

Have a peaceful day,Josh

Ouch!