How to Remove a Ring Stuck on Your Finger

(Being the first—and, blessed be, last—entry in the Acephalous series Helpful Tips for Stupid Husbands.)

There you are on a Saturday night, futzing with your wedding ring because your wife thinks your trichotillomania makes you look mangy: off your left ring finger, onto your right pinkie; off your right pinkie, onto your left pinkie; off your left pinkie, onto your right ring finger; off your right ring finger, off your right ring finger, OFF YOUR RIGHT RING FINGER, non et cetera.  You pull and you twist; you pull while twisting and you twist while pulling all to no avail. 

You look at your wife and you tell her, "I've misplaced my wedding band."  She will look at you, j'accuse burning in her eyes, until you hold up your right hand.  She will then enter the kitchen and return with the ingredients required to perform Step One:

1. Apply cold water and a little soap.  Gently work the soap under the ring and twist.  If the ring still does not come off, massage the area of the finger below the knuckle to remove some of the fluid from the finger.  Wait a few minutes, then repeat. Continue until the finger is good and chafed. 

After fifteen minutes of repeated failure, your wife will walk back into the kitchen and return with the materials needed for Step Two:

2. Dry the chafed finger with hand towel, then apply the following in any order: water-based lubricants, oil-based lubricants, semi-solid fats, hydrogenated vegetable oils, as well as any lard, suet, ghee, tallow, or schmaltz you find lying around.  As with the soap and water, work the slippery substance under the ring and twist and turn.  Carefully slip a knife under the ring and try to slide it over the knuckle.  If the ring-bearer cries in pain, ascertain whether its source is the ring jamming on the knuckle or the knife slicing into it. 

This too will fail.  Your wife will walk back into the kitchen yet again. Take this opportunity to try to wash your hilariously lubed finger. The water-based lubricants will dissolve quickly, but the oil-based lubricants, semi-solid fats, suet, schmaltz, &c. will take some time.  Expect to find an oily residue scumming the top of the bucket used in Step Three:

3. Thrust your hand into the bucket of ice water which your wife has brought in from the kitchen. Leave it in there until the ring-bearer screams.  When he does, shoot him a look of unconcealed embarrassment with a hint of disappointment, then allow him to "tough" it out for another three minutes.  Once he passes out, remove his hand from the bucket and check to see that the desired amount of vasoconstriction has occurred, then repeat steps one and two. 

You may notice that despite the intense cold and vigorous oily massaging, the area above the ring becomes increasingly swollen.  This is normal.  God designed the human body intelligently: when you unsuccessfully attempt to remove a ring from a swollen finger, your body responds by further swelling the finger.  It may also turn begin to turn dark as more and more blood rushes to into the injured finger.  Now would be a good time to consult the internet. Find the Ask MetaFilter thread on "ring removal" and proceed to Step Four:

4. Do what the jewelers do: spray Windex on the finger and twist and pull.  Do it again.  Then again.  The trick is to do this repeatedly so as to unlock the magical lubricative power of Windex.  Then consider the probable reason jewelers use Windex: a jewelery shop consists almost entirely of display cases and Windex is sort of wet.  At this point it will be past midnight.  There is nothing more you can do.  Put away the Windex and have the ring-bearer proceed to Step Five.

5. What you need to do now, ring-bearer, is drink enough vodka to catch a few hours of restless sleep in which you alternate between dreams in which you are Hans Brinker, son of a sluicer, and Hans Brinker, son of a space station captain. Alcohol is a diuretic, which should help with the swelling.  Eat some pistachio nuts too, since salt absorbs water.  There is also the chance that your finger may mysteriously unswell during the night.

6. You will awake to discover that your finger has not mysteriously unswollen during the night.  That it has, in fact, swelled larger and darkened ominously.  You should consult the internet to learn that 1) fingers are naturally more swollen in the morning, 2) your body responds to a) alcohol-induced dehydration and b) the massive amount of sodium found in pistachio nuts by swelling.  Now panic. 

You may want to panic for a good long while.  Remember, this is your right ring finger, and although you are ambidextrous, relearning how to do everything with your left hand will still be unthinkably inconvenient. Once you can breathe again, go online and learn what you need to do for Step Seven:

7. Elevate the hand above your heart for 15-20 minutes, then repeat steps one and two.  When that fails to work, place a bucket of ice water on a chair, sit on the floor, then elevate it into the bucket and repeat steps three, one and two in that order. Pine for the mangy days of yore, then consult the internet again and proceed to Step Eight.

Step Eight will require string or dental floss, but have no fear, for it is endorsed by The Harvard School of Medicine. 

Step Eight, Part the First:

"Pass an end of fine string or dental floss under the ring. With the other end, begin tightly wrapping the string around the finger. Ensure that the string is wrapped evenly and smoothly past the lower knuckle."

Step Eight, Part the Second:

"With the end that was passed under the ring, begin unwrapping the string in the same direction. The ring should move over the string as the string is unwrapped."

It should, but it will not.  In fact, the act of wrapping the fluid-engorged finger will cause pain the likes of which reasonable people compare to birth-pangs.  This will make your move to Step Eight, Part the Third particularly daring.

Step Eight, Part the Third:

Repeat variations of Step Eight, Parts the First and Second with packing tape, then Saran Wrap.  When you regain consciousness, consider picking up the telephone and calling your local jeweler or emergency room.  Exhausted interns and jewelers both keep one of these handy for just such an occasion. 

Now pony up the $35 it costs for the jeweler to repair it, and resume plucking the hairs from your beard one at a time.  If your wife complains, remind her of what happened the last time.  If she insists on reminding you about your mother's favorite story—about the time you got your head stuck in a toilet seat and the rescue squad had to be called in, and since your father drove an ambulance with that very squad, all the paramedics knew you and teased you  as they used the jaws of life to extricate your head,[*] and did your mother mention she has a picture of you bawling, the toilet seat around your head, which she took while she waited for the paramedics to arrive, because she does and it is around here somewhere—if she insists on reminding you of that, turn up the television and pretend you can't hear her, because you can't win this one. 

Comments

[Flavia]

Pure comedy gold, this is.

[Sisyphus]

Heh. And when will the edition of "How to Get Your Head Unstuck from a Toilet Seat" be out?

More pertinently, when will the edition of "Just how DID You Get Your Head Stuck in a Toilet Seat" be out?

[Ahistoricality]

Hmmm. I wonder about the cold soak: in addition to unswelling hands (in some circumstances) it might also make the ring ever-so-slightly tighter. The corollary is that heat applied to the ring might make it ever-so-slightly looser, but I kind of doubt it would be enough to make much of a difference before it became intolerable.

That definitely goes in the category of self-inflicted wounds. There's an old singer-songwriter saying about former relationships: "at least I got a song out of it." In this case, it's a blog post, and some sympathy.

[CR]

So, um, does it stop with the beard or are you also a pube-plucker, ya trichotillomaniac? Must be nice finding those on the sofa etc.

Reading further into the wikipedia article, I am now wondering about this:

Related dangers

A practice related to TTM is trichophagia, in which hairs are swallowed. In extreme cases, this can lead to the development of a hairball (trichobezoar) in the abdomen, a serious condition in humans (see Rapunzel syndrome). A trichobezoar can lead to intestinal blockage, which may only be relieved via surgery. [11]

I'd recommend petromalt, if so. Best for your wife to smear it on your paw for you to lick it off.

[Wax Banks]

Flavia has it: a jewel of a post.

[JPool]

Funniest post in a long time, though I think you are perhaps a little too proud of that "I've misplaced my wedding band" line.

[SEK]

Flavia and Wally, it's odd that everyone likes these posts so much, since they're exactly the sort I decide not to post after an hour's consideration. I could turn this into that kind of blog, but then I wouldn't feel suitably, um, academic. One day, post-tenure, I'll say "fuck it" and write like this regularly. I only hope that it's rarity isn't what entertains.

Sisyphus, I already told you: the jaws of life. They're amazing all-purpose tools, which I admire because, well, I watch Good Eats and have an irrational love of multi-taskers. As for the story of how I got it on, well, maybe when she returns from my cousin's wedding the mysterious "alkau" will fill you in on the details and/or upload the picture.

Ahistoricality, now that I think about it, that makes sense: metal contracts in cold. I don't know the ratio of vasoconstriction to metal shrinkage, though, so it may still be decent advice. From what I read in many, many online forums, pregnant women have used this technique to great effect. Just didn't work for me. As for bright-siding it with the knowledge it'll make a great post, well, that's pretty much the story of my life at this point. Anything tragic/horrible/embarrassing that's of my own devising is gristle for this online humiliation mill.

That said, CR, as the owner of four children, er, cats, I'm well aware of the dangers of hairballs. I may give myself the mange -- esp. as deadlines loom -- but I don't eat my own hair. I'm odd, but not that odd. (And to be honest, I only discovered that this bad habit of mine has official DSM-V status by dumb luck: I was looking for that food toxin, you know, "trichinellosis," but Google suggested "trichotillomania" instead. I figured they were related, but damn was I (productively) wrong.

JPool, I would be proud, but it's what I said. I meant something like "I placed it on the wrong finger," but thought that since I'd been on the couch for a few hours working, Meg would understand that I'd "misplaced" it very, very recently. As in, like, the last two minutes. I've a knack for this sort of contextual error ... but damn it, you're right, I do play it for shits and giggles. This makes me a terrible person, I know, I know...

[Sisyphus]

Flavia and Wally, it's odd that everyone likes these posts so much, since they're exactly the sort I decide not to post after an hour's consideration. I could turn this into that kind of blog, but then I wouldn't feel suitably, um, academic.

It's the tone dude, that and, as you keep putting it, you know how much to leave out. Oh, and the playing with the Cohen voice of giving orders of what not to do.

CR, "ya pube-plucker!" may replace kittenshitter as my favorite insult that takes a long time to explain.

[alkau]

I have returned from a wonderful wedding where two very normal relatives of Scott's joined together never knowing what a weird family they were joining.
The toilet seat story
Scott was 2 years old and being potty trained(I know this may embrass him,but it it relvant to the story). We lived in Albreta at the time in a housing comples on the top of a very high hill. we had a 1/2 bath the size of a small closet and one day while I was cleaning it Scott was holding the toilet seat used for training(so the poor child would not fall in while using the toilet). I turned my back and Scott said "mommy look I can wear it as my hat". As I turned back he pulled it down around his neck and started laughing because he thought it was really funny. I tried to pull it back off and couldn't. I then tried several ways to get it off and it remained around his neck. I then went next door to my friend's house and we tried several things - soap, lotion, grease and anything else we could think and yet it still remained firmly around his neck. We then called our husbands, who are engineers,to see whatthey could offer - which included trying to break it since it was thin hard plastic - and it still remained around his neck. By this point Scott was not happy anymore and he just wanted it off. There was a fire station accross the street and we(the moms) decided that firemen must know how to get it off. We went there and at first they thought we were just crazy. After they tried several things and it did not move they decided the solution was the JAW-OF-LIFE. Since they did not have one at this station they called to the station down the hill to get them to bring one up. At first the other firehouse thought it was a joke but after hearing the crying child they felt they had no choice but to have ALL the town firemen come up the hill to rescue this child. So...the JAWS-OF-LIFE were used with a party of 30 firemen to save this poor child. And that's the story of the First time Scott embrassed his parents - I now know he continues doing silly things that get himself stuck in need of outside help. He has never lived down this story and now the world knows just how crazy his family can be.

[jlkau]

This comment is for anyone who has ever operated or even seen a Hurst Extrication Tool (aka the Jaws of Life) and was appalled by the notion that any trained rescue personnel would even consider using it in this type of situation (http://www.airshore.com/Main/ProductCategories,124,41.aspx).
It was NOT the Jaws of Life that they used. It was a bolt cutter. Just like a fine wine, stories like this get better with age.
Where are the MythBusters when you need them?

[Brock]

Dude, you may want to check this out. Seems, I don't know, familiar.

[trianwreck]

This was super funny and pretty resource full for my sons science fiar project.

[read]

so so funny, i can relate, once i had to wait losing some weight and it took around 4 months, in order to remove my ruby ring

[sage]

This was no help at all. This website is useless, and is a waste of time!

[Donna]

very helpful, never have i though i would see a ringstuck tutorial..