Brunswick Co. family talks about son’s life or limb ordeal

WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) — A Southport couple is talking about how their son had to saw off his own arm to save his life in a real case of “life or limb.”

“He was thinking well, you know, ‘Geez, my parents are going to come up here, and they’re going to find me, but unless I do something, they’re not going to find me alive,” Paul Metz said.

On June 7, several states away in Connecticut, Paul Metz’s son Jonathan went down to his basement to fix the furnace. The 31-year-old’s left arm got trapped between the metal vents, and the harder he tried to pull it out, the more swollen and lacerated it became. He screamed for help for 18 hours until he lost his voice.

“I actually used the flip-flop that I had been wearing and managed to scoop a couple mouthfuls of this hideous, hideous water,” Jonathan said. He could smell his flesh starting to rot. “It took me about six hours to psyche myself up to the point where I thought I was capable of actually doing what I thought needed to be done.”

With the shirt off his back, he made a tourniquet. He grabbed saw blades nearby and started cutting off his arm.

“It was just mind-numbing to know that somebody could do such a thing to themselves to try to rescue themselves,” Paul said

Half-way through the cutting, the pain became too unbearable to continue. Jonathan said he thought he was going to die twice but kept focusing on what he had to live for.

“Family, fiancée, friends, my dog, and also feeling that I had a lot of living to do,” Jonathan said.

A co-worker called 911 when Metz did not show up to work. Emergency workers found him in and out of consciousness and barely coherent. Doctors say there’s no doubt Metz saved his life by stopping the spread of the infection.

“Given everything that happened, I think I’m in pretty good spirits, and I feel blessed and more than fortunate to be here today, really,” Jonathan said.

A prosthetic arm is going to cost Metz $100,000. Friends and family have set up a website to collect donations. You can check it out at http://www.HelpJonMetz.com.