Punched in the face.

Depends where.

A smack in the nose, even if it doesn't break the nose, will, in addition to the pain, make your eyes sting and tear.

Around the jaw/cheek, I'd equate the pain to really bad sinus or root-canal pain. And you'd feel it in your teeth too.

But you gotta remember that depending on the angle and relative sizes, there is likely to be some whiplash effect. Also, again depending on where, if the fist is bare, there is every chance it will hurt the hand too. Given the edge and a little experience, you'd use a forearm to the face.

Another thing to consider is that shock will be an issue, especially if she's surprised by the attack. Even if she's struggling, unless she's a fighter, being smacked in the face is still gonna be a shock.

And blood. Head wounds bleed. Alarmingly. If it's never happened to you before it is d@an scary to see all that blood. It looks way worse than it is, but there seem to be gallons of the stuff.

Hope that helps.

Yeah, lot of things to consider here. If he´s a lot bigger, throws at least a reasonable punch and gets full contact you could be talking serious damage: broken cheek or nose. Also if her jaw is separated when she gets hit it could get broken. In all probability she´ll be knocked over. If he´s wearing rings that can make a difference in terms of cuts and pain.

Agree with wordmonkey about shock and whiplash effect. When I´ve been hit in the face I haven´t felt pain until after, shock and adrenalin must have prevented it. I should add however that I´m about 6´2" (185cm) and about 17 stone (240 pounds). Or I was lucky not to have been belted by real fighter!

If I think of anything more I´ll let you know. Any questions just ask.

And the ears will often ring if it's anywhere cheekbones & up.
There's a weird kind of fuzzy silence if you get clocked even medium-hard in the skull and your brain gets rattled; things tend to come more slowly for a few seconds or even minutes afterward.

I remember hearing it more than feeling it... At first, anyway

Hello Kim, long time no hear.

If he´s a lot bigger, throws at least a reasonable punch and gets full contact you could be talking serious damage: broken cheek or nose. Also if her jaw is separated when she gets hit it could get broken. In all probability she´ll be knocked over. If he´s wearing rings that can make a difference in terms of cuts and pain.

Agree with wordmonkey about shock and whiplash effect.

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Agree.

I remember hearing it more than feeling it... At first, anyway

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Agree

And the ears will often ring if it's anywhere cheekbones & up.
There's a weird kind of fuzzy silence if you get clocked even medium-hard in the skull and your brain gets rattled; things tend to come more slowly for a few seconds or even minutes afterward.

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Agree

A smack in the nose, even if it doesn't break the nose, will, in addition to the pain, make your eyes sting and tear.

Around the jaw/cheek, I'd equate the pain to really bad sinus or root-canal pain. And you'd feel it in your teeth too.

But you gotta remember that depending on the angle and relative sizes, there is likely to be some whiplash effect. Also, again depending on where, if the fist is bare, there is every chance it will hurt the hand too. Given the edge and a little experience, you'd use a forearm to the face.

Another thing to consider is that shock will be an issue, especially if she's surprised by the attack. Even if she's struggling, unless she's a fighter, being smacked in the face is still gonna be a shock.

And blood. Head wounds bleed. Alarmingly. If it's never happened to you before it is d@an scary to see all that blood. It looks way worse than it is, but there seem to be gallons of the stuff.

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Agree.

Seems like you have it covered here Kim. Although.

I used to play a lot of rugby a long time ago. One day I got a shoulder charge that hit me square in the jaw. First thing I felt was the back of my head hitting the ground and then everything went all eerie. I rolled over and got to my knees. I knew something was wrong with my face and I put my hand up to my chin. I then noticed blood pouring out. Next thing I remember is being in the back of an ambulance getting some happy gas. Long story short, I ended up having to get a traechyotomy (no idea if this is spelt goodly). I spent two weeks breathing from a tube in my throat. No food or water. Man that was miserable.

Told you I would hi-jack your thread.

JJ

There are two occassions that I have been hit by a man. In the face.
The first time, it was pitch black, so I didn't see it coming. And it was several hits, each delayed by 7 seconds or so--which can seem like a lifetime when you can't see if there's more where that came from.
That first hit, there isn't pain, it's more like you felt a wallop of pressure, but the brain instantly numbifies (yep, it's a word, as of right now) the reality of the pain. And adreniline does wonders to block it out the truth behind the impact as well. I don't know about guys, but for most women, being hit like that is so shocking, the pain is later. You're covering your face, screaming, nothing like this has ever happened, and it's pitch black, so each blow is prepared for in the blind.
Thank God, your sense of self preservation kicks in. You grapple. You clutch. You swing whatever it was you were lucky enough to wrap your hand around.
Later...much later...when you've driven without headlights, fear overruling common sense, and you've arrived to a friend's house...one look in the mirror......THAT'S when you feel the pain.
The following day, there are knots along your cheekbone. Huge knots. Blood vessels burst, the whites of your eyes now red as if possessed. Both eyes black. Everything puffy. It takes about a week for everything to start turning yellow, except the soft tissue under the eyes. That stays black for a long time. The knots can take up to 3 or 4 weeks before you finally don't feel them anymore. And you can't swallow food--but with all the hitting, your brain blocked out you were also being choked. Speaking to the doctor, this is actually quite normal, which is why a lot of abusers go free....the woman doesn't remember all the details. It comes back to her more like flashes. But that was 25 years ago.

The second time, I faced down an intruder. I had a young son. Mothers do stupid things when protecting their children.
I didn't see him raise his fist. I didn't feel the hit. It was like I blinked, and suddenly I was sitting on the floor, wondering how I got there. No pain. Blood everywhere. The pain took about 30 minutes to make a connection with the brain. Then, I could hardly breathe.

Some people will feel the pain instantly, but for me, it was more like impact...but no pain. And then, like I said, the second time, I was hit so hard, I realized later that I must have been knocked out for a few seconds/minutes? Dunno. And I was in a sitting position, not lying down.

So, there you are. First hand account. Hope it helps with your writing.

sunna7kore said:

And the ears will often ring if it's anywhere cheekbones & up.
There's a weird kind of fuzzy silence if you get clocked even medium-hard in the skull and your brain gets rattled; things tend to come more slowly for a few seconds or even minutes afterward.

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And don't forget the smell...there's a definate smell to it. But
I just can't think of anything else like it...maybe it's just the absence of smell or something. Like the ole-factory gets put out of commission for a few seconds.

You hear (or feel) a thud followed by silence, you see the lights followed by a blackness, you smell something, and then you get pissed cause you realize you've just been punched.

At least that's how it is for a guy anyway...maybe it's different for girls.

And that's only when you're not expecting it. If you're in the middle of a fight, the juices are already flowing, and you don't feel much of anything. Unless you get hit hard enough to knock you out maybe. I've never been hit that hard.

I should also mention the after-effects.

I stumbled into a fight on the way home from the pub. I can usually talk my way out of most things (which is good, considering I usually talked my way into them) but this was not happening. Me against three. Unlike the movies there are two things you have to remember in a situation like this.

1. You will NOT win this fight. The best you can do is really hurt one of them.
2. You are going to get hurt. Really. If you don't accept that, the first pain will be such a shock that you are gonna be useless.

Anyways, to cut a long story short, AFTER this was all done with, and I got home, shock set in. The adrenalin is gone and with its departure come the shakes. You can't get warm; you can't sleep; the pain kicks in; if you look in the mirror, even if you've been cleaned-up, you look terrible.

And that's when you start thinking, "what if...?" considering what I dropped into, I got off lucky, but I had a cut above an eye that needed stitches and I started wondering what if that had been a half-inch lower? Would I have lost an eye? And logic sails out the window. You start dwelling on that.

A brandy will steady the nerves in he short term, but the "what ifs...?" last longer.

Of course, if the character is used to this kinda thing, the emotional reaction is gonna be different. My comments here come from a surprise attack and I'm a lover, not a fighter. I just seem to find more fights than love.

wordmonkey said:

And that's when you start thinking, "what if...?" considering what I dropped into, I got off lucky, but I had a cut above an eye that needed stitches and I started wondering what if that had been a half-inch lower? Would I have lost an eye? And logic sails out the window. You start dwelling on that.

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Yeah, that's a big thing. I think any time you lose a fight, there's a constant 'what if' thing clanging in your head.

What if I'd grabbed the guy first and knocked him out before he threw the first punch?
What if I had tried to run?
What if I had called for help?
What if I had tried to pull a weapon?
What if I had been a trained martial arts expert?

As time goes on, the what if's get crazier and they poison your mind. You gotta move on or they'll rot your brain.

BTW...I have beaten 2 attackers (got mugged while delivering pizzas). Glad it wasn't 3. That would suck. But even after holding my own and chasing them off, the what if's plagued me for months.

theengel said:

As time goes on, the what if's get crazier and they poison your mind. You gotta move on or they'll rot your brain.

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This is true. And with distance you can look back at how silly it all becomes. The "what ifs" start to move more towards the bizarre and then into revenge.

This is, of course, great for structuring a plot, and even back then, when I wasn't really writing, the romantic side of me starts thinking, "Well, I can see how characters like Batman and The Punisher come to be. I can see how revenge drove Hamlet." And because you where beat down you start to fixate on how to set that straight. You want revenge. And very quickly you are asking friends who have friends who maybe might know the guys that jumped you, and then you have other friends who have friends that are the kinda people who break legs and have no remorse.

And at times like that you find out what kinda person you are, deep down. But THAT is a whole different thread entirely.

"The second time, I faced down an intruder. I had a young son. Mothers do stupid things when protecting their children."

Inked, I have to know - were you and your child all right?

What I remember about being punched by a man is first, as someone else said, shock. Once I got past that, there was intense and insane anger. I wanted to kill him. Had fantasies about getting him drunk and tying him to a chair in his sleep and then beating him with whatever I could put my hand to.

Until I realized after a particularly horrid beating that I was not so much angry at him as I was at myself for not sticking up for myself. That's the day I decided to hit back. I figured I didn't have anything to lose; he wasn't taking it easy on me because I was not fighting back, he was hitting me with everything he had, so why not hit back? I did. Of course it helped that he had backed me into a corner and my fight or flight reflex had kicked in, but I knocked the hell out of him with a hot iron. That was the last tiime he hit me. Surprise, surprise.

BarbJ said:

"The second time, I faced down an intruder. I had a young son. Mothers do stupid things when protecting their children."

Inked, I have to know - were you and your child all right?

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I always had the neighbors laughing and laughing with my daily descriptions of my life at work. It pays to make people laugh, to be the nice one on the block. The guy across the street was new, and though he had numerous tattoos, and had been a gangster (I know allll kinds of interesting people), he'd married, worked at a bank, you know the story, made a new life for himself and small family. I threw a barbcue, welcoming he and his family. Yeah, I'm a sap. We all hit it off. I'm real big against judging people by their covers.

He was home sick. Let out the dog. Saw the cretin coming in through my side gate. They all knew, and teased relentlessly, that I was dateless/manless/single parent.
Big Bear Dan--yep yep, that was really his name--didn't go to jail, though at first they wanted to put him away too, even though he defended me. My attacker went to the hospital. Very broken. And then to jail.
I also had a few buds that were correctional officers. Darn. Guess which prison Rick went to? Yeah, you learn the name of your attacker and it sticks with you forever.
But, that was 22 (?) years ago.
I'm quite the princess in Camelot these days.
My son? Army Ranger. Only a bloody fool would break into HIS house.

Thanks for asking.

k

cjmouser said:

What I remember about being punched by a man is first, as someone else said, shock. Once I got past that, there was intense and insane anger. I wanted to kill him. Had fantasies about getting him drunk and tying him to a chair in his sleep and then beating him with whatever I could put my hand to.

Until I realized after a particularly horrid beating that I was not so much angry at him as I was at myself for not sticking up for myself. That's the day I decided to hit back. I figured I didn't have anything to lose; he wasn't taking it easy on me because I was not fighting back, he was hitting me with everything he had, so why not hit back? I did. Of course it helped that he had backed me into a corner and my fight or flight reflex had kicked in, but I knocked the hell out of him with a hot iron. That was the last tiime he hit me. Surprise, surprise.

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I had started a thread on that very topic! here's the link; the answers there were very helpful:

http://absolutewrite.com/forums/sho...+does+it+feel+like+to+get+punched+in+the+face

If you get punched in the nose, your whole head buzzes, really buzzes, like if you had tons of water spurted up your nose at once - add in the pain and shock and there you have it.

My husband is a physician, and he says there are little, fragile bones in your face - not much fat, skin, or muscle, so you might consider the bone on bone contact. A man could easily break cheekbones, nose, etc. If he hit her nose bone up into her brain, she could die.

Another suggestion: I looked on Google, - this might help for after the hit. Go to this site:
http://www.plasticsurgery4u.com/pt_qna_folder/pt_qa_nasal_fx.html

Here's a sample off the page:
Question: Re: broken nose

I was punched in the nose four days ago and it is still sore and puffed up on both sides of my nose. I have been sneezing constantly since the initial blow. It originally bled , but stopped after two days. When I try to push my nose to either side , I can feel some kind of separation around the middle of the nose. I have no black eyes and my question is how long should any one wait if he thinks the nose my be broken?

Punched in the nose: shocks you, eyes water, it does hurt, but more than anything it just stuns you.

Anywhere else on the head? Imagine anytime you ever hit your head. You know that weird muffled "whump" sound you hear? Before you even feel anything? Same thing. Then a localized pain followed by a general pain in the head.

I was punched in the face while being held in a headlock by a very muscular teen. His muscles crushing my neck hurt just as bad as the punch. I was trying to gasp for air, kick him and avoid being hit. Like someone else said, it depends on the angle, too. I walked away with a fat, bloody lip and no real head injury but certainly dazed, confused and scared sh*tless. All for twenty bucks in my purse. The smell was very powerful, too. Teenage summertime armpit deodorant but dirty man smell...if you can imagine.

good luck.

"The smell was very powerful, too. Teenage summertime armpit deodorant but dirty man smell...if you can imagine."

Kimmer - This is a good point for writers. I wouldn't have thought of it, never having - praise God - experienced it. Thanks.

If I press my jaw together really hard, I get sort of a whooshing sound. That, followed by a feeling like I just popped my ears and a bit of a ringing sound.

I am very small, so if I take a good one to the face, I usually feel it in my neck early and often.

The skin doesn't always break (it usually doesn't) but if it does, the blood is all out of proportion to the actual injury. If the cut is over the eyes and blood runs into them, it is very hard to see.

My nose has been broken many times, and it is very sensitive to pain because of that. It also tends to bleed like mad.

Adrenaline and anger have always kept me on my feet, except for the few times I've actually been knocked momentarily unconcious. Those actually seem to hurt less.

Wordmonkey was spot-on, and Inked's accounts were incredibly vivid...gave me the heebity-jeebities and made me want to kill any man that would do such a thing!

My experience comes from being a martial artist and not knowing when to keep my big mouth shut. I've never been the victim of an attack that I didn't see coming. I jumped in even though you probably already had the info you needed because 1) I'm a small female and 2) I've been in lots of fights, but never with a woman.

Edit: Maybe this doesn't really count, but I remembered that I did fight women during one tournament many years ago. Got kicked out of the tournament. Go figure.

If he hits you near the front of the jaw, even from the side your teeth are going to cut into the side of your mouth. You'll be able to taste the blood. It would be very sore the next morning.