In late September, news broke that our friend Buddy Valastro (a.k.a. the "Cake Boss") was involved in a scary bowling accident at his home in New Jersey and severely injured his dominant hand.
Nearly two months and three surgeries later, Buddy made his first TV appearance on our show, opening up about the accident and sharing a recipe for the easiest Thanksgiving dessert ever with a special assistant — his 13-year-old son, Marco.
"Thank God I've still got my hand," Buddy tells Rach from his home kitchen. "We're feeling better. We're trying to be optimistic about it. It's only been two months, so it's still too early to tell exactly how much I'm going to get back. I might be at 15 to 20 percent of my strength right now in squeezing and holding things and how much dexterity I'm going to get back. I'm in some intense physical therapy, and I might need actually another one to two surgeries, depending on how the next couple months go."
What exactly happened on the day of the accident?
"It was a bowling accident," Buddy explains. "It was a Sunday afternoon, and [on] Sundays in my house, I wake up to the smell of my wife cooking sauce, the meatballs are going and we're ready to watch the Giants play football."
"It was about 12 o'clock," the "Cake Boss" continues. "Me and my son were downstairs, hanging out, and we were like, 'Oh, everybody's coming over,' so I oiled the bowling alley. I took out the machine, I oiled the lanes and then I said, 'Alright, so later if we want to play, we could play.' And then, I [turned] the machine on to make sure everything was good, and the sweep that cleans it was stuck, which happened before. And I went behind to go fix it. So I go in the back and I start doing what I have to do, and I turned for one second and then, boom, it just went through my hand and I was kind of pinned and stuck."
While Buddy says he initially screamed, of course, he then stayed calmer than he thought he would while giving his kids direction.
"I screamed. My sons, my brothers-in-law came over. I see that there's no way I'm getting it out, except for cutting it out. I tell my kids to go get the saw, go get the pliers. They cut me out and we [wrapped] my hand and we [ran] over to the emergency room. They took the spike out, and the next day, I went to the Hospital For Special Surgeries and we did some other surgeries. So now I'm on surgery three."
As terrifying as the accident was, Buddy is trying to remain optimistic during such a challenging year.
"It could've taken fingers off. It could've hit my wrist, I could've bled out," he tells Rach. "It could have been [so much worse]. It sucks [that] it's my dominant hand, but you gotta do what you gotta do."
We're so happy you're doing better and recovering, Buddy!
