Bite!

December 28th, 2019| Topic: RaMbLeS | 0

The other day, Susie Torres of Kansas City, MO, thought she had something inside her left ear.

I woke up Tuesday hearing a bunch of swooshing and water in my left ear. It was like when you went swimming and you have all of that water in your ear.”

Well, Susie went to the local ER. She was in for a surprise when a nurse checked her out.

Said Torres:

She ran out and said I’m going to get a couple more people. She then said, ‘I think you have an insect in there.’”

In any case, the tough lady she was, Ms. Torres didn’t panic, until …

She came back in and told me it was a spider, and I’m pretty terrified of those creatures.”

It turned out to be a creepy-crawly arachnid, about the size of a dime.

[I once had to take out a dead cockroach piecemeal, bit by bit, out of a five-year-old’s ear during my pediatric internship at Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston, but no spiders.]

Explained Torres:

They had a few tools and worked their magic and got it out.”

But it wasn’t your run-of-the-mill, garden variety spider. No, sir! Doctors informed Ms. Torres that said entomological culprit was none other than a highly venomous brown recluse spider! The medics assured her she hadn’t been bitten by the invader. (Not that she wouldn’t have known if she had.)

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a bite from a brown recluse can cause itching, muscle pain, increased sweating, headaches, nausea and/or a fever

The venom of a brown recluse can cause a severe lesion by destroying skin tissue (skin necrosis) which will require professional medical attention.”

The CDC adds:

Brown recluses, recognizable from violin-shaped markings on their heads, are usually found in workplaces with secluded, dry, sheltered areas such as underneath structures [or] logs, or in piles of rocks or leaves.”

These eight-legged beasts, native to the South and Midwest US, earn their name for their tendency to tuck themselves in hidden nooks and crannies. If they get indoors, they can sequester themselves in in dark closets, shoes, or attics. Or ears!

Torres:

I never thought they would crawl in your ear or any part of your body.”

She has no idea where the thing came from, but she is taking no chances in the future.

“I went and put some cotton balls in my ears last night. I’m shaking off my clothes, and I don’t put my purse on the floor. I’m a little more cautious.”

I’d be, too!

The things we have in us!

Some deadlier than others.

The heart is more deceitful than all else And is desperately sick; Who can understand it?
Jeremiah 17:9

And watch out for these body parts:

“There is none righteous, not even one;
there is none who understands, there is none who seeks for god;
all have turned aside, together they have become useless;
there is none who does good, there is not even one.
their throat is an open grave,
with their tongues they keep deceiving,
the poison of asps is under their lips;
whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness;
their feet are swift to shed blood; …
There is no fear of God before their eyes.”
Romans 3:10–15, 18

And the result?

The wages of sin is death …
Romans 6:23a

Worse than the bite of a brown recluse spider, is the bite of sin!

But, praise God, there is a cure:

… the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 6:23b

SOURCES:
USA Today, The Guardian