Inappropriate intimate relationships with…insects

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Courtesy of clker

Courtesy of clker

New relationships should start slowly. Maybe with a nice dinner or drinks. Then move to activities that take longer like dinner and a movie. Slowly!

That’s not what happened. No dinner or drinks. Just blood sucking.

There are very few things that freak me out.

Insects crawling into my ear to attack my brain are one of them. I saw this episode of ER where a spider crawled into the woman’s brain through the ear. I have been grossed out ever since.

You could say it’s a phobia.

For the past 10 days I have had a lump in my ear. It was in the upper front part of the fold where I couldn’t see. Felt like a big skin tag or maybe one of those seborrheic keratosis boogers that seem to grow on my body like mushrooms.

I tried using an ointment just in case it was a big scab. It seemed to shed what looked like black salt.

Source: WebMD

Source: WebMD

The beloved husband looked and said it was black. After consulting Dr. Google he decreed it was indeed (most likely) a seborrheic keratosis. (Fortunately the beloved husband doesn’t charge for his services.)

It was a bad spot to have something removed. It was gonna hurt. Like hell. Crap.

Maybe if I waited a week it would go away.

It takes a few weeks to get into my dermatologist so I decided to make the appointment. I could cancel if it went away.

“We have an opening for tomorrow at 9. Will that work for you?” was the response from the scheduler. I took it.

The doctor asked me what was wrong. I told him I had a booger in my ear. (I like to use the proper technical terms. It makes them laugh.)

He peered in with his fancy glasses that let him see the inside of my pores and said, “You have a tick in there.”

A TICK! I was totally grossed out. I’ve had ticks before but not attached for so long or so close to my head brain.

This tick has showered with me and watched me change clothes. It slept with me and hugged the cats (Wouldn’t it prefer them?).

It was a brown dog tick. (I don’t have a dog!) They sent it for testing.

I have to stop watching medical shows. They freak me out.

Oh, that black salt it shed was tick poop. IN MY FREAKING EAR!

Also I wouldn’t recommend the beloved husband for any medical advice.

59 thoughts on “Inappropriate intimate relationships with…insects”

  1. Pingback: The damn bugs | Views and Mews by Coffee Kat

  2. Well I’m very glad that you got the dermatologist appt. for the very next morning, egads! I too am paranoid about such … invasions, infestations, bugs in general in my vicinity… so I empathize, poor you! Did your non-medical husband take you out to dinner, or at least massage your poor ear?! ~ Peri

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  4. AAAAAAAHHHHHHH. What????!!! I had to go look for this post when I saw today’s reference to it and now I’m just horrified.

    My deepest empathy. I’m going to have nightmares now.

    In your place, I would burn down the garden, hire a chemical assassin for the house, hermetically seal it and have all the coffee delivered. Do not risk it.

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    • That’s funny! I felt like that too for a while. It’s my second tick bite in 2 years. After my outdoor cat died, I thought I wouldn’t be subjected to ticks (he would bring them in from the deep cover where he liked to sleep). Ha! Now I owe him an apology.

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  5. Pingback: Random 5 for July 3rd – Inspiration, hearing, elections, attitude, birthdays | Views and Mews by Coffee Kat

    • My first tick ever, about 20 years ago attached in my hair line and I found it right away. This one was creepy. The blood supply is not great there which may be why I had it so long. This was a week ago and I still have a scab there. That is creepy too because I’m always wondering….did they get it all?

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  8. I had one between my toes once. Yuk! I removed it accidentally because I didn’t know it was there. I guess I didn’t get all of it because the place itched for months. That reminds me to use insect repellent when working outside, like I did this week. I was worried about mosquitoes and sunburn, but didn’t give a thought to ticks. We also have chiggers here, which bite worse than mosquitoes. I have my shrubs sprayed due to Japanese ladybugs, so I guess that helps. Now you have me itching all over. Please do not have any more illicit relationships.

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    • We don’t have chiggers but I hear they can be bad. When I go out to work in the back shrubs, I got covered and sprayed. Occasionally I just jump in the ground cover to retrieve a branch or something and that’s when they get me.

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  11. I guess I won’t recommend “Brain Dead” to you. It’s the new CBS series by the people who gave us “The Good Wife.” It’s a political/horror/comedy show that involves worms from space crawling into politicians ears and turning them weird (if their heads don’t blow up).

    The English beagle we had when we lived in the Philippines was a magnet for ticks, and it was my responsibility to remove them. Yuck!

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  13. Wow… I’m so sorry. We stayed with friends recently who proudly showed off the deer who come into their yard each evening at sundown. While everyone “oohed and ahhed” the experience, I kept looking to make sure the windows and screens were securely closed. I want no part of their associated ticks! Feel better…

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    • It wasn’t so much being ill as being grossed out. Slept with that damn thing! You were smart. I’ve had a deer tick once. Very tiny and hard to see. Fortunately he attached to my wrist and no my ear.

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  14. Better a tick on the surface than one of those ICKy creeping critters that like to burrow underneath the skin and wreak havoc ~ e.g., parasitic worms.

    Glad it tested negative . . . but I think most dog ticks do.
    It’s the deer ticks that are plague carriers.

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    • We don’t have parasitic worms locally at least that I know of (which would also creep me out). When we looked at it both the doc and I felt sure it was a harmless dog tick. However, they way things are today, they test everything. I had a friend who did some missionary work in Costa Rica and came back with some nasty amoebas.

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  18. Totally icky-freaky!!! So glad you got it checked out and REMOVED!!! I have the same phobia .. There was a Star Trek episode where lobster like creatures got into the ear and attached to the spine. Alien take over….

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    • Very carefully! They have all sorts of tools and he had a curved tweezers that did the job. He got the head out too. Very quick but then again he’s a dermatologist. He said he likes these kinds of cases. Easy peasy.

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  20. We are always careful to check Maggie for ticks, and have a couple of tick hooks for disposal. When out in the fields on a rambles with MOH, we check each other out when we get home just in case. Maggie is protected with the drop on type repellant (reminds me, need to dose her again), but we have found a couple trying to set up house in her fur! Glad you are sortted though. Hope test results are negative.

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    • Lab results were negative. When my old cat Jake came in from outside we always checked him for ticks. He too got the drops but we would find them crawling on his fur. Sometimes he would deposit them on the carpet. We have a water retention area in back of us that is all weeds and a lot of shrubs so we have lots of ticks. Mostly dog ticks and not the more dangerous deer ticks.

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  21. Ick… that is creepy! Hate ticks… hate them. Hope it doesn’t test for Lyme’s. If I remember right you took a course of antibiotics for a tick bite a bit ago. I had some kind of spider bite my right shoulder in the spring and the skin is just returning to normal. No, it wasn’t a recluse.

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    • Great! I’m a blood bank. We have shrubs around our yard and they are in there. Without a pet that goes outdoors we haven’t seen them much around the house. I was doing yard work in the back and I think that’s how I got it.

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  23. Ewww. I had similar feeling a couple of years ago when, as I drove in Council Bluffs, I reached back to scratch a small itch on the back of my head. Found a “lump” and removed a tick. Not as bad as texting while driving, but not optimal for driving. Ewww. Glad you saw a doctor!

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  25. I know how kind you are to all forms of life! I even find myself trying not to kill bugs…I take something that they can crawl onto and run like the wind to dump it outside. But ticks…I HATE TICKS. They are blood sucking leaches! There is no mercy when it comes to ticks.

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