Sunday, June 10, 2012

Arizona Scourge

It's been a while since I blogged about one of AZ's greatest scourges.  Almost three years, as a matter of fact.

Can you tell what I'm talking about by evaluating the contents of the little boys' garbage?
Do you need a closer look?
We had just finished family prayer last night about 8:45.  Brad, Ben, and Lily had all left the room and I stayed to sing bedtime songs.  Just as I crossed the threshold to the hallway, I felt something like a pinprick on the outside of my left foot.  A split second later, I knew what had happened--I'd stepped on a scorpion.

"I've been stung by a scorpion!  Find it!"  I looked around, and sure enough--there camouflaged in the dirt-colored carpet (also scorpion-colored) was a two-inch long scorpion.  He was still alive, but not for long.  I smashed and Brad disposed.  Then I hobbled to our bedroom.

I've had this experience before--when I was pregnant with Lily, a scorpion was tangled my a blanket and I was stung a few times.  That was nothing compared to this time.  Within minutes, pain was shooting up my leg, followed by the traveling numbness characteristic of a scorpion sting.  It was awful.  I elevated it, iced it, then took some Tylenol, but no relief came. We had some spare crutches in the storage room, so at least I was able to hop to the bathroom and brush my teeth and get on pjs.  Brad even tried turning on a little HGTV to distract me, but nothing worked.  Around 11:30 I got out of bed, grabbed the crutches and tried walking around our bedroom to alleviate the pain.  I was having muscle spasms all the way up my thigh by this point, and I would have done anything to stop them.  Then, my mouth and tongue started to go numb, along with pain in my back--probably my kidneys processing the toxin (or so Dr. Google said).

I tossed and turned for the next two hours, falling asleep for a few minutes of respite, then reawakening to dizziness, excruciating pain, and and numbness--you know the feeling you get when your foot falls asleep and you're trying to reestablish circulation? That's what my entire lower leg and inside of my thigh felt like.  Finally, around 2 am, I couldn't take the pain any more, and I took some cough syrup with codeine to try and relieve my suffering.

The codeine knocked me out for two more hours.  But when I awoke, I was overwhelmed with a new sensation--body covered in sweat and the need to throw up.  Half comatose, I sat up and yelled, "I'm going to throw up!"  before the codeine and exhaustion took over and I fell back asleep.  Brad tried to waken me, but I was out again.

Morning came, and at least the searing pain had lessened, but the numbness had spread to the sole of my right foot, my left inner thigh, and my right hand.  And the nausea hadn't dissipated either.  I crutched my way to Ben's room around 9 am to give him a few directions, and the effort was so great that I couldn't get off the bed for five minutes.

As the day has progressed, some of the symptoms from the toxin have disappeared.  My mouth, hand, and right foot are no longer numb, as well as my upper left thigh.  I'm still experiencing mild numbness below my left knee, with moderate to severe numbness and pain at the sting site on my left foot. I walked without the crutches for a little while, but I'm back on them tonight.  Hopefully by tomorrow I'll be able to walk unassisted, but I think I might fall closer to the 72-hour side of the symptom spectrum, instead of the usual 24 hours.

I didn't need this this week.

Don't let this post scare you away from visiting Arizona.  I've never seen a tarantula in the seventeen years I've lived here.  Promise.

21 comments:

  1. Yikes Jen. I hope you have a more restful night tonight. I really dread being stung. So far only mark has had the honor in our house. We've been lucky.

    ReplyDelete
  2. This sounds just awful! I didn't know that you had scorpions - hmmm - may re-think next winter's jaunt to your part of the world.
    Up here we have Black Widow spiders. I have never seen one in the house, but I've seen them in the garden, so never, ever garden without gloves.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Kids spent the evening scorpion hunting. Found uncountable numbers of babies out by the barn. Adam and Taylor brought home a jar full of big ones that they hunted in the alleys. Hunter and Dallin watched in delight as the scorpions burned to a crisp with a little help from a sprinkle of gasoline. I fear that this may be a bad year for them. Sorry you had such a bad reaction.

    ReplyDelete
  4. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Ouch! I got stuck 3 times on my left leg in bed a couple years ago, and I know exactly what you're talking about with the stinging numbness. Something I learned when I got stung by a wasp is that onions take away the sting, so I just cut up an onion and rubbed the pieces on my leg where I got stung and hoped for the same result. It worked! But the numbness of course was still there where it spread. Hope you're feeling better soon!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Oh man, I am terrified of being stung. I hate those things so much. I can still hear my mom screaming while beating them with the broom. So sorry you had such a bad reaction. FYI, there are essential oils that help. Devon was stung a few months ago and we immediately put oils on him. He had no muscle spasms and just a tiny bit of numbness on the site of the sting. I hope you feel better soon!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Wow, you seem so calm and nonchalant.... I'm never going to complain about our monster mosquitoes again!
    Dana

    ReplyDelete
  8. I've heard of scorpions, but I didn't know they could send poison into your body like that and make you feel terrible. I hope you feel better as the day goes on today. The whole time I'm reading your post, I'm thinking I don't need to move to Arizona now! I'll remind myself of this in January when I'm jealous of your warm weather! :)

    ReplyDelete
  9. Wow, Jen! This sounds awful! Do people usually go to the doctor for a scorpion sting or not down there? I always thought that would require med. attention.?
    When we lived down there, a neighbor used to have Blacklight parties at night where they'd use blacklights to find scorpions crawling on their garden walls and fences, and then kill them. Of course, there were refreshments afterwards, lol! Only in AZ. You take care and feel better SOON!

    ReplyDelete
  10. Man that's awful! I hope you feel better soon.

    ReplyDelete
  11. OMG I WOULD HAVE FREAKED OUT.

    this is the reason i will never visit family in west texas...or my sister in hill country....

    sorry looks like u'll have to come visit me now instead hahaha

    ok why were you not freaking out? i would have thought i was dying haha

    ReplyDelete
  12. I have lived in Mesa all my life (minus the college years) and I have never been stung by a scorpion (knock on wood). I can't believe you were so calm. I would have been freaking out! Especially as symptoms "progressed". I hope you are feeling much better.

    ReplyDelete
  13. I would have freaked out once those symptoms started appearing and gone to the ER. Scorpions SCARE me.

    And now I know why I will NEVER live in Arizona.

    =)

    PS. My son lived in Prescott and Tucson and never saw even one. Are they not as prevalent there??

    ReplyDelete
  14. YIKES!!!!! It's bugs like this that make me glad I live in a frozen tundra. Don't love big icky stinging creepy crawly furry legged stuff.

    I hope you get feeling better!
    So sorry.

    ReplyDelete
  15. YIKES!!!!! It's bugs like this that make me glad I live in a frozen tundra. Don't love big icky stinging creepy crawly furry legged stuff.

    I hope you get feeling better!
    So sorry.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Ick, Ick, and MORE ICK! I can gladly say I have not yet had this experience.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Actually I'm less afraid of tarantulas. We used to see them up by our horse corrals years ago, and they really don't want to bother with you. They do jump though. A sting from a scorpion sounds terrible - so sorry that happened! I hope you're demanding breakfast, lunch and dinner in bed.

    ReplyDelete
  18. I feel bad now how I was less than sympathetic when Logan got stung at your old house!

    Sorry for the crappy weekend! I hope you feel better!

    ReplyDelete
  19. I'm with everybody who said I WOULD HAVE FREAKED OUT! You were so calm - scorpion-experienced, I guess. Glad we don't have them here - stink bugs are bad enough :)

    ReplyDelete
  20. yep, this definitely keeps me from wanting to visit arizona AND reminds me of why i can never live there. the heat too. i don't do heat. yuck, yuck, yuck.

    ReplyDelete
  21. Okay...that would be enough to keep me from even driving through AZ. I kept expecting you to say..."I finally went to the ER". Scorpions just sound too exotic and life threatening to me.

    ReplyDelete