Where did THAT bruise come from?!

Ever have a mystery bruise? I do, often, but this one was special. In what way, you ask? Well this one was the result of a little critter!

I first noticed it when Jason and I were sitting out by the fire barrel. We had a lot of cardboard to burn, so we decided to sit outside and enjoy the beautiful night. The weather had finally broken and it was cooler than it has been since May. The sky was full of stars and it was gorgeous.

As I sat in my chair, I moved my leg and hit (lightly) my upper calf on the leg of the chair. I looked down, and in the fire light, I saw what appeared to be a bruise. Weird, I thought, because I couldn’t remember hitting that part of my leg on anything. It had been a relatively calm day and I hadn’t moved any furniture or anything. I just could not figure it out.

In the beginning…before it started to spread.

That night, as I was sleeping, I rolled over and that part of my leg hit the mattress. OUCH! It was so painful, it woke me up from a dead sleep. I avoided pressing my leg against the mattress and went back to sleep.

The next day, the bruise was dark colored and getting bigger. It was also very warm to the touch. Oh dear. It was time to circle the area with a sharpie so I could see if it was growing larger.

The previous few days, Jason had found and killed two Brown Recluse spiders in our bathroom. We verified their identity on an app, to make sure they were not the “mock” recluses. They were not. Jason said he’d spray for them (in his youth, he worked pest control with his Dad’s company), and we thought that was the end of it.

Now with this strange bruising, we began to get worried. I looked up what the Brown Recluse bite would look like and lo and behold…I had one! Geesh!

The redness was spreading over the next couple of days, and I knew it was time to contact my doctor. He agreed it was either a Brown Recluse or a Black Widow bite and ordered up a round of antibiotics.

A lovely Brown Recluse Spider!

I must say I was very fortunate. There has been no necrosis (that’s where the tissue dies from the poison in the spider bite), so the bite was not serious, and the antibiotics did their job. So no worries there.

I love our homestead and being out in nature, but the nature keeps trying to kill me! (You should see what happens when I get poison ivy…YUCK)!

Hope you all have a lovely and bite free day!