I woke this morning with something like a mosquito bite on my left thigh. There had actually been a mosquito flying around in here (dangit) so I was somewhat expecting a bite, but not on my thigh. That would take a pretty dedicated mosquito. So I looked at it and thought I saw a little spot. Figuring what it was, I picked at it and got the spot and put it on the kitchen counter. I got a flashlight and looked closely; the spot had legs and they were moving.
So I clapped it in a sealable plastic bag. It's a second or maybe third instar deer tick, less than 2mm across all told. A dangerous citizen indeed. I've been taking Facebook advice all morning ranging from "get it and yourself tested immediately!" to "just ignore it." The clinic that I used back when I was a more dedicated hypochondriac no longer has an ask-a-nurse line outside office hours, nor any answering service whatever unless you have an emergency and want to page the resident. I wasn't feeling very emergencyish, so I'll call Monday. My friend who had such a miserable time with Lyme disease says testing is seldom accurate anyway and my best move is to find a doctor I can browbeat into giving me the doxycycline just in case. It could happen, but as SC isn't a Lyme hot spot and as I'm not as hypochondriac as I used to be, I'm not too worried.
The subject line is from famous advice to hikers. After you get home, take your clothes off and check yourself over carefully. Any freckles that move, those are ticks: get them off! I seldom bother checking anymore; I never was much good at spotting damned things, and have too many freckles.
No comments:
Post a Comment