I had a day full of developments regarding my spider bite. Doctors are thinking it was a brown recluse, so it is legitimately itsy bitsy. Here’s an update from this week…

I felt like I turned a corner on Monday with this whole thing. My leg really wasn’t in any pain and I finished up three solid weeks of antibiotics. Honey has the most patient, calm and positive disposition of anyone I’ve ever known. His daily (hourly?) remarks of “you’re doing great”, “this is really looking good”, “you’ve practically beat this” also helped me to feel like I was doing immensely better.

We both went to see my doctor today, and I could have hugged her I was so happy to see her. Like Honey, she’s kind, patient and positive. And, also like Honey, she gets me. She knows I’m scared of needles, pain, blood and basically anything that happens inside of a doctor office, lab or hospital and she treats me gently. Unfortunately, she took one look at the (still open) wound and said “I had hoped it would look a lot better than this by now.” I felt crushed! In all fairness, Honey and I have NO idea what it should look like so the fact that it was basically pain free made us think we must be knocking this healing thing out of the park.

She said that she wanted me to see a wound care specialist, but cautioned that it can take two weeks to get in. Well, within an hour her office called and said they got me an appointment for 2PM today. Honey cleared his calendar again and went with me. I wasn’t sure he needed to attend, but was incredibly grateful he did once I arrived. The office is nurse run, and mine was yet another kind, gentle and extremely knowledgeable soul. I wanted to hug her too. (emotional much?!) After her first look at my wound she called in the vascular surgeon. They explained that all of the skin around my wound was dead and that most of the cells on top were not viable. He performed a debridement and, despite constantly checking in on me, holding my hand and being yet another compassionate human on this journey, I nearly passed out. And then was overcome with nausea. We got past that – after a while – and were given brand new instructions and a “care package” for the next two weeks. Every three days we have a six step process of cleaning and dressing. No getting it wet, and still no swimming in the lovely pool that mocks me all day long. I can take quick, light showers with the bandage on. They also explained the importance of protein and water intake in healing a wound, which I appreciated and will follow diligently. I have another appointment with the vascular surgeon in two weeks. I begged for an approximate timeline, even a no-strings-attached-worst-case-scenario timeline, but nobody will give me one. That doesn’t sound encouraging either. Now that two more medical professionals have said brown recluse, I’ve looked up pictures of the different stages of that bite. It looks eerily similar to mine.

Now to the fabulous part of my day… Honey abhors going to the movie theater (he has misophonia) but suggested a night out to see Cruella. He knows how much I love the theater and I’ve been so excited to see this movie (thinking we’d buy on Disney+). It was such a FUN night out. We started by browsing through Target and then moved on to the movies. I had protein on my mind and ended up picking up a bunch of greek yogurt cups. Randomly, Honey threw in a package of ham for Whit and I grabbed some of those little snack pickles. Well, we got to the car and realized we didn’t have time to go home. We had to carry in our groceries and, as I opened the bag multiple times to explain we weren’t sneaking in snacks, the looks we got from the teenage employees were hysterical. (Uh…. okay, ma’am. I guess you wouldn’t be eating ham and yogurt in the theater.) Cruella was SO good and I enjoyed every minute of the 2+ hour show. I am a little baffled about what happened between the closing credits and the cartoon we all know and love, but Honey explained it away with “she said it herself… she’s brilliant, bad and a little bit mad.” Honey liked it so much he said he’d probably buy it on Disney+ too. On top of that, the lounger chairs, popcorn, junior mints and cokes were perfection. I didn’t realize how much I missed the movies!

Thank you to all that have flooded my inbox with prayers and encouragement. I have never felt so loved. I know this will pass and I know it will heal. I need to get out of my own head most days. <3 I got clearance from all the people I saw today to take Whit to a baseball tournament next week so that should be a nice, fun, positive thing to do! I’m a little terrified to be away from Nurse Honey but it’s time to pull up my big girl pants!

UPDATE: If you really, really want to read the full schedule of events and see the nasty photos, I have created a hidden page that you can access here. I have reached the end of the internet on MRSA photos and information. I was and primarily am interested in what things to visually look out for. I am ONLY sharing this for reference in the hopes that it can help someone down the road. MRSA can be deadly. CLICK WITH CAUTION

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