My little stingray of sunshine

It seems this blog is turning into a 'Faces o' Death' blog, what with all our near death experiences. This time it was my turn to almost die. I almost went the same way as the dearly departed and sorely missed Crocodile Hunter, Steve Irwin. I too was stabbed by a fierce, man-eating stingray. Ok, maybe not man-eating, but certainly man-stabbing. And that man was me.

I was out surfing early Tuesday morning when I accidentally stepped on something squishy and skittish. I knew it was a stingray the instant I stepped on it, but apparently he wasn't aware I was dropping in for a visit. He thought I was steppin', which technically I was, but not the way the kids mean it. I tried to 'step off' (both the regular meaning and the 'kids these days' meaning) but I was not fast enough. So he shivved me. Or is it shanked me? I can never remember which one is the verb and which one is the noun. I guess you only learn those all important details in the Big Time House.

Anyway, he stung me right in the bottom, middle of my left foot. If any of you don't know what a stingray barb looks like, they are quite long, sharp and filled with poisonous poison. Luckily this little guy's...I mean this huge monster's barb did not break off inside my foot, which often happens.

So I hobbled back to the shore and checked the life guard stand for help. But lifeguards are apparently not early risers. It's probably safe to say that early morning beach goers are more likely to still have their natural inhibitions and common sense in tact than the late night variety. So I drove myself home with the radio blasting so I couldn't hear myself crying like a little girl.

I had learned that the best treatment for a stingray sting is to soak the punctured limb in water as hot as is tolerable. So I jumped in the bathtub after efficiently spreading blood and sand all over the carpet. Alice and google confirmed the treatment schedule and also found out that the venom is likely to ooze out of the wound and form a jelly like blob. I checked my foot. Yep, jelly blob confirmed. About the size of a quarter and all mixed with sand.

I continued to soak myself in scalding water for two hours. I tried getting out after one hour but my foot immediately started to throb so I got back in the tub. At the end of two hours I finally removed my wet suit and it looked like my feet were sun burned. There was a distinct red line where the wet suit had been. And they remained bright pink until the following day. Nothing like a first degree scalding to take your mind off the pain of stingray venom eating you from the inside out. But I think the severely hot water did the trick because it didn't hurt much after that. It did split open and bleed every time I tried to walk on it the rest of the day, but it's not our carpet so I wasn't too worried.

During this time, I made Alice call our lifeguard friend, call our med school friend, call the doctor/hospital four times, schedule and then cancel a doctor's appointment, reschedule and recancel the same appointment, and read me the entire wikipedia entry on stingrays. All while I chillaxed in the tub with a virgin daiquiri. And she never complained once. She really is a trooper.

In my efforts to capture the moment on film/silicon, I found that what hot rodders paint on their cars is not so much like flames, but more like blood draining in a bathtub. Makes you wonder what they have in those spacious classic trunks of theirs.



Still, I think my new/old volvo would look pretty sweet 'blooded' out. All in all, this has garnered me much sympathy and given me a cool story to tell people I meet on the street or at the grocery store. And so my near tragedy has become the little stingray of sunshine in an otherwise pleasantly sunny and mild San Diego week.