Chapter 18
March 8, 2008……….Enter Brown Recluse Spider
After being home a few days I decided to go help my psychic friend unpack some clothing from India he was going to handle in his store. I showed up in time to find out they needed more than unpacking, there were shelves to put up and construction work to do. I was in my element.
After a great day of work I realized I had been bitten by an insect. I guessed it had happened while at my friend’s house as my arm was normal in the morning when I went to his home and when I got home I had a very itchy bite on my arm. I applied some Sunbreeze Oil, the liquid version of the popular antiseptic Tiger Balm to it and assumed it would go away without issue.
5 days later it seemed a little bit itchier but I wasn’t too concerned. I’d always had rather severe reactions to bee stings, scorpions and red ant bites which lasted for several days. As much as I hate to take medications I carry an antihistamine in my purse in case I am bitten and need to stop the symptoms the bites can cause. I don’t like to mask symptoms, but when my lymph glands are swelling and I experience difficulty breathing I’ll take a pill to avoid a dangerous situation.
Even though I wasn’t overly concerned about this bite something told me this one was different. I would keep an eye on it and if it didn’t go away soon, I would seek medical counsel.
On Monday, March 10, I had to replace a kitchen sink. The bite was still itching but I had work to do. I had to use my bite arm, my right arm, to run the jigsaw and the drill never dreaming I was stirring up venom in the wound area.
That evening it itched more than ever and I was concerned. Before I went to bed I took a photo of my arm and the red spot with a penny next to it for reference as to its size.
When I awoke in the morning the little red spot had blown up to the size of a penny with a ring of pimplish-looking things forming around the red circle. It appeared as though it was going to continue to grow. It was time to find out what was causing this volcanic eruption on my arm. It looked very similar to some photos I had seen on the Internet a few years ago of a brown recluse spider bite. I knew there was no antivenin to fight their bites. I also knew people lost limbs and lives as a result of not caring for them.
I was up too early to call anyone so I typed brown recluse spider bite into my computer’s search engine and when the photos came onto the screen there was no question in my mind. I‘d been bitten by a brown recluse spider.
After reading the available information thoroughly I found traditional medicine still had no cures for the brown recluse spider bite. Once bitten the venom begins to eat away at the flesh and doctors either suggest cutting away the flesh or injecting the area with steroids, neither of which have any guarantees of success and, according to the Internet, caused a longer healing time. I also chuckled a little when I read the information on the brown recluse spider. They are clearly marked with a fiddle on their back.
I called Dr. Susan and made an appointment to see her the following day. In the meantime, she told me to start applying Golden Yellow-a Chinese drawing suave we had used with great success on an old friend of mine who’d had an infection.
She looked at the wound on Wednesday and we discussed ordering a poison detox from an associate of hers who had been practicing oriental medicine for many, many years. We weren’t too concerned as we had a great deal of confidence in the efficacy of the Golden Yellow and decided not to order the super-detox. It was a month long treatment and it cost over $300. Susan did a detox needle treatment, which made me feel better and I went home promising not to do anything but rest. We thought if we could keep my body calm the venom wouldn’t be able to move away from the wound site and the drawing suave should pull it out in a few days.
Thursday morning the wound site was a little bigger. The circle of pimples which had appeared yesterday was now part of the open wound and there was another circle of pimples around the outside of that so I concluded the drawing suave we were using was not potent enough. I called Lynn Deen, a healer-friend who does Meridian Stress Assessments with a highly technical frequency testing machine. I decided I needed to make sure exactly what I was dealing with and I knew Lynn could help me. She and Dr. Susan have worked together to heal many individuals with some rather odd ailments. I hadn’t called Lynn in the beginning as her remedies generally take time before working as most natural healing remedies do. They work with the body to cure and heal without masking the symptoms like making the pain or the itch go away. Now I would rely on her expertise to confirm my suspicions and get started on whatever remedy she suggested.
Lynn answered her phone and said she could fit me into her afternoon and refreshed my memory as to where she lived in Gainesville. I felt better just knowing we would be able to positively identify what was causing this growing volcano on my arm.
The frequency test showed the venom of the poisonous brown recluse spider lurking in my body. Well, at least we knew for sure what we were dealing with. She put a series of frequencies into hydrolyzed water and prescribed starting with more than the usual 1 drop 3 times per day under my tongue. She wanted me to start with 3 drops under my tongue 3 times per day. The technology behind the Meridian Stress Assessment Machine is quite amazing, based on the concept everything has a frequency, a vibration unique to it. When there is something present in the body that shouldn’t be there she puts the necessary frequency into the hydrolyzed water and over time it pushes the bad guys out. Before I left her office, I put 3 drops under my tongue and drove off. While I was there she also asked her pendulum whether the drawing suave was strong enough and it said it wasn’t. When I redressed the wound I used Icthamol, a petroleum based drawing suave used to pull infections out of wounds in livestock. She was also able to put frequencies of a few homeopathic antivenin cures in the water drops too so I felt confident I was on my way to healing as I left her house.
Whenever I am in Gainesville I feel a need to accomplish more than just one task so I stopped at an office supply store on my way out of town. As I drove away from Lynn’s house I was hoping I wouldn’t have an adverse affect from the drops but it was too late to worry about it now, besides, it was only 3 drops under my tongue, how bad could the reaction be?
I collected my purchases at the store and as I was standing at the cash register listening to the woman ask how I felt today the room began to spin. I grabbed onto the counter and said, “Fine thanks,” while thinking to myself, good grief, I hope I don’t faint here. Just let me get out to my truck. She kept chit-chatting while I held on to the counter trying to smile wishing she would finish ringing my sale and let me go. Lynn’s drops were proving to be powerful medicine.
Finally she stopped talking and I walked out to my truck and sat in the driver’s seat until the waves of nausea stopped washing over me. It took several minutes of deep breathing but I felt fine after awhile and drove home. I called my mother to let her know I wasn’t doing too well and also to have someone keep me company for the 45 minute drive home.
Friday night I dined at a local restaurant owned by friends of mine. Even though my ugly wound was wrapped in gauze with the drawing suave in place they all expressed great concern for me. They had a bad feeling and I try not to entertain negative energy so I tried not to hear their worries. I always have such blind positive thinking my arm could be rotting off and I will smile and say it will be fine.
On the way back to my house I called a friend who was supposed to be camping tonight at Fanning Springs and performing music on Saturday. With the rain coming in I wanted to offer my extra bedroom to her, besides a little company right now would take my mind off this THING on my arm.
She thankfully accepted and arrived at my home a few hours later. I was just getting ready to do a Moxa treatment on my arm so we chatted while I burnt the Moxa stick and waved it close to my wound. Lynn, my healer friend, had suggested I do regular Moxa treatments on the wound because when this herb stick is burned it vibrates at the same frequency as the human cell helping them grow while destroying the cells that don’t belong there.
After the treatment I got very dizzy and had my first “episode” of palpitations and severe dizziness and nausea. My friend thought perhaps it was the smoke from the burning Moxa causing my dizziness. She felt it was hard to breathe in the room so I went outside. I was rather frightened but eventually my breathing returned to normal.
I had ordered and received some Microhydrin and decided to apply some directly to the wound. I had used it on a bad outbreak of shingles a few years previous and remembered it had burned and caused the area to bleed but obliterated them quickly. When I applied it to the spider bite it burned and made the wound bleed, as it had done in the past with my shingles, so hoped it would heal this as quickly as it had worked on them. Microhydrin works on micro-technology and brings oxygen to wounds at an accelerated pace.
I didn’t sleep well worrying about my arm realizing this was getting serious. If the wound continued to grow I could lose use of my right arm or, according to reports on the Internet, I could lose my life.
I had invited a friend over for the following morning so I could help him with his new website. While we were working I began to feel the nausea and palpitations come over me and thought hunger could be blamed so I fixed myself an egg while helping him. We went to Fanning Springs and listened to my friend who’d spent the night at my house play music and then I went to dinner. I had a dizzy episode at the restaurant and my friend offered to take me into Gainesville to the emergency room.
I called Dr. Susan and she explained to me what they would do in the emergency room with a scalpel and steroids and I knew I did not want either of those remedies. I decided I would continue on the treatments I had and she wanted me to come into her office on Sunday.
I was feeling pretty good on Sunday. I was getting used to the pain of the wound and the application of the drawing suave. I was also getting better at balancing the penny on my arm and taking photos with my left hand. What I didn’t like was the fact the wound looked like it was sinking. This meant the flesh below was deteriorating and I was going to have a big scar. Right now, the thought of a big scar on my arm was comforting as that would mean the wound had healed and I wasn‘t facing the unknown like I really was. A big scar would be the best case scenario.
That afternoon, I looked down at my arm and my heart sank. There was a red line starting from the wound heading up my arm. This was not good. I had started on the colloidal silver too late and there was no doubt in my mind an infection was developing.
I showed it to Dr. Susan and she called and ordered the “super-detox” to be shipped overnight the following day.
On the way home I called my psychic friend and told him about the red line. His grandmother had been a healer and he said he would work on a formula and call me back.
When I got home I was nervous and worried and called him again. He said he had spoken to some doctors and I should come over. I headed to his home and found him crushing Neem tree leaves and mixing a potion from a recipe given to him by a doctor-psychic-monk friend he had spoken to in India. I had the whole world working on healing me. This was good.
My friend said his doctor-buddy told him to crush the leaves and mix some yucca into it. He told the doctor in India he didn’t have any yucca and the man on the other end of the line told him in a very strong Indian-accent, “Yes, you do. I see it in your medicine cabinet. It is on the third shelf in the middle in a brown bottle.”
My friend said he immediately went to his medicine cabinet to look again and told the good doctor there was no yucca there. The doctor nearly yelled his answer, “Yes, there is yucca there. I see it clearly. It is in the big medicine cabinet with all the herbs on the third shelf in the brown bottle.”
My psychic friend then realized the holy man was talking about the kitchen cabinet where he kept all the herbs from his grandmother's healing days. He went to the proper “medicine cabinet.” There it was, on the third shelf in the brown bottle, just as the man had described to him from the other side of the earth.
I sat there listening and taking this all in. I figured if someone from the other side of the earth could see into my friend’s kitchen I wanted him helping me and I would be fine, I would be fine, I would be fine, I think I can, I think I can, I think I can. Breathe deeply, I am fine.
After I helped him apply the poultice and wrapped the gauze around my arm we sat on the porch for awhile. He sang medicine songs and beat on his grandmother’s drum. This was the drum he had lent me for my drumming circle the day I met him less than a month ago. So much had happened since then.
After awhile, I was getting sleepy and he sent me home with his Grandmother’s rose quartz crystal and an amethyst crystal and made me promise to call him if I needed him. I felt safe and very well protected.
Once I was home I worked online for a little while, to take my mind off my arm, and then things turned worse. My vision became blurred, I had nausea and diarrhea, palpitations, dry-metallic taste in my mouth, and when my legs started twitching uncontrollably, I called my psychic friend and asked him to please hurry over. Then I called Dr. Susan and described my symptoms. She calmly asked if I could use the other phone while we talked and I said yes. She said dial 911. I was giving 911 directions on the land line with Dr. Susan holding on my cell phone when my psychic friend arrived.
I lied down on the couch and put my feet up above my heart, per Dr. Susan’s instructions and my friend helped me cover up. I was freezing and sweating and shaking all at the same time. It took 25 minutes for the paramedics to arrive. Thank God it hadn’t taken the ambulance crew that long the night my husband died. I probably would have had a heart attack myself. I lied on the couch and looked up at Red’s portrait on the wall and silently told him I hoped he wouldn’t be too busy to meet me at heaven’s gate if my life here was going to end.
By the time the ambulance crew got there my vitals were back to normal. Probably a good thing they hadn’t arrived earlier heaven only knows what they would have given me to stabilize me. They offered me a ride to the hospital but without insurance $700 was a pretty expensive cab ride to Gainesville.
I looked at my friend and he asked if I would like to take a ride to the hospital. I said, “Yes, I would love to,” and we grabbed some water and headed out the door.
We laughed and talked all the way in to town. My leg tremors had stopped and the palpitations and the funny feelings I had were calming down as well. My biggest fear was the red line of infection on my arm which seemed to be getting shorter. The Neem poultice was obviously working but I wanted some of western medicine’s strong antibiotics. I didn't mind using more than one form of healing!
When we arrived at the Emergency Room the place was packed with really sick people. I filled out my paperwork and put it through a slot in the wall as directed by the sign. I watched it fall into a stack of papers made out by people who were sitting in the emergency room who hadn‘t been checked in yet.
We sat for a few minutes and I got up to go to the bathroom. While I was in there I felt as if my deceased husband were in the room with me. Red’s spirit was so strong I expected him to appear before my eyes. I used the motion activated paper towel dispenser and dried my hands and walked to the door. I opened the door and the paper towel dispenser, about 5 feet away from me, was activated by some movement and dispensed another paper towel. I told Red I welcomed his presence, thanked him for showing himself and for his support and that I knew he was glad I was at the hospital. Then I continued to tell the air I was going to go back out and see how long I would have to wait before seeing someone. I promised Red if I left this evening without seeing a doctor I would go to the clinic first thing the next morning no matter how great I felt. I didn’t want to sit here all night waiting.
I came out of the rest room and told my psychic friend what had happened with the paper towel dispenser. He said he wasn't surprised a bit. He'd felt Red’s presence earlier. I asked some folks who were heading into triage how long they had been there.
When they answered, disgustedly, “5 hours,” I told my friend I wanted to go home and how sorry I was to have brought him out this late at night. He laughed and said it was a beautiful night for a ride to town and back to the Nature Coast. No traffic to deal with either!
He dropped me off at home and made me promise to call him if I needed him again. I said I would and went in to bed and went right to sleep. I was completely worn out.
When I awoke I took my morning wound photo and headed for the local clinic. They opened at 8am and took walk-ins. I was very impressed with the staff and saw the doctor in less than an hour. He prescribed antibiotics both orally and topically and I went home. At least I felt confident the infection would gp away. I picked up some yogurt with probiotics for my digestive system.
I continued to have the palpitations and other symptoms all week. The “super-detox” arrived and I started on that immediately; drinking the tea, taking the herbs and applying a new “super-detox-suave”.
I had also ordered an advanced detoxification system manufactured by Enhanced Living to help speed up the detox process earlier in the week realizing I could use it with clients to help their detoxing in the future. The Ion Spa works by ionizing and alkalinizing all the cells in your body causing them to release toxins more easily.
Dr. Susan called to tell me the spa had arrived at her office and I came into the clinic and stuck my
hands in the ionized water for 30 minutes. I was quite amazed with the powerful odors coming out of the water. I had to close my eyes as they were burning and I didn't want to breathe the harsh vapors back into my body. It was so acrid it took my breath away and it was turning the water a nasty rusty color. This procedure is such a powerful detox people over 50 years of age are limited to only one treatment every 3 days. I felt more energy when I left the clinic after the treatment then I had had in several days and was sure I was cured. Positive-attitude-Diane!
After 3 days on the super-duper $300 detox program the palpitations and accompanying symptoms began to subside and I started to break out in a rash. The poisons were coming out of me through my skin and I was glad to see them leave my system. The rash eventually covered my entire body and I joked with my friends I could no longer play connect the dots with my rash because they were so many dots they were connecting themselves. My friend Polly, from California stopped to stay with me on her way to the Florida Keys and I welcomed her company. She was amazed and a little overwhelmed by the state I was in. I am always the healthy, strong one of the bunch and, I have to admit, my red body was a little frightening.
The rash lasted for approximately one week and I felt better every day, well, almost. Over the next few days I figured out, whenever I ate more than a bite of food, my body would start to go into what I called a venom reaction; the shakes, dizzies, palpitations, etc. So, I just began eating small amounts of food here and there and supplementing with my Sunrider foods. I had just received a stock order and had lots of Quinary-50 herbs to feed my 5 systems. I knew I would heal quickly with all this good stuff.
I also found each time I would try even a simple yoga pose my body would start to react with palpitations and dizziness so I had to learn to do NOTHING.
Doing nothing is something I have never been good at but with my life and limb at stake I was a quick study. I didn’t move from my couch except to go to the bathroom or get a yogurt or some of my food herbs. These were keeping me alive and helping my body to heal at a faster pace.
All of the reports I’d read said brown recluse spider bites take 3 months or longer to heal if they heal. Some of the reports were about people who’d lost their life and limbs but I was strong and determined to survive unscathed. Actually better than ever because now I knew how to relax!
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