Madness of Mrsa

Along with the amazing adventures that traveling to new and foreign places provides it also comes with some medical concerns especially when in third world and developing countries. Before I embarked on my journey I went to a travel doctor and with a list of countries that I thought I might visit and I was given pills for malaria, high altitude sickness and chronic diarrhea. I was fortunate to only need the high altitude sickness pills and it was for a short period of time; if I remember correctly it was only 2 or 3 days. Unfortunately, that was not the only thing that I had to deal with while traveling.

My first big issue was a second degree sun burn that I got on the back of my legs and my lower back. The pictures shown here are when I was on the up side of my recovery. However, under the white gaze patch was a huge blister that formed and was raw and extremely sensitive. As if the burn weren't bad enough I was hit by a surfboard on my lower back which broke open the skin and can be seen unclose in the picture on the upper right. Overall, I had trouble sitting, sleeping and walking. The worst part was that I had to take a couple days off of surfing. After I recovered I surfed with leggings on and immense amounts of sunscreen. I only hope that there are no longterm effects down the road.

When I was in Indonesia the second time I encountered my second medical concern. I wasn't sure what the issue was but a very painful welt appeared under my armpit. I figured it would take care of itself and eventually go away but it just kept getting larger and more painful. I finally asked some of the other people at the camp and the feedback I got really made me nervous. Everyone had a different opinion and there were a multitude of potential diseases, infections or bugs that I could have had. What made me the most concerned was when someone told me it looked like something her friend got when they were traveling in South America; her friend was able to get rid of it by cutting it open. I was less than thrilled to hear this, however, I really lost it when she then preceded to say a large worm crawled of the open cut! All I could then think about that I was now the host to some unknown jungle bug. Ahhhh. Other people thought it could be a centipede bite, bissle from an ingrown hair, or some other scary unidentifiable infection.

I was able to take care of the one that had appeared in my armpit with the help of an immaculate first aid kit provided by a German friend and some fearless surf coaches. Since there was a small white head that had appeared after a couple of days we were able to cut it open relatively painlessly with a needle sized scalpel instrument. I then tried to drain the fluid myself by squeezing it out, however, was unable to get all the contents out myself because of its location and the amount of pain I was in.Think about the most painful pimple you have ever tried to pop. Now, multiply the size by 10, the pressure build up by 100, and the pain by 1000!! Simon, one of the coaches, and his girlfriend Lucy helped me drain the rest as I was lying down in the medical room sipping a cold Bintang. 

Although there was still a wound under my armpit now that it was drained it felt a lot better! A couple days later another one appeared in the same place as well as three on my upper leg/thy and two on my left shin. Whattt was happening to me?!? I continued to try and drain them myself but was getting a bit more concerned. I was told to talk to Jess, one of the Westerners that lived at the camp who had endured several medical issues of her own since she had lived there and was the most likely to know what it was and be able to help. When I talked to her she seemed very confident that it was staphylococcus from bacteria in the coral in the water. Okay...great now I knew what it was called and how I probably got it but she said I needed antibiotics which the local doctor could not provide. I was heading back to the USA within about a week so I decided that I would wait until I returned to the states. 

The series of plane rides back to the US was extremely difficult because as I sat in the cramped airline seats I put more pressure on the welts on my upper thy which made it even harder to sit in the same position for hours on end. When I arrived back in California I went to an urgent care clinic where they cut one open and tired to drain it but nothing would come. They decided to take a sample and told me I needed to see a dermatologist. I immediately called the dermatologist to make an appointment. When I went they got the results from the clinic and told me that I had Mrsa which was a stran of Staf. Not only did I have a terrible infection on various parts of my body but I came to find out that it is basically the worst type to get because it is resistant to antibiotics. They put me on a medication and gave me a cream to put on the sores. By some miracle the swelling went down and I was left with several scars but was able to avoid lost limbs or death!