Zer0
Active Member
So, I’m in a bit of a quandary. I’ve been keeping reefs for over a decade and I’ve never had an experience like this before. Now, I would like to preface this post by saying that I’m still pretty skeptical of having been bit or stung by anything, but, some things line up, and somethings don’t, so I’m exploring some possibilities.
On Sunday around 10am I had to do some tank maintenance that required sticking my whole arm in there, up to my elbow anyways. Somewhere around the half minute mark, I feel a sharp pinch on my forearm. I thought maybe it was either my cleaner shrimp being a pest, or maybe it was just my skin reacting to the saltwater(my skin is a bit on the drier side, so if I don’t wash my arm/hands off right after working in the tank, my skin gets itchy). I shrugged it off and kept going, but then a few seconds later, I felt another pinch, but this time it was enough to make me remove my arm from the tank to see what was causing it. I then noticed a tiny black dot where the pinch had happened, and my gut reaction was to flick/scratch it off, which I did. I went and finished up with the tank, and went about my day.
Approximately three hours later, I started feeling sick. I was experiencing slight brain fog, some dizziness, cold sweats, fever symptoms without the fever, and the two absolute worst symptoms were extreme nausea, and incredible stomach pains. Which led to bouts of diarrhea pretty much the rest of Sunday and into early Monday morning. The nausea only began subsiding some +24 hours later.
My rational mind says that in all likelihood, my getting sick and whatever pinched me in my tank, is coincidence. My tank is around three years old and I’ve never had an issue even remotely similar to this, nor from any of the tanks I’ve had in the past. I also have doubts about something so tiny being able to cause me to get that sick.
However! I also need to mention that 24 hours after the event, I developed two decent welts/pustules at the exact site on my forearm where I felt the pinches. Again, these things still could be unrelated; meaning, it’s possible I did get pinched or bit by something resulting in these two welts, but that they are unrelated to my having gotten sick. Just bad timing. I have attached a photo of the welts as they look right now, four days later.
Another thing I would like to mention, is that I was working on a ricordea that had decided to freefloat, and I had been trying every dang thing to mount it to rock rubble. While working with it, it was busy sliming all over, as they usually do when you handle them, but I made sure to thoroughly wash and then sanitize my hands after I was finished with it. Also, from the time I finished working with the ricordia, to the time I started getting sick, I had not eaten anything or done anything that would result in my hands touching my face or mouth.
So. I would like some rational opinions. Is this almost certainly coincidence? Or is it possible that something in my tank caused this reaction? I know for a fact that something in my tank bit or pinched me, that isn’t up for debate. But was it the cause of my getting sick? Unclear.
On Sunday around 10am I had to do some tank maintenance that required sticking my whole arm in there, up to my elbow anyways. Somewhere around the half minute mark, I feel a sharp pinch on my forearm. I thought maybe it was either my cleaner shrimp being a pest, or maybe it was just my skin reacting to the saltwater(my skin is a bit on the drier side, so if I don’t wash my arm/hands off right after working in the tank, my skin gets itchy). I shrugged it off and kept going, but then a few seconds later, I felt another pinch, but this time it was enough to make me remove my arm from the tank to see what was causing it. I then noticed a tiny black dot where the pinch had happened, and my gut reaction was to flick/scratch it off, which I did. I went and finished up with the tank, and went about my day.
Approximately three hours later, I started feeling sick. I was experiencing slight brain fog, some dizziness, cold sweats, fever symptoms without the fever, and the two absolute worst symptoms were extreme nausea, and incredible stomach pains. Which led to bouts of diarrhea pretty much the rest of Sunday and into early Monday morning. The nausea only began subsiding some +24 hours later.
My rational mind says that in all likelihood, my getting sick and whatever pinched me in my tank, is coincidence. My tank is around three years old and I’ve never had an issue even remotely similar to this, nor from any of the tanks I’ve had in the past. I also have doubts about something so tiny being able to cause me to get that sick.
However! I also need to mention that 24 hours after the event, I developed two decent welts/pustules at the exact site on my forearm where I felt the pinches. Again, these things still could be unrelated; meaning, it’s possible I did get pinched or bit by something resulting in these two welts, but that they are unrelated to my having gotten sick. Just bad timing. I have attached a photo of the welts as they look right now, four days later.
Another thing I would like to mention, is that I was working on a ricordea that had decided to freefloat, and I had been trying every dang thing to mount it to rock rubble. While working with it, it was busy sliming all over, as they usually do when you handle them, but I made sure to thoroughly wash and then sanitize my hands after I was finished with it. Also, from the time I finished working with the ricordia, to the time I started getting sick, I had not eaten anything or done anything that would result in my hands touching my face or mouth.
So. I would like some rational opinions. Is this almost certainly coincidence? Or is it possible that something in my tank caused this reaction? I know for a fact that something in my tank bit or pinched me, that isn’t up for debate. But was it the cause of my getting sick? Unclear.
