A Ticklish Problem

I went this week for a semi-annual full body check by my dermatologist. I have some history of skin cancer, so I can usually count on my dermatologist to take a few bits and pieces of me every visit. I was not disappointed this time.

As I sat in the waiting room before my appointment, I was taking a mental inventory of all the suspicious spots on my body that I wanted my dermatologist to take a look at. Temple, chin, chest, back, and left leg all harbored spots I didn’t like. And then I saw an unknown spot on my right leg. I was genuinely startled. That one looked nasty. How could I have missed it before? It looked something like this. In fact, it looked exactly like this because this was it …

The problem was the spot had legs and was making its way through my thicket of leg hair using a tiny machete. Yes, it was a blood-sucking tick that I must have picked-up on my morning walk through the woods. It had survived my walk, a shower, a quick rubdown from Gerta my Finnish masseuse, and a change of clothes.

I was torn as to whether to bring it in with me to my appointment. I figured my derm would get a chuckle. However, I was also concerned that she would charge me for tick removal. She didn’t get that fancy car in the parking lot by removing things from people’s bodies for free. So, I removed it on my own before it could attach to me. I was relieved. That would have sucked if the tick had started to suck.