A Dublin man told of his harrowing ordeal after he was bitten three times by a 'false widow' spider at home.
A few weeks ago we found out that we would be getting much bigger spiders this year and now it turns out that wasn't the only bit of arachnid news for the season as a Dublin man was recently hospitalised after a 'false widow' bite.
Eugene Murphy, a 28-year-old father of one detailed his harrowing encounter to Independent.ie in which he was bitten three times by the spider, and was taken to intensive care as a result last Saturday. Murphy went in to cardiac arrest and had to be injected twice with adrenalin after being bitten in the side and the shoulder by the spider.
Murphy said that he was in his parents' home, playing with his son on the couch when he felt a terrible pain in his shoulder that "was ten times worse than any bone break". He told Independent.ie that the final bite of the three was the one that he noticed and said when he turned to see what it was, he saw the spider, whose "fangs were embedded underneath the skin. A lump of skin came off with it when I took it out.”
Luckily for Eugene, both his Dad and his brother were there, and he credits them with helping him survive the ordeal: "they saw me going into the shakes and frothing at the mouth. They were keeping my tongue out and making sure that I was safe, and my Dad actually gave me mouth-to-mouth.”
Doctors in Tallaght hospital told him that his level of fitness helped him survive the potentially lethal bite, but that he had a lucky escape: "The next day, a guy from the fire brigade came in to visit me and he said ‘I thought you were a goner’".
Eugene hopes that in telling his story that others will be spared from the same experience, in particular children, as "people don’t know what they look like" or how dangerous they can be.
Thankfully, he's expected to make a full recovery, and bar going for a check up in a few months' time to keep an eye on his heart, which may have been affected by the ordeal, 'Spidey' (as the doctors nicknamed him) is on the road to recovery.
Via Independent.ie
