Beware of Roses by Arkansas Patti

Blog Name: The New Sixty
Date:November 11, 2009

Subject: Rose can kill you

I think I had a related problem as yours but mine was caused by touching and caressing cactus. Yes, in my teenage life, my passion was collecting cactus of different variety and everyday, I touched them and caressed them as if they were my lovers. And in those days having lived in a remote area in my country where convenience was out of reach, there was no such thing as garden gloves. I grew up basically gardening with just bare hands.

For all I knew, tiny particles of the cactus that were left undetected in my hands particularly my right hand thumb.

Every night I moaned in pain; excruciating pain. But we could not see the culprit. My thumb looked red and swollen and soon a pus formed.

My mother gathered some herbs and wrapped them in banana leaves and heat it over a live ember. Then re-wrapped it in gauze and applied it as a poultice over my infected thumb.

It eased the pain until it subsided. The result was and is a deformed thumb.

I don't know what infection it was for we were far from the doctor and void of any medical help.

Thank you Ma'am Patti for alerting your experience because in my case, I did feel the pain traveled throughout my body that I just could not explain. If the swelling and the accumulation of the bacteria did not stop, it could surely travel through my heart and probably damaged my central nervous system.

Thankfully my mother was resourceful and she did the best she could in the absence of medical or scientific cure.