So, in the course of 24 hrs what had looked approximately like two mosquito bites turned into a swollen red spot about the span of my palm, and over the next 24 the red for most of it dulled down a little, but spread to a span about the size of my hand with fingers spread, and the middle got much brighter.

I took a somewhat amused attitude about it at first, but it was hurting and itching and waking me up in the middle of the night, and my friends who knew more than I did on the matter seemed to think it might be serious, so I got on the phone to doctors. Having made more than one trip to urgent care facilities in the past, (used to have to go in at off hours to get antibiotics for UTIs. I don't anymore because I keep a stock of D-mannose) I was not eager to have to spend a few hundred dollars to go sit around for a few hours and then get rushed through the clinic.

Instead I called a couple of Planned Parenthood facilities. The first person I spoke with, who did note that she didn't actually have training, said that that sort of thing happens with spider bites all the time and not to worry about it, although she'd refer me to the intake person. The intake person told me I should see a doctor asap or go to the emergency room, or if I was worried about expense, to ice it for 24 hrs first and then go to the emergency room if it didn't get better. They didn't have any appointments available. I called another location (around 4:30pm last night) and actually managed to get an appointment for 9:30 this morning. I was hemming and hawing last night about whether I should just pay for an urgent care visit and go right away, but it seemed like a few hours would (hopefully) be worth paying $30 rather than $300 for some antibiotics.

Anyway, I survived the night and made it to the appointment ;) The doctor was a Russian woman with a very serious looking face, who looked at my chart and said "spider bite?" as if she wasn't sure why I would be in the office for such a thing. I decided it was easier to show her than explain, to which she responded with big eyes and some sort of Russian profanity ;) She promptly said that I was going to need antibiotics and that she was going to go check protocol for spider bites. (she then thought twice and asked for my explanation of how I thought it happened, which she agreed sounded like a spider bite) I was glad to hear her say so openly that she wanted to go look it up: I'd much rather someone who checks the appropriate sources than one who thought they knew everything including that which they had not experienced before by memory.

She came back and gave me antibiotics (Cephalexin) and a tisk-tisk for not having gone to the doctor sooner. I'm supposed to go back in a week if it doesn't improve, although I think I'll go sooner this time if that is the case ;)

However, I'm feeling better already: I had stopped my regimen of oral anti-inflammatories (ibuprofen) and topical ones yesterday evening, in case it made a difference for diagnosis and/or professional treatment, so it had hurt a lot more this morning than prior. I hope that in addition to resuming that stuff, the antibiotic is at least part of why I'm feeling better at the moment.

If it is the same thing, I think I understand why the worst case scenario brown recluse spider bite pictures I saw were open sores. In my case, the skin over the afflicted area is very tight because of the hardness and swelling, enough so that the additional stretching required makes it painful to walk. I imagine that it would have to rupture... most likely in a quite painful way, if there was much more pressure. I'm hoping to avoid that scenario by keeping the inflammation down. We'll see, I'm nowhere near as bad as most of those web pics I looked at, at least at this point, and particularly given that I'm getting treatment I don't expect to hit that point. Not sure if it would have gotten that bad or not, but regardless, thanks to those who got on my case ;)

BRKVW was the first to note to me that it sounded like a brown recluse bite. I'd considered the notion prior but had dismissed it in thinking about the horror stories I'd read about. However, according to what I have since read, brown recluse bites can manifest as anything between the horror stories found on the web to regular spider bites which just go away as with any others, and all that range in between. Seems like poisonous spider is the most likely explanation: brown recluse or hobo being the only poisonous roamers which might hang out in pajama pants that I'm aware of in California. (Prior to this I'd thought that black widows and brown recluse were the only poisonous spiders in CA, but John turned up articles about hobos which said otherwise. That also implies that there could be more that don't fit the "there are only 2 types of poisonous spiders in CA" that I'd been told during childhood)

Here's a pic from yesterday and one from today. (yes, I know its hard to tell the red of the swollen area from my semi-transparent pale leg in the photos... the contrast is more evident in person, although this is still a reminder that at least aesthetically speaking, my legs could use a bit of a tan ;)