You have no idea the load this takes off of my mind. I seriously worried about swallowing spiders in my sleep for the longest time. I would check my bed for spiders every night and worry every time I felt the slightest sensation on my skin, sure it was a spider readying for the attack. I just always hoped the spiders waited until I was asleep to crawl in my mouth, because I'm pretty sure I would have had a heart attack if they had done so while I was awake.
Perpetuating this myth as reality in my mind was an unsettling encounter I had about 2 years ago. (As an aside, my mother always told me if I didn't make my bed, spiders would get in it. Not sure if this is true...) Two years ago, I was living in an apartment by myself while studying for the bar exam, and my husband was living in another city. So, I was basically living like a hobo... I had no real furniture. I had wicker outdoor furniture as my "living room", a card table and chairs as my "dining room", and a blow-up mattress on the floor as my bedroom. That was it. So, one morning I woke up on my blow-up mattress, and I can feel something on my hand, I thought it was a stray hair or something. I look down, and a relatively large spider is CRAWLING ON MY HAND. I am actually surprised at my level of consciousness at that moment, but I thought to myself "I don't want to freak out and startle it, because then it will bite me, run away, and I will never find it... and it will forever be creeping around my apartment." So, I slowly reached for a tissue and grabbed it and smashed it...and flushed it. Cool head led to desired result: the spider was gone forever. But, this encounter solidified in my head that spiders crawl on you while you are asleep and you swallow them. After all, I woke up to one crawling on me!!! I slept wrapped up in covers after that, making sure my covers could not touch the floor, as I was convinced that was how the spider got to me. I am glad to report that I have yet to see another spider crawling on me when I awake in the mornings.
Today, I saw a spider (pretty sure it was a brown recluse) crawling by the garden hose. I freaked a bit and smashed it - sorry PETA. But, this led me to wonder if these things were inside my house crawling in my beds, yet again. So, I actually looked up the "statistic" about swallowing spiders on the internet, and multiple sources confirmed it was false. My sanity thanks you, internet gods.
I can now sleep at night, knowing that this is not happening:
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| image via sodahead.com |
By the way, that image is incredibly disturbing and will probably give me nightmares. Creepy kids are the worst. Alas, that is a subject for another blog. I seriously think this girl could marry the kid from The Ring.
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