Yeah, I know what you’re thinking. How can such a handsome man get worms?
Well, I don’t know how I got them, but I can tell you that finding out that I had a living parasite/bacteria/thing inside me was the most disgusting moment of my life. It’s also changed my life forever.
Throughout my entire life, I’ve done a lot of Chanel No. 2 in the toilet. I’m talking like, five to 10 times a day. At first I thought this was normal, but I realised that I might be a bit high on the poo frequency scale when a former colleague gave me some unsolicited advice while we were in the office toilet.
He told me that I should see a doctor because my toilet routine sounded like a machine gun fight from a Schwarzenegger movie. I ignored this guy’s advice and continued going to the toilet like Sinatra suggested, My Way.
Late last year I was going about my business at home, but I was experiencing more discomfort than usual. I flushed the toilet, washed my hands and then caught some moving in the corner of my eye. Yeah, something moving, IN THE TOILET.
I went in for a close-up. It was horrible. It was a giant, deep-crimson worm. It was massive. It must have been 10cm long. It was writhing in the toilet bowl, like it was slow dancing to Sade’s Smooth Operator at your cousin’s wedding. I felt like I was going to be sick.
For some reason, I decided to call out to my wife: “Babe, come here. I have to show you something.”
When my wife entered the bathroom I was first greeted with a look of anger because she figured I was trying to intentionally gross her out. The anger quickly transformed into a flash of horror as she agreed that this was the most disgusting thing that we had ever seen.
Top Comments
I don't reccomend regular worming of humans unless your on a farm with dogs that may access offal or you or you family are symptomatic.
Most worms are harmless and they may even be beneficial - some worms can help inflammatory bowral diseases believe it or not and a study in remote aboriginal populations in WA showed a protective benefit from diabetes.
My kids have never been wormed and I never was as a child either. I have had the occasional dose as an adult if I felt itchy on the bum. The concept of worm is worse then the reality in non tropical Australia.
My friend, a pharmacist, moves 50 units of worm tablets a day- multiply that by pharmacies across the country and that's a lot of wormy people. Threadworm is incredibly common. About 40% of people have it at any time. Often you can have it with no symptoms. I read a study that analysed the walls of a school and there were literally millions of threadworm eggs on every wall.
We had it recently. My son goes to daycare 2 days a week. He never exhibited symptoms but I sure did! Including seeing them (white bits of cotton-like threads.)
It took 6 weeks to get rid of them properly, which is apparently normal, not that I knew that. I ended up going to the doctor and getting Zentel, which has the same active ingredient as over the counter meds but is 4 times stronger (400mg instead of 100mg.) 2 tablets of that and they were gone! I think they are a bit like nits- immune to the meds! Vermox is far superior to Conbantrin and those chocolate squares made me nauseus and dizzy. I crushed a Vermox tablet onto my son's strawberry jam toast and he was none the wiser. I did this 3 times in 6 weeks so as to catch them at every point in their life-cycle. Sadly for me, nothing seemed to be working- hence the Zentel.
You need to vacuum the whole house, damp dust, wipe taps, toilets and flushes. Change undies and pajama bottoms every day, be careful going to the toilet - wipe seat and floor to capture fallen eggs. Wash bottoms/ shower first thing in the morning for 3 days after treatment to dislodge eggs. Change towels daily and sheets as iften as you can. Wash hands carefully after using toilet and before eating. Keep nails short and avoid fingers in mouth (which is probably how I got it, as I bite my nails.) You have to keep these measures up for 6 weeks!! But it works.