For those with entomophobia, AKA the fear of insects, simply laying eyes on a bug can be terrifying enough.
It escalates into an infinitely more hellish experience when it actually comes near and touches us, but one TikToker recently experienced this nightmare on a whole new and terrifying level.
While sleeping in bed, she awoke suddenly when she felt a cockroach crawling near her ear. She tried to get rid of it by whacking it, but the insect retreated into her ear instead.
Her attempts to pull it out by herself failed, and the OP had to make a trip to the hospital to have the creepy-crawly removed.
Source: TikTok
Netizens were understandably appalled by her story, with some remarking that they no longer dare to go to sleep.
On Wednesday (20 Jul), a TikToker in Singapore uploaded a video saying that she was going to the accident and emergency department (A&E) to remove a cockroach that had crawled into her ear.
She explained that the bug had been crawling on the bed right next to her head, waking her up.
Source: TikTok
She tried to make it go away by hitting it, but this backfired spectacularly when the roach apparently decided to seek refuge inside her ear.
Since her attempts to flush it out by “power washing” her ear didn’t work, the OP needed to visit the hospital so doctors could perform a more delicate procedure.
Source: TikTok
Thankfully, her video doesn’t actually show the insect’s severed body getting extracted, but the thought of it alone is enough to gross anyone out.
Source: TikTok
The video ends with the OP showing off a red ear and stating that “all’s good”.
Speaking to MS News, the OP, who requested to remain anonymous, shared more about her horrifying ordeal in disgusting detail.
She recounted waking up to the roach wandering around beside her head. When she panicked and “whacked” it, the insect “crawled deep” into her ear.
“I could feel it wiggling inside and it was so disgusting,” she recalled, adding that it died when she used a liquid to wash it out.
It gets worse. Way worse.
The OP then tried plucking the bug out with tweezers, but it was “too deep in”.
In the end, all she managed to do was break up the roach’s body, causing its “guts and brown shell” to come out “in parts”.
Source: TikTok
While A&E staff successfully removed the roach from her ear, OP said that it “hurt”.
“Half of the severed body and feelers were intact, so they pulled out a large piece,” she said.
A quick Google search shows that roaches invading ears is actually alarmingly more common than we thought.
There are numerous reports about people finding cockroaches – sometimes many of them at once – stuck inside their ears.
The OP’s video has since garnered over 300,000 views and more than 400 comments, most of which consist of other TikTokers expressing their horror.
One user exclaimed that she has now something new to be frightened of.
Source: TikTok
Another quipped that they’ll be sleeping with a plastic bag over their head from now on.
Source: TikTok
And then there were those who said that they’re now afraid of falling asleep altogether.
Source: TikTok
In a follow-up video, the OP explained that she had used mouthwash to kill the roach, which was about 3.5 to 4cm long.
She added that doctors at the A&E had to pull it out from her ear “leg by leg”, followed by the upper half of its body. They then gave OP antibacterial ear drops.
When we fall asleep at night, the last thing we want is for anything to crawl inside our bodies while we’re dreaming away.
Perhaps this can be a reminder for some of us to give our rooms a much-needed thorough cleaning, just in case.
We’re glad the OP managed to resolve the issue quickly and hope that such incidents will never happen to her, or anyone else, ever again.
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Featured image adapted from TikTok.
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