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- Dec 22, 2011
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This probably isn't the greatest place to ask this type of thing, but you people on this board have been all over the globe it seems. At the very least maybe I can get a suggestion.
My dad has always had control issues regarding slamming down beers, it bit him in the *** not long ago. We went out on his air boat to spend some time cruising the shore lines maybe a year ago. Well after spending a good amount of time drinking with this rather cool individual, I know when he gets into what I call "party mode." It's usually at that point where I would just make up an excuse to go do something else, but we were out on the water and he decided it was time to party.
I'll skip to what happened - We managed to get the air boat back on the trailer, but he went way way too fast trying to hop off of it and onto the dock. Foot slipped on the wet dock, feet went straight up, hip slammed straight onto the dock and then head first into the water where he got cut up on some rocks.
Now fortunately this seems to have gotten his attention with regards to going party mode on a boat, but the problem is the cuts that happened. They healed up, but he contracted something from that water out on the st. johns river. He has some kind of bacteria or fungus that is slowly eating away at the skin on his hands. He just doesn't, or hasn't, seemed to get the significance of what is going on either. I got him to go to the VA hospital, and they gave him a cream for it ( didn't even try to identify what the fck it actually is ). The cream DID work, until they had him wean off of it and then the stuff comes right back. Went through 2 bottles and no joy.
Over the year this has been going it has finally seemed to dawn on him that his life may be on the line. He's tried everything under the sun from soaking his hands in motor oil, to all different combinations of honey, ginger, vinegar... the only thing that put a dent in it was when he woke up one morning and it was itching so bad he put his hands in bleach so long that it actually burnt his hands. I suppose looking back that is finally what got his attention that this is a serious situation.
I can't believe the VA hospital didn't do their due diligence with this, but that's another story altogether. Does anyone know anyone that has had this issue or what may be causing it? The day he woke up when it was severe with the bleach, you could literally see the blood in his hands through the cuts.
You need to go back to the spot and get a water sample, and you need to contact the local county.
A lot depends on where it happened. For instance, if it was near the beginning of the St. Johns in Seminole/Volusia, it might be chemicals from a boat. My brother lives on the Wekiva a bit before it empties into the St. Johns, and it is a fairly clean waterway, not a lot of industrial use, thus it could be that someone dumped some chemicals/fuel in the river.
Up around Jax, it would be a more industrial area, they have a lot of US Navy stuff, big cargo ships come in, etc.
And in between Orlando and Jax there is a lot of agricultural stuff, so it might be fertilizers, etc.
As coincidence would have it, I was at a Wekiva River fundraiser this weekend, speaking with a guy who owns a business on the river (he's also an engineer), and he was telling me that several counties (particularly Orange) have sprayed a lot of waste-water onto "agricultural" land, but it easily leaches into the aquifer and the connected springs.
Seriously, get a water sample, and you may have to contact the State of Florida to get something done.