Dangers of Playing in the Woods: My Encounter with Poison Ivy

When I was in fourth grade, I had an unintentional, painful encounter with toxicology. It was a beautiful Saturday and I was outside playing with my older brother, my best friend, and her older brother. We were playing two on two capture the flag in the field and woods surrounding my house.

Of course, in this game, each team hides their "flag" which is basically any material large enough to see from a long distance. The object of the game is to capture the other team's flag from their territory without getting tagged. Unfortunately, being young children, we were only worried about finding a great hiding spot for our flags, and not concerned with the dangers of the surrounding areas. So we started out playing, and it was a lot of fun. There were several intense chases, captures, and victory dances involved. It wasn't until the next day that I realized it hadn't been all fun and games.

The next day I woke up scratching my arms and face because they were itching painfully. I went to my mom begging her to make it stop, and asking why this was happening and what was wrong with me. She hesitated for a moment before saying, "Oh no Katie, you've gotten into Poison Ivy. Where do you think you could have gotten it? Have you been playing in the woods?" In that instant, I realized that I had a problem which was due to my playtime from the day before. I thought back to our wonderful game, where my partner (my friend's brother), and I had been victorious. I pictured that shining white flag, which was really a dishcloth, that my brother and best friend had hidden on the ground in the woods, tucked below the leaves barely in view. I remembered how I had seen the flag and my partner had created a diversion so I could sprint in and grab it, then dodge out. Only, there had been a slight problem with my quick escape. I had just reached the flag, and then I heard my brother, rushing through the trees after my partner just feet away. He didn't notice me as I crouched down to the ground, trying to hide myself behind the nearby tree, surrounded by what I know now to be Poison Ivy.

After relaying the story of the adventures of the day before to my Mom, we decided that I should be taken to the doctor, because my rash was all over my arms and face, and spreading each time I accidentally touched another place of my body. The doctor put me on a prescription and gave me some cream that he said would clear me up in a week or more. I was miserable for the next few days, rubbing warm cloths on my skin whenever I felt the urge to scratch, so that I wouldn't spread the substance any more. After a few days my Mom decided that the rash wouldn't spread any more, and she forced me to go to school, even though I was embarrassed about the way my face looked, and knew the other kids would laugh at me. However, everyone handled the situation fairly well, and within a few weeks, the poison ivy was completely gone.

After doing some research, I have learned a little more about Poison Ivy, the substance which I thought might ruin my life back in elementary school. One interesting tip I read was that there are two types of poison ivy, the climbing variety (toxicodendron radicans), and the nonclimbing (toxicodendron rydbergii). The rash that these substances produce is from an oil, urushiol, which is in the leaves, vines, and roots (http://www.poison-ivy.org/html/faq.htm). An interesting fact I learned is that "Poison oak and poison ivy account for an estimated ten percent of lost work time in the U.S. Forest Service" (http://waynesword.palomar.edu/ww0802.htm). While my experience with toxicology wasn't with a deadly substance, it was still irritatingly painful, and not a lot of fun.

http://www.poison-ivy.org/html/fag.htm

http://waynesword.palomar.edu/ww0802.htm