Ehrlichiosis: It's a Thing, I Promise
I recently spoke out about my dad’s pet tick Omar . (I love using phrases like “spoke out about” when it comes to my dad’s antics; it makes me feel like a real celebrity who exaggerates trauma for book sales.) It was traumatic, but speaking out about Omar reminded me of the time in high school that I almost died from a tick disease, which was called—and I swear I’m not making this up; who could possibly make this up?— ehrlichiosis. I don’t know if you know this about me, but my four siblings and I were raised by my dad because my mom was too busy gallivanting around small town farm animal swap meets, buying goats to use as lawn mowers after guzzling Bud Lights all day (true story; we’ll delve into that in another post) with random boyfriends she’d met at her job at the chicken plant after she left my dad. That lady was livin’ the dream. Who could blame her? In any case, my dad is and always has been a really good dad, so he more than made up for us not having a mom around.