Swimmer Thought He Had Water Stuck in Ear, Turned Out to Be a Cockroach

A New Zealand man went for a swim recently to cool off during the hot summer days in the Southern Hemisphere nation and thought he had water stuck in his ear following the dip, but it turned out to be a cockroach, the New York Post reported.

Zane Wedding posted about the incident on Facebook, which then caught the interest of local news outlets in New Zealand.

He said he thought he had water in his ear for three days but then told the New Zealand Herald that “it made me feel physically ill.”

The bug reportedly crept in his ear canal Friday while he was swimming at a pool in Auckland and for days he felt it move around and tried everything to get what he thought was water out, the Post reported.

"I used some drops to clear it up and fell asleep on the couch later that night," he told CNN. “Over the weekend I tried anything I could for relief — ear candles, jumping on one leg, chewing gum, I went for a run — just anything I could think of [to] get the ear to clear."

He went to a doctor who said to use a hair dryer to blow on the ear canal and dry some of the water but nothing worked.

By Monday, he went to an ear, nose, and throat specialist who discovered the insect in his ear, the Post reported.

He told CNN that it took less than five minutes to get the bug out.

"Every time she touched it I just imagined her squishing a cockroach into my eardrum, so I wasn't the perfect patient. It was instant relief... I felt a pop as soon as the doctor pulled it away," he said. "Once I knew it was a bug it all clicked together... That's why the water would move even when I was still. It was a cockroach moving in my head."

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