Mar 16 2009Real Life Spider-Man: Paralyzed Man Walks Again Thanks To Brown Recluse Spider Bite
David Blancarte lost the use of his legs nearly 21 years ago in a motorcycle accident. And now, thanks to the bite of brown recluse, he can walk again.
I'm here for a spider bite. I didn't know I would end up walking," says David.
A nurse noticed David's leg spasm and ran a test on him. "When they zapped my legs, I felt the current, I was like 'whoa' and I yelled," he says. He felt the current and the rush of a renewed sense of hope. "She says,'your nerves are alive. They're just asleep'," explained David.Five days later David was walking.
David basks in his glory and gives a ray of hope to other hoping to walk again. The 48-year-old former boxer and dancer is taking it in stride, knowing his best days are still ahead.
David's dream is to see his 14-year-old twin daughters grow up and get married so he can walk them down the aisle and have that first dance.
Well ain't that some cockle-warming Peter Parker/John Locke shit! To tell you the truth, I haven't been having much luck with my manhood lately, and I did see a black widow out by my treefort yesterday....
IT BUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUURNS!!!
UPDATE: And it just fell off. Great.
Hit the jump for a news report video for those of you who can't read.
Paraplegic Man Suffers Spider Bite, Walks Again [cbs13]
Thanks to Pat, Alexis and MLou, who have never been bitten by a brown recluse but have all stepped on bees.
Reader Comments
1. RideNsMile - March 16, 2009 2:30 PM
first gooch
2. Chris Hansen - March 16, 2009 2:33 PM
Twincest?
3. Atlanta Grape Lady - March 16, 2009 2:43 PM
Stop. oh oh oh ooooooooooooh ohh oooooh oh ooh ooooooooooooooh
ow ow ow ooooooooh stop oh stop ooh ooooooooh oh oh oooooooooh
I can't breathe ohhhh stop uh uh ooooooooooooooh
4. Hannukah Montana - March 16, 2009 2:48 PM
It's a miracle. I know it was god's will for this man to walk again.
God is good, all the time.
Am I right, naas? Am I right?
5. Hannukah Montana - March 16, 2009 2:50 PM
...and Ollie Williams can suck his own c0ck! You agnostic retard!
6. Milkman - March 16, 2009 2:55 PM
Cool to hear some good news. Maybe this will open up a new medical application, but was it the spider bite, the jolt of electricity, both, or allah's will (boom!)?
7. r-tard - March 16, 2009 2:57 PM
WHATEVER. Wake me up when he can shoot webs out of his legs. THAT would be news worthy!
WALK WALK WALK PEW PEW PEW!!!!!
8. bigjerm - March 16, 2009 2:59 PM
that warms the shit out of my cockles.
9. Jake Lymes - March 16, 2009 3:07 PM
ninth! YAY...MATT DAMON!
10. Moose Knuckle - March 16, 2009 3:10 PM
Can he spin a web?
Any size?
Catch thieves... just like flies?
11. $.02 and a pocket full of FAH-Q - March 16, 2009 3:19 PM
Cockles are warm.. and tingly... um, something's wrong here...
I was slightly dissapointment not to see a spiderlike apparatus akin to Doc Oc.
12. $.02 and a pocket full of FAH-Q - March 16, 2009 3:20 PM
*dissapointment = dissapointed
(Sorry, those damned millionare site ads are messing with my ability to speak/type engrish)
13. naas - March 16, 2009 3:46 PM
Nice, though I can't imagine how the bite itself is going to look once the cutaneous loxoscelism sets in.
@4 only 1/2 right I'm afraid
14. Vinny Mac - March 16, 2009 3:49 PM
That's Arachni-tastic!
15. Dandelion - March 16, 2009 3:57 PM
ItsPhotoshop!!11
16. Dinosaur Rex - March 16, 2009 4:00 PM
I'll try it with my grandpa, he has been paralyzed since I was born, i wanna see him jumping and shooting webs pew pew
17. Damien - March 16, 2009 4:24 PM
Here we go again with the god thing!
Science will prove what really happen.
Not God!
18. c45j - March 16, 2009 4:38 PM
so, thenn...getting bit by a brown recluse is good when legs are paralyzed?
19. Leonidas - March 16, 2009 4:46 PM
@17: "the fool has said in his heart "'there is no God.'" In this case, the fool is a malcontent who doesn't know his grammar from his granma. Go back to hell, Damien.
20. catch22 - March 16, 2009 4:48 PM
i got bitten by one of those several years back... and all i got to show for it is what looks like a permanent zit on my calf.... it sucked too , in all of a few hours it went from a bee sting looking thing to a white head the size of a pingpong ball... it took a shitton of antibiotics and i fortunately didnt need skin surgery or anything liek that.... little bastards need to meet the business end of my shoe
21. Zombo - March 16, 2009 4:54 PM
Still half a man in my book.
22. el guapo - March 16, 2009 6:01 PM
The followup story on CBS news showed that this guy was soon after arrested for outstanding warrants related to domestic violence. Now his rediscovered ability will come in handy when running from his new boyfriends.
23. Carl - March 16, 2009 6:07 PM
It fell off? At least it wasn't too big a loss...
24. ralph big junk - March 16, 2009 6:26 PM
It's no damn miracle, it's the poison.
The poison made the human immune system to react, which allowed the broken link between his spine and legs to reconnect. so the synapses from the brain could reach the muscle tissue of his legs.
25. V - March 16, 2009 7:17 PM
I wonder if it was radioactive....
26. acornstu - March 16, 2009 7:25 PM
HAHAHAHAHA WTF!!!!!
FUNNIEST SH!T I EVER HEARD
Well ain't that some cockle-warming Peter Parker/John Locke shit! To tell you the truth, I haven't been having much luck with my manhood lately, and I did see a black widow out by my treefort yesterday....
IT BUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUURNS!!!
UPDATE: And it just fell off. Great.
27. freak of nature-formerly Hannnukah Montana - March 16, 2009 8:08 PM
@24
What the f'uck are you talking about?
I bet you a million bucks, that thing is a work of god.
This ain't no science, neither ain't it paranormal or luck. Jesus is with him. You can't explain that sh!t through science, homeboy.
Jesus is gonna save the believers. Remember that. I dunno when's that gonna happen, but trust me it will.
28. CaptainMorgan - March 16, 2009 8:12 PM
I'm gonna go dig up Grandma and throw a few spiders in there. Maybe she'll wake up???
Does it matter that she was cremated? Will spider venom know the difference? Hopefully it's not predjuiced against old people!
29. formerly SPELLINGNAZI© - March 16, 2009 8:17 PM
@27 Shut the fcuk up you troll. You sound like an ignorant asshole.
30. Beastman AIDS - March 16, 2009 8:17 PM
allah is great.
31. Phiddy - March 16, 2009 8:40 PM
It clearly wasn't the 8 MONTHS OF REHAB that helped him walk.
Definitely the bite of the Jesus-spider.
32. Daisy - March 16, 2009 9:30 PM
FAKE!!!!
This is a complete photoshop job. You can tell its a fake because the shadow's are all wrong.
This is exactly like that scene in the movie Never Back Down where Max bought a house and found out it was so inexpensive because it was haunted by a crabby old ghost. Max and his family eventually made friends with the ghost, and the weird guy from town, charles manson riley.
33. v tard - March 16, 2009 9:37 PM
I don't buy it.
Quick Wikipedia check says Recluse spider venom is a necrotoxin. It's specifically designed to kill cells. So it's not a neurotoxin, a venom specifically for the nervous system...which I might buy. Might being the strongly operative word.
Sounds more like one of these guys with that psychological disease that's a step up from hypochondria. For whatever reason, maybe childhood trauma or something, he caused his own paraplegia. And a spider bite knocked him out of his medical delusion....again for a reason only a couch and a man with a beard might discover.
34. Watch - March 17, 2009 1:29 AM
The venom usually causes tissue to become necrotized rapidly. Maybe there is a chemical that somehow restarted his nervous system. I wonder how much tissue it damaged on him? Also the bite from one of these will fcuk you up, it's no joke
35. formerly SPELLINGNAZI© - March 17, 2009 1:49 AM
I finally got to see the news vid. I agree with #31, it was the 8 months of rehab, not the bite that helped him.
It's like saying you went out for a smoke and got killed by a bus, so smoking must have killed you...
36. joe - March 17, 2009 4:58 AM
did anyone read the part where he got arrested 4 days later?
37. HG! - March 17, 2009 5:30 PM
he got arrested for catching some "bad guys" and getting there money.
38. Ronbo - March 17, 2009 5:32 PM
Blancarte's dreams may have to wait. He was arrested Friday (3/13) on an outstanding warrant stemming from a domestic abuse case.
39. Kidiu - March 18, 2009 1:04 AM
Oh, great! Just 'had' to post a picture of a HUGE WHOMPING SPIDER!! I'm gonna have nightmares now!
40. amber - March 18, 2009 10:06 PM
my dad is paralized and has been for 2 years he is only 40 i wonder if this would help ever paralized person this is truly a miricle!! i see how my father suffers and it isnt fair to anybody this man is a true mircle..if anybody knows more about this and its studies or if they r going to try it on more people let me know my father said he would be the 1st person to try it..
amber<3
omgtwinkletoes@aol.com
41. Marcy - March 18, 2009 11:18 PM
Wow. I love this. IT does give hope. I have been paralyzed for 2 years. It is very hard and challenging. I have no privacy, nothing is the same. I just keep praying!
42. handicapped - March 21, 2009 3:51 PM
im jealous i wish i was a paraplegic
43. Don - April 4, 2009 2:21 AM
I was proven that a concentration of white blood cells into the spinal cord in the area of the damage can repair paralysis. They have done it in rats. They have taken rats with broken backs and injected white blood cells and the rats end up using its hind legs again. I remember seeing as well, an show where a teen age girl had re gained use of her legs through this treatment although she had to go out of the country to have it done as it is illegal in the US to do such procedure.
I wonder if the spider bit him in the back? If so it may have caused his immune system to up his white blood count in the area of the spinal damage.