MudNCrud Forums
Climbing and ... Climbing => Masters of Mud -- Pinnacles => Topic started by: looks easy from here on February 13, 2026, 07:01:29 AM
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Last Saturday while climbing I was just weighting the lip of a pocket about 3" wide and a little deeper when I felt a sharp stab in my finger. The two people who had just climbed the route had both reported how sharp the rock was on the climb,, so I attributed it to that and kept climbing. Though something deep in my lizard brain refused to let me try to use that pocket again, in spite of it being an important seeming hold in a fairly critical place. Later that afternoon, winding down in the parking lot, I noticed that the entire pad of my middle finger was numb. At that time I just figured the rock must have dinged it worse than I had realized in the heat of the moment. But several days went by and the numbness remained (albiet diminishing slightly day by day, though even now, a week later, a small patch remains), and on reflection the stabbing felt a lot more like hitting a cactus spine than a pointy rock, and my conclusion is I probably got stung or bit by something protecting its home. I''ve become curious about what it might have been. Do those symptoms (brief, sharp pain followed by lingering localized numbness) match anyone else's experience with getting tagged in Pinnacles?
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(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/55094063964_319bdb2684_c.jpg)
Seen a few of these guys around park. Every time has been after I break off a hold or rock and they are underneath.
Asked Gavin about them and he said they probably hurt as much as a bee sting unless more allergic.
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I'd thought about those, but my dad has been stung by one, and he compared it to a yellow jacket sting. My pain was much less, and just momentary, not lingering the way a yellow jacket or bee sting is. As soon als I pulled my hand away it stopped, just like getting poked by a thorn. Are there any pointy plants in Pinnacles that I might have had a reaction to that has caused this numbness?
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I suspect that Marco is right - I've seen some really tiny scorpions at Pinnacles and their sting is like a yellow jacket's. Maybe some kind of bee or some such?
Any chance you might have tweaked or compressed a nerve ending?
Coulda' been the donuts too, come to think of it.
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Tweaked nerve was my original thought when I noticed it the day it happened. As it hung around my thinking drifted tp a sting or bite of some type. Though now that it's been long enough any small amount of venom should have cleared my system and I still have a small sensory fuzzy patch I'm back to thinking I dinged a nerve.
Though peripheral neuropathy secondary to diabetes is also not am unrealistic diagnosis with how I eat on climbing days. Damn pink box! :lol:
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I've had a partner who tweaked a nerve just the right way at the beginning of a three week climbing trip. He still couldn't really feel that finger at the end of the trip, though it's now all better. Such things can last quite a while.