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The original was posted on /r/tifu by /u/PumpkinMaster1323 on 2026-01-29 11:26:30+00:00.
It was a beautiful afternoon as I was coming home from work, I parked up and got out of the car, when I noticed something flapping and scurrying on the ground on the path outside my house. I went to investigate to see it was; it was a pipistrelle bat, the poor thing was downed its wing was messed up and was in the middle of the day, this is incredibly dangerous for it. I rushed inside to grab a shoe box, towel and put latex gloves on. I then went back out to put the bat into the box as I did I saw it bite my finger, I felt pressure but thought nothing of it. As I was giving the bat water using an old chopstick and dipping in clean water, I then tried to contact the Bat Conservation Trust to get any information; unfortunately I called just at the time they were all out for a 2 hour break (???). So I called the vets instead, they told me to bring the bat in and had to fill out some forms, they took the bat away and hope for a speedy recovery of the poor thing.
I then went back home and as I was about to throw away the gloves I notice a hole in the finger. Crap! I looked at my finger, but could see nothing. I started to panic, even though bats these days have a 1% chance of giving you rabies its still 1% (put it this way you have 100 M&Ms and one of them is laced with cyanide would you still eat those M&Ms?). I was pacing for a few hours contemplating should I go to hospital I didn't want to waste the NHSs time. At this point my wife came home and I told here everything. She told me to call 111, so I did I explained the situation and they booked me an appointment and the emergency hospital in Canterbury.
We headed to the hospital (my wife drove us) where I was seen in no time at all, I told them everything and they said they could see anything and told me to go home. This got me confused, worried and I started to panic more, but on the way home I got a phone call from them saying that actually due to protocols I did need a rabies vaccine! They told me they have just closed (this started to feel like they were near the closing time when I arrived and tried to brush me off to go home early) and they also said didn't have the vaccine anyway and had to go to QEQM.
We headed there told them the situation, and told me to take a seat. I waited for 10 hours until I was seen and they took blood and told me to take a seat again. Another 5 hours went by in which they told me they do not have the Rabies Vaccine in stock here. At this point in my head I am truly panicking. However there was inventory at Canterbury and is being delivered as we speak (so basically Canterbury lied to me TWICE!). 3 more hours went by and was finally given the vaccine (I then had to get 3 more shots in the foreseeable future, but they could be done at my local surgery).
Exhausted me and my incredible wife who stayed with me all the way though this headed home and was now 8am the next day. I phone my boss telling hime I just needed 1 hour sleep before heading in and told him what happened. Luckily he was very understanding and headed in the next hour.
When I got into work I waited till the vets opened to get a catch up on how the little one was doing. When I called they told me "Sorry due to extensive damaged to the bats wing we had to put it down". I thanked her and hung up.
My world blackened, my heart stopped and I slumped to the floor and began to cry uncontrollably for a good 15 mins (thank god everyone at work was out doing a fitting job).
TL;DR: Got bit by a bat spent over 18 hours waiting for a Rabies vaccine!! Only to be given the news the bat had to be put down!! All because I didn't use thicker gloves!