NEWINGTON — It all started with a tweet, and now 55,000 people are laughing with–not at–Emily Petrozza, a young woman from Newington who had an unfortunate run in with poison ivy over the weekend.
On Sunday morning, Lauren Petrozza posted a picture of her sister Emily with her eyes swollen shut and the caption “DONT GET POISON IVY ON YOUR EYES.”
Emily told FOX 61 that she believes she got the poison ivy in her eyes by rubbing them after either from fishing, or from taking care of feral cats in Newington, which does does “almost every day” with her friend Miranda.
Unfortunately for Emily, although she was smiling and laughing with her sister and friends, it was definitely not a fun experience. “This is MISERABLE,” she tweeted about an hour after the picture was posted.
By Sunday afternoon, Emily had achieved internet fame. As of Tuesday night, the initial tweet has been retweeted 31,000 times and liked 55,000 times.
“40K people are laughing at my sister,” Lauren posted Tuesday morning.
But Emily is taking it like a trooper, finding the humor in the painful situation. “I want people to know I’m not mad at my sister for posting the picture in the first place. We always joke around with each other and neither of us ever expected it to turn out like this,” Emily told FOX 61.
By Tuesday night Emily was doing much better after taking medication for two days, and now she says can “actually open” her eyes!
Emily hopes that this incident serves as a lesson to others to always wash your hands after coming indoors from doing activities outside.
Here’s a picture of the sisters on a better day:
