MELBOURNE, Florida – A Florida woman had a real-life horror film experience when a live cockroach crawled into her ear while she was sleeping that had to be removed during three separate medical procedures.

Right out of a scene from the movies Night Gallery and Brokedown Palace, Katie Holley of Melbourne, Florida wrote an essay to Self Magazine describing her horrific experience.

“Last month, in the middle of the night, I woke up startled. It felt like someone had placed a chip of ice in my left earhole—but it was something way worse.

I shot up out of bed, disoriented, and stumbled to the bathroom. I could feel that my ear was not right. I grabbed a cotton swab and gently inserted it into my ear to see what was up and I felt something move,” the Brevard County woman wrote to Self.

Holley then went to the Emergency Room where the doctor administered a local anesthetic that made the roach wiggle in her ear.

“Feeling a roach in the throes of death, lodged in a very sensitive part of your body, is unlike anything I can adequately explain,” Holley continued.

Unbeknownst to Holley at the time, not all of the pieces of the roach were extracted at the emergency room.

Nine days later, it was revealed at her doctor’s office that something dark remained lodged in her ear. Her doctor removed more of the insect and referred her to an ENT.

“That’s when I started weeping again,” she told TODAY.

The ENT removed the final pieces of the Palmetto Bug, but Holley’s ordeal left emotional scars.

“I am still not ok, and I don’t think I ever will be again,” Holley reflected on Facebook about her experience.

The cockroach was a large Palmetto Bug, also known as the American Cockroach, that is found throughout Florida.

Photo and article credit: Katie Holley