Woman Puts Raccoon in a Headlock, Suffers Injuries (PHOTOS)

A woman in Massachusetts got more than she bargained for as she was putting lights around her home.

According to her Facebook post, Donna Sanginario appears to have been putting up Christmas lights in the bushes in front of her home in Lancaster, Massachusetts, when she heard a strange sound.

She looked up to see what the noise was and, to her dismay, it wasn't Santa with his 9 hopped-up reindeer: it was a trash panda. A sly cooper. A rascal tail. A dumpster bandit. A common raccoon!

Sanginario says that the raccoon was more than 3 yards away from her and, before she could remove herself from the situation, the raccoon jumped at her.

Now in a normal situation, I might find myself beginning to laugh at the thought of this happening to someone. That is... until I saw the pictures. Sanginario really had it out with this raccoon.

She describes it as the "worst nightmare of my life". She said that there was a lot of screaming happening, from her and the raccoon.

As Sanginario tried to protect herself from the beast, it fell off of her arm, but that respite was short: the raccoon came right back at her and lit into her again.

The two fell to the ground, and that is when Sanginario was able to wrangle the raccoon into a headlock. She said that she was in it for the long haul, as she kept the raccoon in a headlock until it stopped screaming. The bad part about this is that the raccoon was biting and scratching the whole time.

After the raccoon got quiet, Sanginario let it go and rolled off of it. She said that the raccoon then got up and walked away. She shared photos of her injuries to Facebook.

Many people were sending notes via Facebook of well-wishes and one person commenting said that she had been through the same thing.

After the attack, Sanginario did the right thing by getting herself to the hospital. As cute as raccoons can be, they can also carry diseases that are transmissible to humans. Salmonella, E. Coli, Leptospirosis, roundworm and other parasites and, of course, rabies.

At the hospital, medical experts recommended a tetanus shot and a series of rabies shots, just to be safe. Sanginario said that she went back to look for the raccoon, but could not find it. She did say that she hopes it went off somewhere to die.

It appears that her comment about the raccoon dying didn't sit to well with one Facebook user, and he/she let his/her feelings be known. Se Rom defended the raccoon and its right to live where it wants to live.

I'm not certain that Se Rom knows the characteristics of a rabid animal but, to me, this raccoon sounds like it fits the bill. I understand Se Rom's concerns about humans taking over the land that the animals call their home, but it sounds like Sanginario's home may have been there for a few years.

In any case, we are doing our part in helping this story go viral. It's not a "good" story because she was attacked by a wild animal; it's a "good" story because she lived to tell the tale!

We wish you well, Donna Sanginario, and we hope that you recover quickly!