[torifile]

Damn. I went camping this weekend with my son (who's 3.5 and had a great time!) but my ankles and feet are all bitten to hell. I've tried the anti-itch Rhule gel and they still itch like a mofo. I couldn't even sleep last night, it was so bad*. Any remedies for dealing with these things?

* But it felt so good to scratch them. That is, until I broke the skin. Now it feels good and hurts all at the same time...

[PKIDelirium]

Mine always get infected. Been cleaning two I got last week with peroxide, alcohol and antibiotic cream.

[NosferaDrew]

I had this issue a couple of months ago and found this.

Use your fingernail to press an "X" into the bite. This disperses the protein and stops the itch for a while.

This alone helped a lot.

Best of luck, torifile. I can sympathize.

[psmith2.0]

That's funny you made this thread. At some point last week, I acquired some sort of bite and it's a quarter-sized "halo" of red on top of my left foot, in front of my ankle. It looks like a little round "bite" from something with a 1" mouth, but it's "dotted" all around.

It itches. It was really dark and a bit "risen" a day or two ago (especially Saturday), but today it has faded a bit. But it's kinda scaly. I've done a lot of stuff outside this past week, but a) I have no other bites anywhere else, and b) even if I did, they were just the standard small, round bumpy mosquito bites.

I've never had this "halo of itch" before, and I have no idea what did it. I noticed it about Wednesday afternoon or so.

[sunrain]

1. Put tape over your bites.

or

2. Use a large straw, place it where you itch and give a short, sharp suck.

[evan]

Originally Posted by pscates2.0 That's funny you made this thread. At some point last week, I acquired some sort of bite and it's a quarter-sized "halo" of red on top of my left foot, in front of my ankle. It looks like a little round "bite" from something with a 1" mouth, but it's "dotted" all around. It itches. It was really dark and a bit "risen" a day or two ago (especially Saturday), but today it has faded a bit. But it's kinda scaly. I've done a lot of stuff outside this past week, but a) I have no other bites anywhere else, and b) even if I did, they were just the standard small, round bumpy mosquito bites. I've never had this "halo of itch" before, and I have no idea what did it. I noticed it about Wednesday afternoon or so. That's looking at the inside of my left foot...heel is toward bottom right, toes up top (that long line below the quarter is going directly across my ankle). It looks like someone took a 1" washer (because it's more of a "ring" than a solid spot...the center is normal), heated it up and set it on my foot for about 3-4 minutes and let it burn a red place into my skin. Great link above, thanks. I've done the fingernail "x" thing before, just out of curiosity/desperation. It seemed to help, but I didn't know why, or that it was a known, "approved" tactic. EDIT: Holy crap...it is ringworm?! It just popped into my head, thinking of "itchy skin stuff" (I was thinking of that commercial for "ringworm and psoriasis" and I Google-imaged "ringworm" and see some similar pics. Mine is nowhere near as horrific as some of the photos I'm seeing, thank goodness...

could be ringworm?

ah read the edit after hitting quote. but yeah, definitely a possibility.


...and then there's my story! Woke up yesterday with probably a few hundred bites (they appear to be ants) running up each of my legs, stopping at about my waistline. Got a few random ones on my stomach / back, and even a few on one of my forearms. Could be bed bugs but I've looked and can't find them, and the pattern of biting much more closely matches ants. Well wouldn't I have noticed ants? 3 cases where I might not have. 1. Hiking. Stopped briefly at a swimming hole in them middle of a 9 mile hike on friday. took off some clothes and my shoes, could have put them in ants and not noticed. The work of the hike could have blinded my senses a bit to the ants. (unlikely). 2. football game. Went extremely intoxicated to a football game saturday night and stood/sat around barefoot on a hill to watch the game. Could have been ants there. 3. bars later the same night, very intoxicated, sat outside, could have been ants (most likely if ants). If not ants, probably bed bugs. But due to the bite pattern, very concentrated at feet and gradually diminishing as you go up, and the fact I have extensive experience with ant bites (used to play with fire ant hills a lot as a kid...), think these feel/look like ant bites. All the same I've searched my room extensively for bed bugs and found no traces of the bastards. But how I got the bites is a mystery.

go away bugs!

[Maciej]

Brad, that looks like ringworm.

Err, talk about us all coming to the same conclusion.

Does it glow under UV?

[evan]

Originally Posted by torifile Damn. I went camping this weekend with my son (who's 3.5 and had a great time!) but my ankles and feet are all bitten to hell. I've tried the anti-itch Rhule gel and they still itch like a mofo. I couldn't even sleep last night, it was so bad*. Any remedies for dealing with these things? * But it felt so good to scratch them. That is, until I broke the skin. Now it feels good and hurts all at the same time...

oh yeah, got some CVS brand Instant Itch Relief Spray (active ingredients Diphenhydramine HCl and Zinc Acetate) and it works AMAZINGLY. Instantly no more itch and even makes the inflammation go down immensely.

That looks to me like the bite from a tick carrying Lyme disease, same circular pattern the size of a quarter. These ticks are smaller than your average tick, about the size of a pinhead.

[psmith2.0]

Ugh...

[drewprops]

That's a zombie kitteh bite. Seen 'em before. Sorry bud.


^^^

I'm serious about this, look it up. It began here, on the East coast, and is now traveling around the country. The neurological side of the problems stemming from Lyme disease are nothing to laugh about, but it doesn't stop at neurological, there can be a myriad of complications.

[Moogs]

Tick bites aside, if you want protection from mosquitos in areas where they are really bad (camping, rainy summers, etc), for those who are no longer interested in reproducing, I recommend a few drops of 100% DEET. Spread it around your palms and fingers and then rub it onto your arms and legs, back of your neck, etc. They won't come near you most of the time. OFF doesn't always work because it's only like 5% DEET. Cintronella doesn't work at all IMO because the wind just blows the citro-smoke all over the place.

DEET is the answer as long as you're not looking to have kids. And if you are looking, it's only like a 3% chance they'll be born with genetic mutations (three ears, one arm in the center of their sternum, stuff like that).

[Kickaha]

What he said.

REI Jungle Juice is my go-to. Just a few drops, apply, walk through nature blissfully bite free, then go home and knock out a few mutants with the wife.

What could be better?


Re: Lyme: Yeah, that shit is *nasty*, and diagnosing it is hit or miss, much less treatment. When we were living in NY, we saw CDC estimates that 40% of the population had had it at one time or another. Other sources put it as high as 60%. Nasty nasty stuff. Glad to be out west again.

[evan]

Originally Posted by Kickaha What he said. REI Jungle Juice is my go-to. Just a few drops, apply, walk through nature blissfully bite free, then go home and knock out a few mutants with the wife. What could be better? Re: Lyme: Yeah, that shit is *nasty*, and diagnosing it is hit or miss, much less treatment. When we were living in NY, we saw CDC estimates that 40% of the population had had it at one time or another. Other sources put it as high as 60%. Nasty nasty stuff. Glad to be out west again.

one of my professors last semester was diagnosed with Bird Flu and received treatment for four weeks before he saw another doctor and got a correct diagnosis of lyme disease. Was in the hospital for about a month... scary stuff.

[Moogs]

Originally Posted by Kickaha What he said. REI Jungle Juice is my go-to. Just a few drops, apply, walk through nature blissfully bite free, then go home and knock out a few mutants with the wife. What could be better?

Yep. That's exactly what I have - REI Jungle Juice. Bought a little 3 oz container like 10 years ago... STILL works and I have more than half of it left. All you need is a few drops and you're covered. When the revolution comes and we have to run for the hills, Jungle Juice will be worth more than gold or gasoline.

[Kickaha]

Originally Posted by Moogs Yep. That's exactly what I have - REI Jungle Juice. Bought a little 3 oz container like 10 years ago... STILL works and I have more than half of it left. All you need is a few drops and you're covered. When the revolution comes and we have to run for the hills, Jungle Juice will be worth more than gold or gasoline.

And you ever notice that it has basically no scent?

Yup, that nasty, toxic, foul smell of bug spray? They *ADD* it.

Pure DEET is basically odorless.

[Moogs]

Yah you can smell it a little if you put your nose up to your skin, but it's definitely not as bad as ordinary bug spray. Doesn't surprise me Johnson & Johnson or whoever makes OFF adds bad smelling stuff to make it seem extra effective. Probably keeps people away better than bugs.

[Boomerangmacuser]

Afterbite is just Ammonia in a tube so check your cupboard and dab some on. My daughters swear by a creme called Fenistil. It's an antihistamine creme made by Novartis. They don't sell it here in Canada so my in-laws pick some up when they go to Europe. It eases the itch locally without having to take antihistamine pills. Not sure if there's something like that in the US.

[billybobsky]

Ok....


I am appalled at this thread. Appalled.

First Paul, it's either ringworm or a bite from a tick (likely carrying lyme) so go to a doctor asap in either case since there is no use fucking with over the counter treatments for either, really.

Second evan, i was but a small child when i unknowingly stood in a large ant hill (fire ants, for those unaware of what we mean by such things), i couldn't feel their bites at all -- as you are probably aware, you don't really notice ant bites until well after they have happened. My leg swelled, i lost feeling/ability to move it and had to be carried into my dad's station wagon and then into a warm bath. I think i was too shocked to realize exactly what happened since it seems like I was just standing watching a Teepee go up and then I was in the bath at home with no real pause between the two events -- certainly in the era before cell phones someone must have paged my father, he called back realized the potential gravity of the situation (small child, unknown allergies, unable to walk), and abandoned work for the remainder of the day to pick me up, but it certainly didn't seem that way.

Torifile: my recommendation is to stop scratching them. doing so just aggravates the immune response which leads to more itching; etc. take a bath. seriously. bring your wife. make it an adult bath.

Moogs and Kickaha: as you might know, DEET is a neurotoxin in both insects and humans and most certainly has an odor, just not the one you associate with OFF. In fact, it seems to act as a repellent because mosquitos dislike the odor, rather than it interfering with the ability to sense a meal nearby. Having experienced a DEET over exposure, only on skin, but with a healthy smattering to keep the hoards of mosquitos in a CR rain forest at bay, I will never ever use a product with it in it again. I have never once felt the instinctual need to get a chemical off of me (i am a chemist after all) before and I hope never to again. There are plenty of significantly less toxic, effective alternatives...

[Kickaha]

Originally Posted by billybobsky Moogs and Kickaha: as you might know, DEET is a neurotoxin in both insects and humans and most certainly has an odor, just not the one you associate with OFF. In fact, it seems to act as a repellent because mosquitos dislike the odor, rather than it interfering with the ability to sense a meal nearby. Having experienced a DEET over exposure, only on skin, but with a healthy smattering to keep the hoards of mosquitos in a CR rain forest at bay, I will never ever use a product with it in it again. I have never once felt the instinctual need to get a chemical off of me (i am a chemist after all) before and I hope never to again. There are plenty of significantly less toxic, effective alternatives...

Yup, there are a number of people out there sensitive to DEET. I never have been, luckily.

Care to share one of these effective alternatives? Because I keep coming back to DEET as the only thing that made NC summers tolerable. Nothing else worked for me. Skeeters LOVE me. :P

[torifile]

Thanks bobsky. Now, *that's* good advice. You win the thread.

[billybobsky]

Originally Posted by Kickaha Yup, there are a number of people out there sensitive to DEET. I never have been, luckily. Care to share one of these effective alternatives? Because I keep coming back to DEET as the only thing that made NC summers tolerable. Nothing else worked for me. Skeeters LOVE me. :P

I have actually found both aloe vera directly and some of the recently more available DEET free repellents (of strength found in REI or EMS carried products) to work for me. But then again, other than being locked in a room with a mosquito, or under heavy assault at night in a rain forest, mosquitos tend to avoid me. What makes mosquitos attracted to one person over the other is fascinating -- there are certainly different classes of susceptible people, probably arising from a different mix of odors released by the skin/microbes on the skin.

[Hassan i Sabbah]

I'm pretty sure that everyone's similarly attractive to the bastards, but some of us respond differently. That's my theory.

My method is to ignore annoying deet altogether. It stinks and stings and it's pretty useless unless you're up to like 90% solution it seems anyway, at which point your clothes get stained and you're sticky and your travelling stuff stinks and you feel a bit like you fell over in a lab.

I take malaria prophylaxis if I'm somewhere you can catch malaria and ignore deet. Just take a tube of anti-hystamine cream and smear it on when the fuckers get you. They will get you whatever you do, so...

Generally after a week I don't react to badly to the bites anyway.

[709]

I attribute my skeeter-free aura to the shit-tons of garlic that I consume. It may not be the case, but I remember as a kid being eaten alive. Ever since I learned to cook (and discovered that lovely bulb that now borders on addiction) I have absolutely no problem, while others around me are flailing and spraying all sorts of shit on themselves.

[Hassan i Sabbah]

Off topic, I remember being in South Africa when an overland van came in with a cargo of hippies. There was one dredlocked Israeli youth giving it the large one about having just come in from Zimbabwe or Mozambique and that anti-malarials were were for straights and lightweights and not for well-travelled djembé players chasing a true experience (I exaggerate.)

He was incubating cerebral malaria and he went to hospital.

[Hassan i Sabbah]

Originally Posted by 709 I attribute my skeeter-free aura to the shit-tons of garlic that I consume. It may not be the case, but I remember as a kid being eaten alive. Ever since I learned to cook (and discovered that lovely bulb that now borders on addiction) I have absolutely no problem, while others around me are flailing and spraying all sorts of shit on themselves.

Garlic! Yes. I swear by garlic. I put this in my post but edited it out for some reason (to seem hard and cool, probably.)

When I'm at my parents I always swallow a whole clove of garlic. I swear it works.

[addabox]

Right. Garlic to ward off bloodsuckers. Sorry about your parents.

[709]

And marking the sign of the cross into a bite to ward off evil! Suggested by NosferaDrew no less!

[Hassan i Sabbah]

I also like to use consecrated water. And sometimes I sleep in a nun's habit.