Got Bed Bugs? Bedbugger Forums » Bed bug bites, skin, etc.
Just want some support, 2nd day of no sleep
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Stayed one night in a motel and I have over 100 bedbug welts all over my body (which means hundreds of bites, right?) I am extremely allergic and thay have itched severly for the last 36 hours +. I have raised welts, blistered welts (the size of peas), and bites that have a "Saturn-like" ring shape around a center welt.
I have used almost an entire bottle of calamine lotion since yesterday evening. -
your host
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Posted 2 years ago
Wed Mar 16 2011 1:41:57
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Hi janet,
Are you sure this was a case of bed bugs? The "saturn-like ring" around the bites is not something we normally hear about with bed bugs, though a "target pattern" is common with ticks.
Assuming it is bed bugs, did you go home (or to your next destination) yet? If not, there are steps you can take to avoid bringing bed bugs home. See the FAQs here.
I am sorry you are suffering from the bites -- they can be very uncomfortable.
Also, I sent you a private message. There's a link in the sidebar to read them.
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oldtimer
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Posted 2 years ago
Wed Mar 16 2011 7:12:15
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Janet,
It is possible that you were bitten by hundreds of bed bugs... I am not sure from your description... Some allergic reactions can closely resemble bite marks... Did you find any other evidence of bed bugs in the room?
You might be describing an allergic reaction to something else... Given your history of allergies... I would strongly urge you to consult with your physician.
A small number of people have reported severe allergic reactions to bed bug bites and possibly bed bug dander that in a few reported cases has progressed to anaphylaxis... This can be a serious medical issue.
I found that Caladryl (Calamine + topical Benedryl) worked for me... Also sunburn products with aloe and Benzocaine were very helpful... Steroid Rx and prescription strength antihistamines may be indicated.
The most sure way to determine if the room was heavily infested is to have a professional inspect the room... There would be physical evidence of thirty or more bed bugs in the room to produce that many bite wounds.
If you have not arrived home yet, ... Be sure to isolate everything that you took into the room and seal your luggage in garbage bags to avoid exporting any bugs to your home until you have properly decon'ed the contents.
It is hard for people to understand the experience... If they have not dealt with bed bugs themselves.
A severe reaction without any warning is a frightening experience. that can produce lingering fear and anxiety.
It is going to be important to determine whether you are dealing with bed bugs or another allergen.
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jrbtnyc
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Posted 2 years ago
Wed Mar 16 2011 9:40:25
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Janet,
If that bite form does suggest ticks, one question would be whether you've been outdoors and passed through brush, such as next to a road or next to a path through woods near residences, where ticks, such as deer ticks which transmit Lyme Disease, wait to climb on passing animals or people.
Unlike bed bugs, ticks do transmit diseases and could actually make bed bugs seem benign by comparison.
Around the time you developed all the welts, did you look around and happen to spot any ticks still on you or on your bed etc..
But I'm not expert and only know what I've casually read in the media.
[portion of message deleted by admin]jrbtnyc
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oldtimer
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Posted 2 years ago
Wed Mar 16 2011 9:52:41
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Hard ticks rest on host for hours/days, so it's difficult to be bitten by hundreds of them and see only the bites...
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jrbtnyc
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Posted 2 years ago
Wed Mar 16 2011 10:32:56
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EffeCi - 38 minutes ago »
Hard ticks rest on host for hours/days, so it's difficult to be bitten by hundreds of them and see only the bites...Yes but aren't deer ticks really tiny unlike, say, dog ticks, maybe similar to 1st-stage fed bb nymphs?
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oldtimer
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Posted 2 years ago
Wed Mar 16 2011 10:40:51
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I'll answer with a question:
Why should hundreds of deer ticks be in the same hotel room? Did they sell the room to a deer before?
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jrbtnyc
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Posted 2 years ago
Wed Mar 16 2011 11:16:51
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She would not have acquired them in the hotel room, but rather in the brush or woods, where deer ticks like to await humans or animals to grab onto at locations where the ticks can sense there's frequent traffic.
Anyway I'm admittedly on shaky ground here because I *have* been reading up lately on bed bugs but not on deer ticks.
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Anonymous
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Posted 2 years ago
Wed Mar 16 2011 14:34:40
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Thank you for the responses. I do not have allergies in general, I meant that I am highly allergic to these bites that I believe are bedbugs. When I woke up in the morning, I saw light pink round spots in the classic mottled pattern on my shoulder and then others on the rest of my body. Over the course of 8-10 hours, they intensified being bright red and the intense itching/burning lasted from that point until about 4 hours ago when the general flaming stopped and moved into specific bites mostly on the extremeties - the feet, the hands. This morning it is fingers and neck and the rest of my body, like breasts and torso .
The mottled shoulder area is the biggest and has about 10 blisters in it. The very bad, large bites developed blisters over them on the arms. First they filled up like a hard raised bubble and now look like a jellyfish with a red line around the bubble. Those with no blisters you can see the little separate gnaw bubble marks, where they masticated the skin.
I looked at photos of tick bites and the differences are these:
the ring around mind seemed like a spreading of allergens, it was no as concentric as a tick bite, as in it was not a perfect ring and some of the circle wasn't there. My bite had a center of bright red and then a large pink orbit then a sort of leaching ring that was thinner than the edge of a tick bite and less circular that looked like a spreading of allergen instead of a bite radius. The bite and ring was about 4 inches long (there were about 5 that completely took up my very long arm.)
The bad ones (without the blisters) look like something had been gnawing on the skin there are several that have broken through and cracked the skin. A very large one has a line of gnaw marks traveling up the vein in my arm.
The torso marks are darker in appearance and look like very dark hickies or birthmarks with a more bruised capillary appearance. -
lancando
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Posted 1 year ago
Sat Oct 15 2011 20:50:14
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WOW, some suggest that you have a mental disorder called "anxiety". No you don't. If you sleep somewhere else do the same problems haunt you? No, of coarse not. It's because you still have bed bugs. You will never see a bed bug until the infestation reaches epic proportions. Take a hot shower right before bed. Get Diatomacfious Earth and spreed it in a large cirlcle under your bed. Put you oven up to !50 degress F and put a large cookie shoot on the bottem rack. Put your sheets tightly folded on a large cookie sheet on the second rack. "Ovenate" your sheets for 4 hours. Put you blankets and pillows in commercial dryers at high heat for 4 hours. After the show make you bed and jump in and enjoy a bice sleep.
Bed bugs detect your sleep breathing and only come and bite you when you are asleep. Don't let you bed touch anything, have it up on a bed of DE. You may still get a bite, but know that they are not going to die a slow agonizing death before they can reproduce. -
bedbugsuptown
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Posted 1 year ago
Mon Oct 17 2011 20:14:38
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lancando - 1 day ago »
WOW, some suggest that you have a mental disorder called "anxiety". No you don't. If you sleep somewhere else do the same problems haunt you? No, of coarse not. It's because you still have bed bugs. You will never see a bed bug until the infestation reaches epic proportions. Take a hot shower right before bed. Get Diatomacfious Earth and spreed it in a large cirlcle under your bed. Put you oven up to !50 degress F and put a large cookie shoot on the bottem rack. Put your sheets tightly folded on a large cookie sheet on the second rack. "Ovenate" your sheets for 4 hours. Put you blankets and pillows in commercial dryers at high heat for 4 hours. After the show make you bed and jump in and enjoy a bice sleep.
Bed bugs detect your sleep breathing and only come and bite you when you are asleep. Don't let you bed touch anything, have it up on a bed of DE. You may still get a bite, but know that they are not going to die a slow agonizing death before they can reproduce. -
bedbugsuptown
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Posted 1 year ago
Mon Oct 17 2011 21:03:28
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I don't agree about the epic proportions part. My infestation was on the light side (I have not yet let my guard down but it's been 5wks--no evidence of bbs.
Moreover, I found an adult bedbug in the bed....in the MORNING WITH the lights ON while stroking my cat, like I said, in the bed all on a Saturday morning--shortly after the bites began. And after 2 different k9 teams went through my apartment--1st team, dog alerted once at a dresser near my bed; 2nd. team, no dog alert at all. Sounds stupid to some but I asked God, God if I have bedbugs-show me a bug. I don't think my infestation would be described as epic.
Now this is 3rd hand, but I'll post it anyway. My daughter who was the one suffering bites told me that a friend of hers, who apparently had a heavier infestations told her that if he sat on his bed, no matter the time of day, and got real quiet (the kid does yoga) given enough time a few bugs would emerge for a meal. AND this is with a light on and I guess he'd killem' though I never asked.
Because of my own experience.... I caught another bug under the same circumstances I described above. Instead of peaking out of a rumpled top sheet like the first catch, this bug was on the under-side of the now BB encased mattress cover on the top bunk. Again, I was sitting in the bed with the light on, and I looked up and saw the bug and bagged it like the other one, therefore I believe the 3rd. hand story.
I'm not 100% sure that I'm done.... I had 2 chemical treatments with one PCO followed by an inspection by a well known and reputable PCO that posts on this site. I was told there was no further evidence of an active infestation.
I can't comment on the bites you are experiencing but I felt the need to post because of that--you only see bbs if your infestation is of EPIC. In my experience--I DON'T AGREE cuz I doubt my infestation would be described as epic. I'm posting for you anonymous and anyone else who is a newbite and finds this thread.
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mangobirdie
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Posted 1 year ago
Mon Oct 17 2011 21:20:10
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"Sounds stupid to some but I asked God, God if I have bedbugs-show me a bug. I don't think my infestation would be described as epic."
Bedbugsuptown: That doesn't sound stupid to me. I prayed to find out where the hell they were coming from, since I had recently moved and was afraid that I picked them up in the moving van. I had Elizabethan era historical costumes in storage and was terrified that these unwashable pieces might be infested. Thank God, it eventually became obvious that my neighbor (who moved in shortly after me) was the source. So, God has not yet answered my prayers that treatment would make them finally go away, but at least I know more than I did. And anyone with bedbugs understand how valuable it is to have something you *know* for sure!
Anonymous: The red ring around the bite is something I have experienced with known bed bug bites. In my understanding, it is possible as well as the blisters you experienced. If you have health insurance or easy access to a doctor a prescription steroid cream to be applied to the bites can be REALLY helpful. It does not make them stop itching right away but it fights the inflammation and makes the symptom time much shorter. I was itching badly with major redness for at least five days. It has cut it down to two. My doc also advised Benadryl. It can make you sleepy but she said it is better at fighting an acute allergic reaction, than medications meant to be taken for a while, like Zyrtec. Granted, I am not a doctor so this is just letting you know what has helped me. I hope you didn't bring any home with you. Best of luck!
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Louise
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Posted 1 year ago
Tue Oct 18 2011 1:10:09
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lancando - 2 days ago »
You will never see a bed bug until the infestation reaches epic proportions.This is incorrect. It's possible to find a bed bug (or two) in even a minor infestation if you know where to look...and sometimes it can happen just by chance when you're not looking.
lancando - 2 days ago » Take a hot shower right before bed.
This might not be a good idea, as it can dry your skin out in a significant way, making you even more prone to skin reactions.
lancando - 2 days ago » Get Diatomacfious Earth and spreed it in a large cirlcle under your bed.
Do NOT put DE anywhere where it will be/can be disturbed and thereby inhaled. Inhaling DE can cause silicosis of the lungs, which will make having bed bugs look like a picnic.
lancando - 2 days ago » Put you oven up to !50 degress F and put a large cookie shoot on the bottem rack. Put your sheets tightly folded on a large cookie sheet on the second rack. "Ovenate" your sheets for 4 hours.
DO NOT DO THIS!!! This is a fire waiting to happen. Use your dryer or buy a Packtite but DO NOT use your oven for heating cloth or paper items.
lancando - 2 days ago » Put you blankets and pillows in commercial dryers at high heat for 4 hours. After the show make you bed and jump in and enjoy a bice sleep.
Four hours is likely overkill, but this is the right idea.
lancando - 2 days ago » Bed bugs detect your sleep breathing and only come and bite you when you are asleep.
Bed bugs do indeed detect your breathing and your heat, but they will come and bite you when they need to eat, whether you are asleep or not.
lancando - 2 days ago » Don't let you bed touch anything, have it up on a bed of DE. You may still get a bite, but know that they are not going to die a slow agonizing death before they can reproduce.
DO NOT pile up DE anywhere; it should be laid down very thinly. Please check out the DE FAQs if you're going to use it, and be sure to use a respirator .
Also, isolating your bed can be counterproductive as well, since it will mean they form their sneaky little harborages elsewhere.
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