For most people, the bite is the first indication of a bed bug problem.
Bedbugs usually bite you while you are sleeping. They get to your blood by piercing the skin and injecting a salivary fluid that causes your blood to flow easier (an anticoagulant) and also anesthetizes your skin, so you won't feel the sting, immediately wake up, and crush the puny vampire.
Bed Bug Bite Photos
It is that saliva (or rather, the proteins in the saliva) that causes an allergic reaction in most people. The reaction causes redness, swelling, inflammation, and most of all, itchiness around the area of each bite. The flush looks distinct on distinct people, and the can even vary in appearance depending on the location of the bite on your body. It might look like a mosquito bite, or a large red welt, or something in-between. Some population have reported that the bites have a white mark or depression in the center, though that is not always the case. Over time, the shape and the color of the bite/s will change.
Reactions to the bites may be delayed. In fact, in some cases it can be a day or more before the welts appear. Once they appear, the welts shrink down to red spots, but those spots can last for days.
Bed bug bites are often in a puny row, sometimes three or more, one right after another. Both Google and Flickr can show you fullness of photos of bed bug bites.
It is estimated that 20-30% of population do not have a reaction to bed bug bites. No itching, no swelling, nada. (Sounds nice, doesn't it? Makes me wonder if these population have become something like a bed bug Typhoid Mary - carrying the infestation with them, spreading it to new apartments and condos, but never suffering from the misery they bring to others).
For most people, though, bed bug bites itch. And it can be awful - they can itch so much that it becomes painful. I have heard of bed bug sufferers whose reaction to the bites grew worse and worse over time as they became more sensitive to them. That's just another suspect not to mess around with bed bugs. If you think you have them, you have to deal with the problem now, before your own body joins the fight against you.
Here is the one good thing about bed bug bites: They have not been concerned in the spread of disease. For some, that is a comforting thought. No matter how bad the bites get, and even though they might drive you crazy, there is no evidence that you can get anyone absolutely nasty from a bed bug bite.
If you are one of the unlucky majority that is allergic to bed bug bites, here is how you deal with them.
- Don't scratch! I know - they itch so bad, you want to Scream! But scratching will make it worse. The more the bites are scratched, the more they itch. Also, when you scratch, you run the risk of chance the welt and causing bleeding. Some victims have reported that the blood from a scratched welt seems to flow more freely than normal, maybe a consequent of residual traces of anticoagulant. And scratching a bite until it bleeds can lead to infection. So resist the temptation.
- Wash the area with warm, soapy water.
- Apply an anti-itch or anti-inflammatory medication, such as Benadryl or Hydrocortisone. It won't make the bites go away, but it will reduce the symptoms.
Neurotheology 3 - What happens in the brain when a person attains enlightenment? This talk offers an hypothesis. Using concepts in neurotheology developed by Michael A. Persinger (inventor of the God Helmet), Todd Murphy (inventor of the 8 Coil Shakti neural stimulation system) explores the brain's role in enlightenemnt as understood in Buddhism. The talk also looks at the self (or sense of self), and how it's place as a brain function allows it to be flexible enough to change as a person becomes enlightened. It examines a few case histories, including those of Ramana Maharishi, Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, The Buddha, and some others.
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