When I got home from working outside (environmental biologist) on Tuesday I found a bite on my hip that was really itchy and thought it was a fire ant bite. I woke up yesterday and had this weird quarter-sized bruise around the bite and showed it to my co-worker and he said that it might be a brown recluse bite. I woke up today and the bruising now covers an area about 3” x 2” and still itches like crazy. I attached a picture of what it looks like now. I’ve been reading up on recluse bites all morning and there’s not really anything doctors can do if I go have it looked at, but judging from pictures online it's a real possibility that it is indeed a recluse bite. I’m not experiencing any other symptoms (nausea, vomiting, muscle cramps, fever) and the only treatment right now is to keep the area clean and keep an ice pack on it, which I’ve been doing. Fortunately, the giant necrotic lesions that people associate with brown recluse bites are actually pretty rare.Thanks for the input.
7/3/2008 11:54:21 AM
7/3/2008 11:55:01 AM
I think you have AIDs
7/3/2008 12:23:46 PM
I'd still have it looked at, esp. if you can get in today rather than have to do an urgent care over the long weekend. It might be a brown recluse bite but it could be a lot of other things. Odds are the doctor will tell you to do what you're already doing but there's the chance it might be something that requires attention by a doc.
7/3/2008 12:28:25 PM
looks more to me like the bullseye bruise associated with a tick bite from a tick carrying lyme disease.
7/3/2008 12:32:37 PM
lasersoup makes a good point
7/3/2008 1:11:48 PM
I've gotten a lot of tick bites lately although to my knowledge I did not have one where the bruising is. However, that other bite that's more on my ass, that one is from a tick.
7/3/2008 1:19:57 PM
Are those stretch marks or veins that have popped out because of the bite?
7/3/2008 1:21:50 PM
stretch marks
7/3/2008 1:23:47 PM
7/3/2008 1:54:09 PM
IIRC, a recluse bite has a tell-tale "cone" that keeps reemerging from the bite area, like a scab
7/3/2008 1:56:01 PM
yeah. like they've been sayin.. tick bite f0 shizzle
7/3/2008 2:12:05 PM
im gonna 2nd, th!rd, and fourth the e-diagnosis of it quite possibly being a tick bite
7/3/2008 2:53:25 PM
I have to agree...either way you need to see someone soon for sure.
7/3/2008 2:55:07 PM
How sure are you this is insect related and not a staph infection?[Edited on July 3, 2008 at 3:15 PM. Reason : Go to the doc]
7/3/2008 3:15:16 PM
I'm thinking tick bite.
7/3/2008 3:35:56 PM
after zooming, i do see the bullseye now.still, go to the doc
7/3/2008 3:39:11 PM
tick bite, and you now have lyme disease
7/4/2008 12:23:56 AM
i got bit about a month agohere is a pic of the bite about a week oldits mostly gone but there is still a little bit of skin discoloration
7/4/2008 1:43:20 AM
they just finished a report on good morning america about lyme disease and how you can have painful chronic symptoms if it's not treated early (w/ antibiotics). that definitely looks like the typical bull's eye rash from a tick w/ lyme disease. go to the doctor, even if you're not convinced. the last thing you'd want is arthritis type symptoms for the rest of your life.
7/4/2008 7:51:13 AM
it looks like your stomach is swelling a bit. You should look into that before it gets too bad. I had the same problem a couple years ago and didn't take care of it then. Now it's much harder to treat.
7/4/2008 8:51:41 AM
I got a rash almost that bad from a horsefly bite and it went away pretty fastit didn't have that bullseye thing going on though but if it were lyme disease wouldn't there be evidence of a tick?[Edited on July 4, 2008 at 3:14 PM. Reason : k]
7/4/2008 3:13:12 PM
damn ncsuwolfy...damn...
7/4/2008 3:20:47 PM
7/4/2008 7:26:29 PM
NCSUWolfy has gotta be one of the hottest girls on this sitei mean..even with a nasty looking tick bite or whatever that is
7/4/2008 9:28:33 PM
As much as I'm against creepy internet shit, I have to agree
7/5/2008 12:36:06 AM
as much as i hate creepy internet shit, i have to disagree adamently.
7/5/2008 6:59:35 PM
as much as i love creepy internet shit, shes def top 10 or 15[Edited on July 5, 2008 at 7:28 PM. Reason : which is pretty good imo]
7/5/2008 7:18:23 PM
You people are easily the saddest group of horn-dogs ever.
7/5/2008 7:28:27 PM
i see what you did there
7/5/2008 9:06:39 PM
i like that shes not skinny and shes not fat
7/5/2008 9:14:25 PM
Unless the wound is oozing/oozed I'm just gonna go with a histamine reaction to a bite.
7/5/2008 10:49:19 PM
omg you mean i'm normal? haha hey i could be a lot skinner but i loves to eattake that hater who sent me a pm calling me fat try picking on someone without self confidence
7/5/2008 11:43:46 PM
lol you're phat
7/5/2008 11:55:07 PM
^
7/6/2008 2:09:28 AM
doctors here don't believe we have lyme's disease in NC. There is one in Charlotte that does and a NC Lyme's disease group that does (not doctors but people that tested positive for it). I tested positive for RMSF last year but I had all of the symptoms of lyme's (minus the tick bite, b/c we never could find one, but it could have been on my head under my hair). I went to an Infectious Disease specialist and he said that there is no lyme's disease here. So after 5 weeks of antibiotics, I finally started feeling better but I still have some problems from whatever the hell it was.I think you should go to the doctor. Regardless, of what bit you. the bite looks nasty and if it gets infected, that is bad!
7/6/2008 7:47:57 AM
7/6/2008 8:52:47 AM
i got bit in the woods of texas while camping
7/6/2008 9:44:37 AM
agentlion wins
7/6/2008 9:57:26 AM
except not really
7/6/2008 10:00:20 AM
yeah he does. it was gonna be my reply, but he beat me to it and a few of you were too busy trying to run egame to notice.
7/6/2008 10:15:39 AM
7/6/2008 11:17:52 AM
^ I'll ask Peacock tomorrow. Whatever he says = GOLD STANDARD from the CDC:[Edited on July 6, 2008 at 11:30 AM. Reason : ]
7/6/2008 11:19:16 AM
^^^lol
7/6/2008 11:20:24 AM
http://www.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/conditions/07/06/lymedisease.treatment/index.html
7/6/2008 10:45:46 PM
dat 190% Lyme disease
7/7/2008 12:45:46 AM
^^^^ wow, those are really sharply divided lines
7/7/2008 2:01:27 AM
Brown recluse bites are dramatically over-diagnosed, especially in this state. The spiders are almost nonexistent here. The overwhelming majority of diagnosed bites are simply staph infections. I've had a yellow jacket sting and 2 spider bites develop infections. The sting happened at a football game and was several hours before I could properly clean it. The spider bites started with histamine reactions and developed infections slowly, probably from me scratching early on.
7/7/2008 3:11:32 AM
i have a nice dent in my thigh from a bite 15 years ago. it turned into a puss volcano for a week or two. now its a crater and the skin in the middle is scar tissue. HAPPY SQUEEZING!
7/7/2008 7:54:20 AM
7/7/2008 10:03:26 AM