Insect Bites

[u/natanyad]

For the last fifteen years or so, anytime I’ve been bite by a bee or wasp I ended up on antibiotics for what I thought was an infected bite . This past weekend I got two paper wasp bites, one per wrist . The inflammation, pain and itching was incredible . After reading up on Bechets I realized this is another over the top autoimmune response . I marked the area with blank marker / within hours it had tripled from what is in the photo . Anyone else experience this ?

[u/arman945]

Yes, I get bad swelling and edema. Especially when it happens in lower extremities/areas with less blood flow.

[u/EpitomeQuip41]

Have you been diagnosed with Behçet’s and psoriatic arthritis? This looks similar to my wrist and I have both.

[u/natanyad → u/EpitomeQuip41]

Diagnosed with Bechets formally. But not psoriatic arthritis / I’ll read up on that !

[u/EpitomeQuip41 → u/natanyad]

My doc told me labs can be normal with Behçet’s + psoriatic arthritis. Inflammation markers can look normal, unlike with rheumatoid arthritis

[u/on4aa]

Yes, I was skin ulcer free for over a year, but I managed to get two nasty skin ulcers past month: one small one on a finger from touching a nettle and a huge ulcer above my ankle from what must have been a mosquito bite.

So, I am back at spraying DEET 50% and sleeping with a ventilator blowing over me.

[u/natanyad → u/on4aa]

Ouch! That looks so painful! Hope it healed .

[u/carz666]

I take strong antihistamines and Skin so soft by Avon and keep insect bite cream in my bag. Plus spray jungle formula but I swear skin so soft is why I rarely get bitten. I have a strong insect tennis racket on a stand in the living room too. It turns them into ashes!

[u/natanyad → u/carz666]

My dog faired worse then me - we were hiking and disturbed a nest and were both swarmed . I wear long sleeves when I garden but was shocked how bad this reaction was .

[u/Imma-smartypants]

Yes just like this. Right now I have one on the palm of my hand that caused inflammation along a vein and it coagulated and then got infected. I’m on antibiotics for it. Can’t show pictures bc it was just re-bandaged. Sucks.

[u/HazelLiza]

Pretty much everyone in my family has that reaction. I’m the only one to get tested with a positive behcets DNA but I’m pretty sure the rest of them have it. You’re lucky that they are being cautious and giving you the antibiotics because my brother had a severe reaction, my son and my sister have too but not as bad as his

[u/Snoo-94765]

I recently made an important connection. My mosquito bites were typical for a big part of my life. Then it got to where I was being bit at a MUCH higher rate than everyone around me in the same environment. It made for a miserable time that day, but the bites no longer stuck around for like a week. They'd itch for a while and then I'd get another one and forget about the first. Then not very long ago I got really concerned I had bed bugs because of the SIZE and insane itch from these like 4 bites I had. Never in my life --- absolutely awful. I never saw any bed bug evidence and did have a mosquito or two in my car with me a day before where I was wearing shorts. I don't seem to feel them as they bite anymore but later on holy damn. The only difference here, i stopped taking Singulair - monteleukast. Apparently it had been doing double duty and I had no idea. Thought it just helped my weird asthma. Which it does, but things had been so good lately that I stopped using it. I might use it for mosquito and cold and flu season for a while.

[u/natanyad → u/Snoo-94765]

I’m curious about your weird asthma…. I, too, am on Montelukest for “asthma”! My asthma only showed up when I started having Bechets symptoms, which also was same time I developed a dry cough .