Bug Bite Treatment

So, this past weekend my bf invited me on his boat. I did express some concern over going. I knew that this was the season for greenheads. For those of you that don't know the joy of greenheads (a.k.a: horseflys) here's the rundown on them. They look like flys, but much larger and also have a greenhead, hence the name.

What they should really be called are, "Greenheads, bloodsucking demons of death". Okay, so it's kinda dramatic, but they're really awful creatures. They breed in marshes and come out in July to bite victims. They're vicious and laugh in the face of bugspray. They were making my bf's dad bleed all over the boatdeck.

I thought I wasn't allergic to anything, but I must be somewhat allergic to these things. I ended up with big red itchy bumps wherever they bit me. And they bit me everywhere. So the first day (Saturday) I was fine other than the bumps and I thought it would go away. Then it got super-itchy and I couldn't stop scratching. Sunday night I borrowed my friends calamine lotion and practically took a bath in it. I felt like it didn't help at all. So I looked up calamine lotion on wikipedia and found out that it doesn't really do anything....great. No wonder why I couldn't stop itching when I had chickenpox as a child. Thank you FDA!

So I went to the store on Monday and got some cortisone to put on the bites. It helped on some of them. Mostly my bumps have gone down from that and home remedy (and all the power I have in my body not to itch)

So I would suggest if you have bad swelling use cortisone or benadryl to cut it down, but to stop the itch white vinegar works great. Someone told me that white vinegar also works well on bruises, but found out it doesn't do a thing. Trust me, I tried it. However, witch hazel does work well on bruises.

I also found out they make a special spray for greenheads that people that work in marshes use. I've never seen it anywhere but apparently it actually works. If I do find that bugspray I'll get it and let you know how it works. (but I will test it on someone else first, because I'm not dealing with this giant red bugbite thing again!)