Poison Ivy or Insect Bite?
The photo above is the end results to a 3 week battle with sudden rash I developed while gardening.
I was standing over my winding pole beans when I noticed that one of the bean vines had wrapped onto the flower bush next to it. When I reached over to separate the two, my right arm was scratched by the thorny flower bush.
Instantly, I felt a sharp pricking feeling right underneath my wrist area. I thought, 'Oh No!' as I am very allergic to any kind of insect bites. Quickly, I looked down where my garden gloved met my skin, whaaaaa! I saw a tiny black dot sitting on my wrist. Blind as a bat, I didn't wear my glasses out, I urgently flicked that black speck off my skin.
Taking a closer look, I spied two tiny red dots, about a quarter sized in distance from each other. Oh boy, what happened next, I would have never guessed.
I watched as second by second 😖 those two little red dots started to grow to become a raised up rash. I had my eyes glued onto my wrist as I rushed down the garden's path. By the time I reached the end of the pathway, the rash had ballooned into larger map like bumps.
I hurried indoors to wash my entire arm which has the most painful itch erupt since the discovery of 'the red dots.'
I grabbed my Dawn dish washing soap and rubbed the entire area. I've read somewhere that if a person develop poison ivy, they should first wash the area with Dawn liquid soap or a heavy grease salve to remove any poison ivy oil.
By the time I finished washing, the flaming rashes continued growing. Frightened by what happen during previous emergency visits, I went online and read more about poison ivy, not knowing exactly what I got infected with.
I found what I thought was an expert who said to run hot water over the area and then using a grease killer soap, using a towel and scrubbing the oil off. Boy, was that a mistake.
In my desperation, I later realized that I didn't know what I was doing. In real fact, what I did actually hurt my skin. The hot water opened up all my pores letting any poison or toxins in, the heavy scrubbing, back and forth probably 'spread' any poison or infection further out into my arm.
After that kind of punishment, my arm fought back. It began swelling and raging, pushing up lots of icky fluid to the surface. Pockets of liquid started to ooze out of those to rashes. Secondary rashes started to appear and spread. The next thing I knew, the entire side of my right arm began to 'balloon', feeling very hot and terribly itchy. All the time, I was asking, 'Why me'?
My poor swollen, itchy arm swelled for a couple of my days. I took a lot of Benydrl during this time, hoping to stop any allergic reaction there may be. At the same time, I tried different natural methods to draw out any toxins or poisons there may be ( still not sure what the rashes were from ).
I used an oat meal salve, then a baking soda and salt salve, also a bentonite clay salve, and finally an activated charcoal salve. Not sure which worked but my swelling started to go down. I felt a little relief but the itching continued but not as badly as before.
I was in the end left to fight a rash that was large and oozing. Trying not to scratch, I applied a anti-itching gel called 'After Bite' which contain baking soda to my huge, bubbling rash. Ahhhh! Relief! I continued washing the infected area with plain soap then reapplied the 'After Bite' gel. Surprised to see that I had finished up an entire tube of it when this whole itchy ordeal was over.
That ugly, oozing rash calmed down and eventually went away, leaving two dark itchy spots.
Today, my arm is a darker shade because of the activated charcoal but I'm sure it'll disappear soon but I continue to get tiny, itching bumps coming up and down near the previous rashes. All I can do now is continue my gels and hope the itch goes away, too.
Be sure to consult your doctor before trying any new medications or treatments.
Health is everything, don't take it for granted. 🌸