At first we thought it was mosquito bites. Maia scratched and squirmed and cried, and was more miserable than I’ve ever seen her. It was like she knew in her young brain the significance mosquito bites have had on her homeland and was lamenting all that loss and suffering.
But they itched too much, for too long, and we decided it must be flea bites. We have no cats or dogs, but maybe a visitor dragged them in the house, we hypothesized.
Then they got big, red, raised, and even more itchy, which an hour earlier I didn’t think was possible. Poison ivy? Poison oak? Some other contact dermatitis? On the soles of her feet? Unlikely. An allergic reaction to the antibiotics she’s on seemed most plausible at that point and a late night call to the doctor had us discontinue the antibiotics, (oh yeah, there was an ear infection in here somewhere), give her benadryl, and watch her to make she she didn’t stop breathing. Fortunately the benadryl helped her sleep. At first.
The next day at the doctors office they nixed the idea of an allergic reaction; an allergic reaction wouldn’t happen on the first exposure. The first doctor we saw was perplexed, but after much discussion and consultation with the other doctors in the office we got a verdict: scabies.
The brochure the office gave us describes scabies as ‘the worst itching ever’. They are tiny little mites with a six week incubation period. The itching is due to an allergic reaction to something in the mites. Probably their waste, but I try not to think about it too deeply. So these little mites have been on her for six weeks, probably since our visit to the farm in April. In those six weeks she has learned how to climb on and off the couch, go up and down the carpeted stairs, take all the towels out of the closet, all my clothes out of my dresser, oh and did I mention we co-sleep?
I got to wash all our bedding, clothes, and upholstery, vacuum the entire house, and bag up everything that couldn’t be washed. All while watching a toddler who was getting progressively more hyper with each dose of benadryl. Clean during her nap? Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. Nap time consisted of her laughing hysterically while making funny faces, while practicing her jumping skills.
After finally falling sleep two hours past her bedtime last night, she tossed and turned until 3:30 AM, when she woke excited to begin a brand new day. Today was a fun-filled 15 hours of uninterrupted toddler excitement, but she is now finally back to sleep. The benadryl has been locked away, replaced with mom-friendly, sleep-compatible calamine lotion.
Poor baby. I’m so glad she’s feeling better. It must be so terrifying to go through that with a child. If you ever go through something like this again, feel free to let me know and I’ll send some reiki her way.
Oh my! Poor Maia!!! How on earth did she get them? I hope she (and you) can get some good sleep and hopefully you can get rid of them easily.
We think she got them when we went to a small farm several weeks ago. My husband touched a lot of the animals; apparently farm animals carry scabies so he think he passed them to her then. No one else we know has them, so the only thing we can think of.
I had no idea. Yet another reason not to touch the farm animals at a petting zoo!
Aaaaahhh! Yuck! My sister and I somehow managed to get scabies when we were 9 and 7. My mother still nearly melts down whenever she hears the word. It was bad. And my other sister had that reaction to Benadryl - made her go completely mental - like a toddler on the craziest speed drug you can ever imagine. Oh, I feel for you, Maia, and Bodhi, I really do. Good luck!
poor thing! how uncomfortable for all of you!
go get som esleep mama!