Debate: Bedbug or Tick

[DontMindMe]

Well, this thread is ancient, but I had a problem with dust mites (ácaros) in one of my apartments and this info may be helpful to someone one day. I think I remember reading this thread when I was trying to figure out what the hell was eating me at night, actually. Dust mites are a big (yet microscopic) problem in older buildings, especially with the humidity. My bedroom door was shut and the air conditioning had been off in there for the whole time I was home during the summer. Dust mites thrive in heat and humidity, and they like to dine at night, a process during which they burrow into your skin, lay eggs and munch munch munch. Yummy! Itchy!

It was a really frustrating process and I was terrified the problem was bedbugs, which is a word one should just never, ever Google. I started sleeping on the couch and had terrible insomnia. My Argentine roommate was of no help, just shrugged and said she didn't have any problems in her bedroom. (The exact reaction she had with every other apartment problem, ugh.) My other roommate was being eaten alive by mosquitoes in her room so she had her own bug issue to deal with, which she solved by dousing herself in insect repellent every night. Yeah, no. This is Buenos Aires, not the damn Amazon, and we don't live in a hut. My Argentine landlord just kept repeating no puede ser, sólo tenemos bichitos así en el campo and avoided the issue until one day I demanded he come in person to look at the ones on my face. He recommended some family friend doctor of his on the other end of town, who I wasn't about to trust considering he really did not want to acknowledge this problem. It also would have cost more than I wanted to spend, because I didn't have insurance yet.

I started looking for a different doctor, but luckily one of my boyfriend's former roommates was a resident at a one of the clínicas in Palermo and he agreed to see me. We went over to his apartment one Friday night as he was getting ready to go out. He took one look at the bites, asked me a couple questions and said: ácaros. There was no doubt in his mind. I was so relieved to have an answer. Then he had to give me a shot in the ass to kill all the eggs that had been laid in my skin. It was actually a really painful shot from a huge needle, and one of the more awkward moments of my life considering I had to drop trou and lay face down on his bed while he chattered excitedly to my boyfriend about some hot rubia he was about to go get pizza with on Santa Fe. I am cracking up now because in retrospect it makes for a funny story, but at the time I wanted to cry because I was so frustrated with the whole ordeal. Oh lordy.

As I clutched my ass and awkwardly tried to pull my skirt back up, he wrote out a prescription from the pad on his bedside table and told me to boil everything (clothes, sheets, towels, etc.) and make sure the room stayed well ventilated. I couldn't sit down on the bus ride home. My landlord did, thankfully, offer to boil everything for me, although he was dubious of the diagnosis since he did not personally know this doctor.

And that was the end of Epic Dust Mite War 2011.

 

[katti]

Flees only bite on your legs, never on arms.

Bedbugs (chinches in Spanish) bite several times around the same area. They only come out when it's dark, hide everywhere in the room. In hotels/rented places you can check the matras on the side, sometimes you see black spots. If its your own (new) matras, the best way is to put a flashlight on the matras to try and spot them (I am told that sometimes you can see them, if you are fast).
They get in your clothes.

I brought bedbugs home years ago, after a stay in Sofitel Arroyo (!). I was told never to put a suitcase nor clothes on a bed in a hotel, as you never know if they have bedbugs (even 5 star hotels have their rooms debugged on a very regular bases), they get into your suitcase and that's how you take them home.

 

[irina]

how awful Don'tMindMe! I don't know anything about Mites but I did have bed bugs on my ancient mattress when I lived in the Caribbean. They only bit me at night when I was in bed and only the parts of my body that were touching the mattress, that was a huge hint. There would be multiple bites in each area and they were huge welts. I was able to catch one and put it in a baggie to prove to my landlord and get a new mattress, and the problem stopped. and I laundered everything I own.

I've worked in 5 star hotels and they check for blood trails to see if the problem is bed bugs. As the bugs feed on your blood it's logical they'll leave behind a trail of blood after, well after they pass it. I can't attest to that as I had black sheets.

 

[PhilinBSAS]

This discussion made me glad to have read all of this thread. Seriously.

I'd put down all the bites from time to time just to mosquitoes - who love me but never touch my partner (must be a blood group or skin type thing or something although I've noticed young kids in the family also as bad as me)

Thanks for posting everyone - really informative and helpful

Definitely chargas is scary serious. Someone I know is under the London School for Tropical Medicine because now suspected she caught it in Bolivia and then returned back and was misdiagnosed for many months

 

[PaulBee]

Bed bugs ("Chinches" in Spanish) are now a very serious, common problem in crowded North American cities such
as New York, Chicago, Toronto. Of course buildings with a lot of people living in them or with a high turn over of
people are more susceptible - whether they are upscale or not.

I haven´t heard of them being a problem in very hot climates, but that doesn´t mean they aren´t there.

If an apartment is fumigated for bedbugs, they flee to safe places such as books. For this reason,
some people in Toronto store their books outside wrapped in plastic for the winter. Of course,
if one apartment has bedbugs, the entire building should be fumigated. Sigh....