Do Tick Bites Hurt?

Don’t expect severe pain from a tick bite, but you should treat your bite properly.

A tick bite may seem like the end of the world at first. Yet, tick bites are often painless. And, in many instances, a tick bite may only cause minor symptoms like a slight change in skin color or a sore on the skin. However, you need to be careful if you suffer a tick bite. Otherwise, you could risk long-lasting health issues.

Charlestown Tick Control

What Diseases are Transmitted by Ticks?

Lyme disease and Rocky Mountain spotted fever are two of the most common diseases transmitted by ticks. These diseases and others spread by ticks can result in a fever, chills, aches, body pain, and a rash. The symptoms of the diseases may develop within a few weeks of tick bite.

How to Care for a Tick Bite

As soon as you see a tick on your skin, remove the tick. You can use tweezers to grasp the tick and pull it off your skin. Also, wash your hands and clean the site of your bite after you remove the tick from your skin. When you do, wash your hands and clean the bite site with soap. If possible, take a picture of the tick as well. In the event that you need to go to a doctor, you can share the photo.

When to Go to a Doctor for a Tick Bite

If you experience a severe headache, difficulty breathing, paralysis, or heart palpitations following a tick bite, call 911. This allows you to receive emergency care and support. In addition, you should reach out to a doctor if you experience flu-like symptoms in the weeks after your tick bite. When in doubt, it is best to be cautious. By meeting with a doctor, you can find out if any symptoms you’re experiencing are related to a tick bite. Most importantly, you can receive proper treatment for any medical issues.

How Do I Know If My Tick Bite Is a Possible Infection?

It is common for a tick-borne infection to cause a pink or red circular rash around the area of a bite. The rash won’t necessarily disappear on its own. If you suffer an infection from a tick bite, the symptoms can worsen over time. The symptoms can reach a point where it makes it difficult for you to function and enjoy living life to the fullest extent.

How to Protect Against Tick Bites

The clothing you wear can have far-flung effects on your ability to avoid ticks. You can wear long-sleeve clothing and pants to minimize your risk of ticks getting onto your skin. On top of that, you can apply insect repellent before you go into wooded areas or any other spots where ticks may be present. You can also hire a tick control company to help you keep ticks away from your Charlestown home.

Get Started with Charlestown Tick Control

When it comes to Charlestown tick control, be proactive. You can connect with a tick control company in Charlestown right away. Then, the company’s tick control professionals can assess your property and figure out the best way to help you keep ticks at bay.

Also read: How Fast Can a Tick Make You Sick?

One Tick Bite, a Lifetime of Lyme Disease

Like long-haul COVID, Lyme disease can become a lifelong challenge.

One tick bite from one tiny tick can be the end of a healthy life as you knew it.  Often found in plants and brush, ticks can attach to and bite people and animals. Their bites are usually not harmful; however, these insects can carry serious diseases including Lyme disease.

One tick bite, a lifetime of Lyme disease
One tick bite can result in a lifetime of Lyme disease.

What does Lyme disease rash look like?

A Lyme disease-causing bacterium is carried in the bug bite of the deer tick here in the Chelmsford region. In most cases, a tick – usually 3 to 5 mm long – must be attached to you 36-48 hours to spread Lyme disease.

Lyme disease rash from a deer tick bite
Lyme disease rash from a deer tick bite

A circular, red, expanding rash (a bulls-eye rash, if you will) may be one of the first symptoms of Lyme disease. Other symptoms include fatigue, chills, fever, headache, muscle and joint aches, and swollen lymph nodes. Treatment in the early stages with antibiotics is generally effective and critical to prevent lifelong complications.

Also read: Should I put anything on a tick bite?

What are the long-term health effects of Lyme disease?

Lyme disease can cause muscle aches, mental fog, and fatigue for years or even decades.  Researchers are still trying to figure out exactly how and why Lyme disease affects people in different ways and how best to treat them.  But evidence that the bacteria-borne disease sometimes sticks around in a person’s body long after they’ve gone through initial antibiotic treatments appears to be mounting.

Some pretty famous people have gone on the record with their own Lyme infection experiences.

As of two years ago, several celebrities have come forward to talk about their experience battling Lyme disease. Here are eight that you most likely are familiar with.

 

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Amy Schumer: For this comedic actor, Lyme disease has been no laughing matter. She admitted that it’s possible she could’ve experienced Lyme symptoms for quite some time without realizing it. In an Instagram post, she said she’s taken doxycycline, an oral antibiotic, to treat the condition and she also asked others for advice.

Justin Bieber: The singer wrote on Instagram that it has been a “rough couple of years” battling the disease. He explained that, for a long time, people speculated that he was “on meth,”  but failed to realize that he’d actually recently been diagnosed with Lyme disease.

Avril Lavigne: The singer went public with her Lyme battle in 2015 and is now an advocate for those with the illness. She called that the “worst time” in her life after seeing specialists and doctors who misdiagnosed her with chronic fatigue syndrome and depression.

Ben Stiller: Nine years ago, Stiller told The Hollywood Reporter about his Lyme disease saying, “I got it in Nantucket, Massachusetts, a couple of years ago. My knee became inflamed and they couldn’t figure out what it was, then they found out it was Lyme.”

Shania Twain: The renowned singer has said her battle with Lyme has impacted her career. She told Canadian news outlet CBC that she was bitten by a tick when on tour in Norfolk, Virginia. She said she saw a tick fall off her and she immediately began to see troubling Lyme disease symptoms pop up.

Kelly Osbourne: Undiagnosed for nearly a decade, her contact with the tick spread disease most likely came from a reindeer sanctuary back in England.

Alec Baldwin: The 30 Rock actor opened up about his years-long battle with Lyme in 2017. During an interview with The New York Times, he mentioned that he had chronic Lyme disease.

Kris Kristofferson: A Star Is Born singer/actor, Kristofferson experienced several misdiagnoses before being treated for Lyme. His wife, Lisa, told Rolling Stone magazine she believed he’d been bitten by a tick while filming the 2006 movie “Disappearances” in Vermont.

You can help stop the spread of Lyme disease with professional Grafton Tick Control.

With expert guidance and the latest tick bite prevention methodology, professional tick control is your best assurance against contacting the dreadful tick-spread Lyme disease.

Also read: When are ticks most active in Massachusetts?

Dave Macchia, tick control enthusiast
Dave Macchia, Central Mass tick control enthusiast