When Bug Bites Go Bad

About a week ago, Ana got a bite. We think it was a spider, but as these things often go, we didn’t see the sneaky attacker. She just mentioned her leg was bothering her and when I looked, sure enough there was a little tiny red bump on her thigh. Nothing to freak out over, but as Ana is five, she requested we put a Band-Aid on it. I sprayed it with a little topical anesthetic for the itch/ouch factor and I thought that would be the end of it.

A couple days later she said the bite was still bothering her. So I checked it out. It was pretty red and a kind of swollen, but I figured she was just having a little allergic reaction to the bite and repeated my original process of topical anesthetic spray covered with a Neosporin Band-Aid.

On Thursday it was really hot outside so we met some friends for frozen yogurt and to play in the fountain at Progress Ridge. At one point during our play date I accompanied Ana to the bathroom. When she pulled down her pants I was shocked to see her leg. Right in the middle was the bright purple Band-Aid, and a circle about four inches in diameter around the bite was bright red. I then decided to check it out a little more. The skin was red, hot, and obviously angry. When I touched near the bite Ana flinched. I then sent Sim a text that when he gave her a bath that night I wanted him to make sure to check out her bite because it was making me nervous.

Once he looked at it, he consulted one of our friends who knows a thing or two about this sort of thing and she (without seeing it) said it sounded like an allergic reaction and we should probably give Ana some Benadryl. Not being allergy sufferers, we don’t have Benadryl, let alone children’s Benadryl so I headed off to Walgreen’s. We decided to let the meds have a chance to work and left it alone.

Yesterday morning we looked at her leg and it was most definitely NOT better. In fact it was worse. Now there were two blisters near the original bite. (Here is a picture. Not for the faint of heart.) So we decided we had waited long enough and it was time to take Ana to Urgent Care. Once we saw a doctor, he examined the bite and was touching the surrounding area asking Ana, “does this hurt? How about this?” and working his way gradually closer to the now large and oozing wound. At one point he touched it and it literally ruptured. He quickly looked from me to Ana (who was laying down on the paper sheet covering the hospital bed) to judge our reactions. Upon seeing that Ana didn’t notice what had just happened, he did it again. She said “Ow!” and winced but didn’t actually cry or make him stop. He continued to squeeze her leg until all the junk was visibly gone and it was just dark blood coming from the hole that was now in the middle of her thigh. He had the nurse come in and wrap her leg and we were done.

All bandaged up!

I gotta give the doctor credit, he was quick and cleaned up all the blood quickly to keep Ana from seeing it and thereby totally freaking out. I was so proud of Ana. She managed to keep her cool, never even cried, and was really brave during the entire event. (I managed to hold it together too, not letting anything show on my face and only allowing myself to feel nauseous once we had LEFT the doctor’s office.) The prognosis was that it probably started as a bug bite but she ended up getting a staph infection (cellulitis) in the wound. He wrote us a prescription for antibiotics that she needs to take twice a day for a week and recommended putting a hot pad on it three times a day. He said we would need to drain the abscess at least once (possibly more) to make sure it’s healing properly.

Hot pad time!
So all in all, it’s been a crazy couple of days. I cannot believe that Ana has not been complaining more about being in pain. I mean, after seeing the amount of stuff the doctor drained out of the wound, it had to of been hurting her! And I think back to all the times Hadley was climbing on Ana, bouncing on her lap, not to mention Ana just being five. She is such a tough cookie. I am so proud of my brave little girl. In fact, to reward all her bravery through the whole ordeal, this afternoon we took her on a movie date to see Brave! And she loved it!

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