What has bitten me?!

[polkadotpixie]

Something has bitten me twice on the arm and it's so swollen and itchy and sore!

I never ever get bitten by anything but something has had a good chomp this time 😩

I've taken antihistamines and used bite cream but it keeps getting bigger and redder...very difficult to get photos as it's the back of my arm but they're about 1.5" across and very raised

You could try 111? I think they have a facility where you can send pictures and they might be able to prescribe something over the phone if necessary.

I hope it clears up soon!

I have had Lyme and it didn't have the weepy centre, I get those with horsefly bites but you would have felt that bite you? They're effing painful

Looks very similar to my blandford fly bites, which piriton helped with. Also cover the bite with a hydrocolloid dressing, it sucks out the fluid and reduces the itch and the swelling.

That's a horsefly bite.

Would get hydrocortisone over the counter...at pharmacy need at least 1% i got at boots it said for excema ...but i told the usual afyer bite stuff not touching the sides..

Also draw round darkest red bit so you can make sure doesn't spread can get easily infected!

I don't think anyone here can tell you what type of bite it is (hence the wildly varying answers) but I react like that to everything from mozzies to spiders. I always just take a double dose of antihistamines and dab some tea tree oil on it and it's calmed down the next day.

I react like this to mosquito bites. It's called skeeter syndrome.

www.webmd.com/allergies/what-is-skeeter-syndrome

Nothing seems to touch it. I've tried all sorts including antihistamines and steroid cream. Just have to wait for it to go down.

I react like that to horsefly bites, they get red and swollen over a large area. I find they take about 48 hours to start going down. In the meantime an ice pack helps, I've never needed antibiotics.

Cleg/horsefly!

I get this from certain mosquitoes. It's an allergic reaction

Try some hydrocortisone cream or Eurax HC. My bites react similar, I have needed antibiotics but that was when my whole ankle and a large part of my thigh was swollen. I'd keep an eye over the next 24 hours.

I'd def keep an eye
If it continues to spread beyond the line you drew then call 111
I've been hospitalised and on IV antibiotics after bites became infected and it's not nice at all

I don't like the way it's spread in just one area outside the line.

I’d say a cleg bite. They’re mean so-and-sos!

I've had bites like these from horseflies. I didn't need antibiotics, they cleared up after about a week I think.

I've slathered it in hydrocortisone cream and taken some fexofenaadine so hopefully that will do the trick! I feel fine so don't think it's currently infected, just incredibly itchy and I'd rather avoid both an evening in the walk in centre and antibiotics if at all possible

I'll keep an eye on it though and if it gets worse then I'll get it looked at. An ex colleague ended up on IV antibiotics after a horsefly bite because she got cellulitis but hers was much bigger than mine so I'm sure it'll be okay (if I don't chop my arm off to stop the itching!)

Do you live in the south west of England OP? I agree with a previous poster that a blandford fly could be the culprit. They're really quite nasty and take weeks to resolve.

No, I'm in the East Midlands. I've not heard of Blandford flies but who knows, I'm not sure if they live up here but definitely some kind of particularly vicious bitey thing regardless

Following as dd has one exactly same and we are in East Midlands too

She's at work now but going to take her to pharmacy tomorrow (before we go on holiday,,)

It looks & sounds exactly like when I had my last horsefly bite. I didn't end up with antibiotics but it itched like buggery and took ages to heal.

I’ve already had a couple of horsefly / clegg bites this summer and one came up as blisters plus a big red rash (swollen, hot and itchy). Bastard. I also took fexofenidine and kept it clean and it’s taken a couple of weeks to go down.

Clegs do that with me. Last time my foot doubled in size.

Ditto. I now just take antihistamines, ice it to reduce the swelling and use Inadine patches to dress the bites.

That's exactly what mosquito bites look like on me

I also have a bad reaction to horse fly bites

I was bitten by something when I was on holiday in the US and ended up with a huge hot and itchy lump on my arm that spread over a day or so. I went to the first aid centre in the place I was staying and they told me to get hot compresses on it and take antihistamines. The hot compresses worked wonders and I avoided having to have antibiotics. To compress I used a flannel dunked in water as hot as I could stand it (obviously not hot enough to scald the skin!). I’ve used that trick ever since as it really helps with the itching and swelling.