Fleas??

[Pickingmyselfup]

I'm at my wits end with one of the kids being persistently bitten, I've no idea what it is and I can only assume fleas but the whole situation puzzles me.

We are a family of 4 with 2 cats, only one of us is being bitten and it's pretty much daily, the rest of us have nothing on us at all.

The kids have their own rooms, the cats have access to the whole of the house and the outside. Only one of them spends much time upstairs and it's mostly in my bedroom.

Not that long ago I washed all of the quilt covers, pillowcases and sheets, hoovered the carpets, mattresses, sprayed indoorex on all of the non washable soft furnishings, the carpets in all the bedrooms and the stairs and landing including where the carpet meets the laminate in the hall downstairs. Cats were also deflead but it didn't help and he's been getting bitten since.

I'm sure it's the house, we went away for a few nights and he didn't get bitten, last night I sent him to go sleep in his brothers room and this morning he wakes up with another bite, his brother has none.

So today I've stripped his bed, hoovered his room, sprayed the curtains, the sof bed, taken everything out of the sofa bed to wash, sprayed the carpets, the mattress and the fabric drawers in the kallax.

Did the exact same in his brothers room although I need to wash all the bedding tomorrow. I have treated one of the cats who is the one who is indoors more although I only did them both about 2 weeks ago.

I'm now convinced that there are fleas everywhere, living in our clothes/clean bedding, clothes hung up on tbe doors etc but we haven't seen a single one. I once lived with a woman whose house had a massive infestation to the point where they were jumping on me in the bath, she needed external help at that point because despite my attempts to fix it even though they weren't my cats it was too far gone.

I don't see how we can possibly be in the same situation when we can't see the fleas, only one out of the four of us is getting bitten, the cats show no sign of having fleas and are regularly treated but what else can be causing him to be bitten so much, especially as it's been happening in the winter too.

I considered bed bugs but the mattress is fairly new and because he's in a loft bed we don't put anything like suitcases on his bed. Plus he's being bitten in his brothers room too in a different bed with different bedding!

I'm so confused, what else can I do to help this situation?!

Some people are just tastier.

When I lived in a flat share I was the only one being bitten for ages. Eventually my friends both had 2 or 3 bites each, I stopped counting mine after 80 bites. It was awful, the place was infested.

There will be eggs being laid in the carpet or somewhere so once they hatch the cycle just keeps going.

After treating you need to do it again and again to kill the ones that are hatching before they lay eggs…which then hatch and lay eggs.

We got the council pest control out in the end. No clue what they used, or if they still do it, but they came twice a couple of weeks apart and then the fleas were finally gone.

Indorex is the best thing to buy. Buy a couple of cans, so you can go over everything twice.

I'm the tasty one in this house. I was smothered in bites.

I grew up in flea infested houses. I don't think you have fleas. Some people are just prone to allergic response to all sorts of crawlies bites & pinches, when no one else in the household is. My dad has zero skin response to flea bites, but me.... I usually have a bite somewhere. Weirdly enough, I don't seem to respond to mozzie bites. Midges on the other hand... Of my 4 kids, only one gets swollen bites like I do. How long do your son's bites last when he gets them?

I did it twice the last time I sprayed the indoorex, today has only been once. I can do it again tonight in one of the rooms and do the other kids room tomorrow. So that's twice for both of them.

My room and the rest of the carpet will have to wait until Monday. I cant wash my actual quilt but I can do the cover and the pillows and pillowcases and any blankets that need doing.

If I've sprayed everything twice, washed and tumble dried anything I can get my hands on and treated the cats then that surely must do the trick? If he's still being bitten I don't know what it could be.

Absolutely ages! They appear overnight then take weeks to actually disappear. He's covered in them, his chest, back, arms, legs..

if they last a long time then he's quite sensitive when rest of you aren't.

There are a lot of things that bite or pinch.

We’ve had a flea problem recently 😩. As well as Indorex I bought some flea traps (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Zero-Killer-Mains-Powered-Poison-Free-Treatment/dp/B00HW1GBRG/ref=mp_s_a_1_3?crid=CJ5AB65ILG8&keywords=flea+trap&qid=1693686983&sprefix=flea+trap%2Caps%2C68&sr=8-3) which have caught lots of the blighters! Then you can see for certain if they are fleas, and it’s very satisfying to see the trap full of them!

The combination of spraying with Indorex, treating and combing the cat, vacuum cleaning and using the traps seems to have solved our problem 🤞

Unfortunately the price has increased by 60% since I bought them 😲

If the bites are all over him it sounds like they are in his bed, because most of ours were on our lower legs.

I've had a couple of flea infestations in the past. If you want to check if you have them, put on white socks (tuck trousers into them so your legs don't get bitten) and walk slowly around, fleas will jump on if your have any.

It could also be carpet beetles - they don't bite, but some people have an allergic reaction to something they produce in the air, and you end up with something that looks exactly like flea or bedbug bites. But you sound as if you have cleaned so much that this is unlikely.

What flea treatment are you using on the cat?

It needs to be something decent like Advantage or Advocate.

The last few times it's been Advantage. One of the cats was done at the vets at the beginning of the year, don't know what they used.

I'll do what I can in terms of treating everyone and everything, I might try piriton for the bitten child to see if that helps.

I'd go back to the vet and get all the cats (and any other animals) treated at the same time with a proper prescription strength treatment. Spray everywhere with Indorex and try and wash all the covers/soft furnishings too.

When I have had fleas in the past the bites have been almost all on my feet and ankles. Do you have a garden? I ask because at this time of year I was eaten alive by harvest mites if I stepped into the garden. Nobody else in the family was bitten at all. The bites were horribly itchy and lasted for ages. We’ve moved to a flat with no garden and not being bitten is one of the big pluses.

Fleas seem to be more of a problem this year, I'm getting a bit desperate myself. For context have had cats all my life and never had this many bites. I've very rarely seen fleas on my cats and now I am consistently seeing them on one even though he has prescription flea treatment monthly.

Something to remember is that the flea treatment only works on them once they've bitten the cat and even then not immediately. The cats could be carrying them in and they are biting your son either having not bitten the cat or just after biting the cat.

I'm going to get the flea traps and see because I too am cleaning like a mad woman and not really seeing much change!

Took my son to the doctors about these bites and they were just as perplexed. We all agree that they look like bites but it's odd how it's just him that's covered. He's been sharing a room with his brother the past few nights and has been bitten so it suggests it's not just his room..

I think one of the cats is scratching more than normal despite me only treating him a couple of weeks ago but I've put some more spot on anyway.

I considered carpet mites but I've done what I need.to do to get rid of them which is hoover including in crevices and treat with a spray, I assume indoorex would kill mites too??

The only things left to do are give the cats a bath in flea shampoo (can't imagine that going well) get someone into treat the house and replace the carpets. For that though we would be looking at thousands which we were planning on spending on a holiday. We don't want to start ripping out carpets when we actually don't know what's going on.

He's been referred to a dermatologist so I guess we just wait and see what they say. He's on antibiotics for his old bites because they are infected. I had to take photos for the dermatologist and he is absolutely covered. He has them on his feet, shins, hand, neck, hip, bum, chest but the 3 of us don't have a single one despite the potential flea cat sitting on in 2 of us in bed at night! We've had bites in the past so we aren't complete flea repellers.

It's all very odd.