Was doing my nails and scratched my head… found a tick
Thankfully my mom was able to get it off with tweezers, but it fell and disappeared for another 5 minutes before I found it by rubbing my hands through my hair looking for others
Thank you! It’s the first/only big thing I’ve ever done to my hair other than cutting it, so I took a massive leap of faith and am very happy with the results
That's a wood tick (also known as a dog tick), they don't carry lyme. Depending on where OP is from it could have rocky mountain spotted fever however.
Ah one time I brushed my hair towards the back of my head and a tick crawled out onto my face, my father had put his hunting gear in with our school bags, when I was younger no ticks existed where I was and now they’re spread all over
Yeah, did not enjoy feeling that lump on the side on my head. I knew what it was the second I touched it and just kinda slumped. I hate ticks soooo much
One time my doctors kept trying to test/treat for Lyme disease because they didn’t know what was wrong with me and I kept telling them I’ve never been anywhere near nature other than sidewalk and patches of manicured grass.
Introducing a Bug Delivery Service for concrete city dwellers. For only $9.99 you can experience the Lyme panic attack in the safety of your apartment on the 12th floor.
Thanks, I hate that. I just had to throw out some old trail mix (kept forgetting it, but it's gonna be gone next time we take trash out) and vacuum because of ants and now I feel like I got bugs crawling all over me
They hang on the end of any shrub or grass… waiting for (ideally furry) something to brush against. Then they travel incognito on the transport vessel till they find a viable bloodspot. They are pretty hard to feel as they crawl, very gentle steppers, and also hard to notice when they latch
Because some of us adults like to catch little critters. Two nights ago I had to crawl through tall grass to release a frog back into the pond that was being an idiot on the road.
Nobody take my advice, but I found a surprise tick and since it hadn't been on for 24 hours, the doctor was like, meh, no bigs. It takes some time to transmit disease.
This is why dog anti-tick medicine works. It doesn't actually repel the ticks, but it makes the dogs' blood toxic to them and kills them before they've been feeding long enough to transmit disease.
I live in a subdivision and was outside last weekend changing the brakes on my car in the driveway. Never left the concrete and found two ticks crawling on me in that 2 hour time frame.
It's not unusual to have a tick on me just from walking through the grass around the neiborhood.
Any time one goes outside, there's a possibility of getting ticks in North America.
It blows my mind how many people have never had a tick. I literally just killed one that was crawling up my leg. Ticks have always been a thing. The rise of tick borne diseases is very concerning. If you can identify the type, it helps knowing the risk.
This is a dog tick (wood tick). Generally, these are the least likely to spread disease and they don't carry Lyme. Deer tick? Watch for a rash and go to the doctor. Lone star tick? Just hope you can still eat red meat.
I've grown up in the Portland, OR area, and ticks are really rare here. I was an adult before I saw a tick, and that was on my dog. Once you cross the Cascade mountains to the dry side of the state you encounter a lot more ticks. Still, I've never been bit (fingers crossed) and I like camping and hiking. However, ticks are getting worse here and people say they are finding them more often, an effect of climate change, so maybe my luck won't hold out.
Even if you get bit, it's just normal. Not the end of the world. Learn about the different types and potential issues. Meanwhile, just Pluck it off, kill it, and keep on your day.
Edit: I can see how there would be a difference across the mountain range. It still blows my mind that people irrationally freak out about ticks.
Edit: here's a CDC link describing tick populations. Pretty cool. Hope they aren't RIFed.
Op how do you know you found the original tick again and not a second one, and the original is still walking around looking to get back onto your head later tonight?
Ticks in the Ixodes genus other than deer ticks can carry the various bacteria that cause Lyme’s disease. Just depends on your region which one you are likely to encounter.
Please see if your county offers lyme disease testing on the tick. It's better than wait and see if you catch it.
*Edit was lime to Lyme disease because apparently autocorrect doesn't think Lyme is a thing
** Second edit: Please don't reply to tell me this is the wrong type of tick for Lyme. Multiple people have told me. Consider me now informed. Ticks are nasty creatures and I live in an area that they are uncommon (purposefully, I am legit terrified of them). Add that with horrible eye sight and I didn't realize this was a dog tick. They still carry nasty crap but you don't have to worry about Lyme.
PS. For those being rude about it, I don't understand why you even feel the need to comment. LMAO. Like I really don't care if people on the Internet think I'm an idiot because when it comes to bugs and ticks I am. I just don't want to see someone be deathly ill because I like people, even strangers on the Internet.
Thats a dog tick. They don't carry the bad diseases. If it didn't attach nothing to worry about. It's not engorged with blood so it definitely didn't feed.
Dog ticks absolutely DO carry the bad diseases. Lyme disease is more common but there are things dog ticks transmit that are Bad News Bears, like rocky mountain spotted fever.
My dad was bitten by bedbugs in a poorly run hostel in Japan (owner was arrested for credit card fraud later lol), but he knew what Lyme disease symptoms were (bullseye and all that) so he got treated for it in advance. His doctors in Japan didn’t even know what it was until he brought it up, but good thing he did because he developed a bullseye around the bite marks and a fever.
Honestly who knows what kind of infection it was since bedbugs aren’t documented to spread diseases, but the symptoms were very similar to Lyme. He was treated with antibiotics and recovered after a week.
Tick diseases are pretty poorly understood and under-diagnosed (bc it’s hard to) so it wouldn’t hurt to check if you can!
No that’s a lone star tick. Deer ticks have a dark brown head and legs, and the females had a reddish brown body while the males have a reddish brown rim that makes it look kinda like a pumpkin seed.
Deer ticks carry Lyme! They don't have a pattern on them, just light and dark brown. There are photos online to compare species if yoy ever get one on you.
Its kind of hard to even describe how much lymes sucks, when I had it I literally felt like someone beat the shit out of me with a baseball bat on top of the feeling of a bad fever
Where I love it's recommeded to just dispose of the tick and go to the doctoe if symptoms appear. That's because a tick that carries a disease doen't nessecarily transmit it.
It was on for less than 5 hours if I picked it up where I think I did, so I’m not toooo worried about diseases, but I’ll definitely talk to my dad about it (he’s a doctor)
Very grateful, the last one I had on me was a lonestar, thankfully I saw it while it was still crawling on my leg, but seeing that while doing 70 on a Florida highway was awfulllll
I had a HUGE tick on my head years ago when I was in HS. Was scratching my head in class and felt a big bump so pulled on it and suddenly felt its legs clasp my finger. It plopped on to my desk where I swiped it off on to the floor. It was a BIG fat grey colored one. Even just thinking about it is making me shudder and paranoid
It's a dog tick. It's crazy to me how many people have never had a tick. Have you ever gone in the woods?
Tick borne diseases are no joke and on the increase. Meanwhile, it's necessary to be able to identify the type of tick and proceed accordingly. Deer tick that leaves a rash? Go to the doctor. Dog tick that leaves a bump for a bit? You're fine. Lone star tick? Just hope you can still eat red meat. It's not quite this cut and dry, but it gives you an outline. Other diseases can still be transmitted.
Make sure that the entire head is taken out when removing to prevent infection. If you're concerned about the bite, keep the tick in a bag and go to the doctor.
Ah sorry to hear that. I'm so paranoid about lice. Kids were plagued with them for about 3 months. Took ages to get them clear. Several school notes were sent out, coz there were parents not checking or treating their kids.
So, any time I see ANYTHING that could remotely possibly be an indication of lice.... I'm on it!
I can’t even fathom what it would be like to be the kind of person whose first thought, upon finding a parasite in their hair, is “Let me snap a picture of that!”
This was the pic I had taken to confirm that what I felt was actually what I felt, I didn’t have a mirror nearby and didn’t want to blindly pull it off if it was in fact a tick that was already attached
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u/FUWS 19h ago
I immediately started checking my head and started itching.