Mom has been to a psychiatrist as the bugs are not real. This has been going on for 2 years and she is changing clothes 4 and 5 times a day. She insists on vaginal medicine that she keeps getting prescriptions for that. Her doctor said diabetics often have yeast problems. She is constantly complaining at the age of 79 and thinks all drs are just getting money and not listening.. I realize she is getting old and there are lots of little issues. But the "bugs" are making her life miserable and me too.
Blannie, I've found the Environmental Working Group website to be a very informative source of toxins as well, and the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics also is helpful. I believe it's the latter that had information on lead in lipstick. I just cringed when I thought of using lipstick for years while I was working. I wish I had known then what I know now.
Now wasps -- they're a different matter. I was stung by one MULTIPLE TIMES while trying to enjoy some lunch and a glass of wine at a restaurant patio. And my daughter's back yard is full of ground wasps.
Ow ow ow ow OWWWW!
I too am shocked to learn abt celery (which I only found out abt on this thread) and I am appalled to know that there are at least 15?? pesticides in it! I knew abt strawberries and apples. What are we to do tho'? We can't buy organic from the food stores (well, not much), and do farmers' markets do organic?
It looks like global warming is going to do us in. If the fires and floods don't get us, the bugs will. (Or Trump.) Faugh.
Have your daughter avoid celery for several days and see if the itching still occurs. It could be that she's hypersensitive to either the celery or one of the chemicals in it.
I'm going to check my research on celery; I recall that one article stated celery had been tested for pesticides before and after washing. The pesticides weren't necessarily on the outside only; they were inside the celery; they were systemic.
I do recall that one test found 15 different pesticides in celery, and that it was one of the most contaminated foods examined. I knew apples and strawberries were pretty well drenched in insecticides as well, but I was shocked to learn that about celery.
I grew up in a mid-western city that has the worst mosquito concentration on the continent. We couldn't WAIT for the city to spray with DDT. (I actually liked the smell of it -- about 60 years ago, that was.) That self-same city is even more infested, but if one neighbour in an area complains, no spraying is allowed (not DDT, but I don't know what they use). I know of ppl who died in the bush from mosquitoes and I wouldn't be surprised if they died in the city too. You have to literally run from the back door to the gazebo, counting on bug spray to work during the 30-second dash.
I'm off topic. But Iwo days ago I had to run from my car the five feet to my front door. I HATE them. [[[shiver]]]
What we shared is true. Only organic celery is going in my tuna sandwich, along with the mercury from now on! Thanks for sharing that, GA.
Anyway, I am so thankful to all of you here-even the GERD is less with much less nightime chocolate! I think I will give up the celery juicing altogether now.
Will research and write letters about the good idea to at least notify others when spraying pesticides!
Everyone has been so good to share! Even the slightesf thing can be helpful!
Lo and behold, the coughing was cut down by 75% after I finally retired my 30 year old vacuum and bought one of those vacuums where you don't use a bag, but you actually see what you are vacuuming up. Good heavens, i could not believe all the cat hair and dust bunnies that thing picked up. And here I thought my old vacuum was a work horse, but nothing compared to that Shark I had bought [ok, I am beginning to sound like an info-commercial].
Anyway, if my sig other skips a week or two of vacuuming [he's the master of excuses], then that annoying cough comes back.
Now, if only I could find a cure for my panic attacks while driving. The past couple of days I have cut back on eating or drinking chocolate to see if that might be a trigger [I hope not].
If what we shared is not true, Garden Artist, then I guess the diagnosis would be a 'shared psychotic disorded' ha ha, lol.
Many neighbors here have a dementia, are not approachable with the truth. My husband knew the odor of Diazinon crystals from his days in Texas, long ago.
Even with the windows closed, the odors come inside! omg.....Even if a smoker walks by outside, I can smell it! I am trying to find a viable solution without correcting anyone's behaviors here. It has been an untenable situation for a long time. However, I am not a victim, I will keep my space private and free of assaults by careless non-thinking individuals. I am strong, and when I am not, I know the one who is.
1) Wash clothes/sheets every 4 days in scent-free detergent and scent free fabric softener. Use less clothes in each load in order to rinse well. Use clean pillowcases daily until any itch in hair/head subsides. Tell mom she can change underwear more often, but it is not necessary to change entire outfit.
2) Cool the room, vacumn daily, or every other day. Cool to less than 70 degrees, as low as 65°.
3) Use benadryl cream on the itch-allow Mom to put a small amount on if she does nof have dementia. Otherwise, you apply it.
4) Shower in tepid water, at least once/day, use hypo-allergenic soaps, or no soap. Rinse in cool water-just before bed. Wash hair early in the day.
5) Other times, take a warm or cool wash cloth, state it is time for your tratment mom. Apply diluted witch Hazel, cool washcloth to arms, legs, back.
6) Us cotton only night clothes, lightweight.
7) Keep a diary of Mom's foods-any itchy welts after 20-30 minutes from eating.
Discontinue those foods. Look up non-allergy foods on the internet.
8) Get her medicines re-checked by a pharmacist-pinpointing most likely to cause allergy. Discuss discontinuing these with the doctor. Do not abruptly stop which could cause withdrawal from any meds.
There are other ways to decrease or treat the itching. Please give more details. Is mother at home?
How sad that the neighbors use toxins to control weeds. Our country needs to see weeds as plants that are growing in places that the majority of people don't want them to grow, not as horrors to be chemically eradicated. I've seen finches nibbling on dandelions, but so many people think they're just weeds. Imagine the poor finch that might nibble on a dandelion sprayed with a pesticide to kill it.
I assume there's no way your community controls use of pesticides? I'm guessing some had Diazinon before it was banned but just kept using it. Do you think an anonymous report to the EPA might be helpful? Probably really wouldn't do much good, unfortunately.
Do you have to keep all your windows shut to keep out the odors? That's disgusting.
Sometimes I wish I had gone to law school; I would go to work for one of the environmental groups and help sue manufacturers of pesticides. Making use of pesticides subject to prior notice to surrounding neighbors would be a good project as well.
We also found crystals on the ground in our area, a smelly pesticide banned in 2005! Diazinon!!! The elder neighbors all choose a different weed solution, do not notify that they are spraying or putting down pesticides. The odor comes inside. There outta be a law from being poisoned by the neighbors, imo.
Oh dear, shortness of breath, itching, stomach cramps and more.
I had been having some shortness of breath as well as itching, the latter of which occurred after driving. I found nothing in the car to cause itching, but suspected it might be because that was during the winter and the car heat wasn't humidified, so my skin was probably drying out (an unfortunate side effect of aging?).
The breath shortness couldn't be attributed to anything so I started experimenting with foods that I liked and ate a lot, of which celery was one. Doing research, I realized how contaminated celery is with pesticides, which DO NOT wash off; they're absorbed as systemic pesticides. Two of the side effects were itching and shortness of breath.
I cut out celery, let it clear from my system. No itching, no breath shortness. I ate more celery to see if the conditions returned, and they did.
So it looks like I'm going to plant half of my garden with my own organic celery this year!
Get a second opinion. It is a really strange visual to try and see the psychiatrist checking her skin for mites, and after inspection (that never happened) decided there were no bugs at all. Everyone knows, bugs are normally in and on the human body, everyone's.
Keep trying.
And as I've recently discovered, foods that high in pesticides can cause some very weird reactions.
This sounds like one of the stories that might be featured on that Learning Channel program of unsolved medical mysteries. Hopefully not, and I don't mean to be crude, but perhaps she picked up a parasite. It's surprising how many people and places don't wash produce in hot soapy water.
Or, could she have other health conditions that have not been correctly diagnosed? I've read that 80% of women don't even know they have herpes, and when they do, don't know where it came from. It often mimics yeast infections. Doctors don't even test for it unless a person is having a major outbreak they can see, regardless of numerous office visits.) It can cause lots of strange symptoms.