Itty, bitty mite facts #2

The bad news:

"Dust mites cause several forms of allergic diseases, including hay fever, asthma and eczema and are known to aggravate atopic dermatitis. Mites are usually found in warm and humid locations, including beds. It is thought that inhalation of mites during sleep* exposes the human body to some antigens that eventually induce hypersensitivity reaction. Dust mite allergens are thought to be among the heaviest dust allergens."

--wikipedia/mite

[Emphasis added by KB.]


The good news:

Ten minutes in a household clothes dryer at lethal temperatures [near 105 °C (221 °F)] has been shown to be sufficient to kill all the dust mites in bedding.

--wikipedia/house dust mite

*One last little not-related-to-dust-mites-but-pretty-close story. This is not for the squeamish, but if you clicked on a post about dust mites, and you read the above info and you're still reading, I don't think that you are too squeamish.

A year or so ago, my then-18-year-old nephew S woke up with a hellacious ear ache. I think that it woke him up in the night, which, with S, is saying something, since he sleeps like the dead. Actually, his mother thinks that there are dead people who would be easier to wake up than her son S. I think that there may have even been a little bit of blood trickling from his ear. He was in so much pain that his mom took him to the ER right away. The ER doctor examined S's ear and diagnosed the problem as a bug (or spider) bite on his eardrum. Very painful, the doctor says, but not much we can do about it, and sent S home with pain relievers.

Strange fact #1: This was the second time in S's 18 short years on earth that this has happened to him.

Disturbing fact #1: The ER doctor told S and his mom, "When insects and spiders crawl into our ears while we sleep, if we move around or do something that scares them, they sometimes bite whatever is handy." My sister, S's mom, blinked hard and said,

"When they crawl into our ears while we're asleep? Not if..." To which the doctor responded, "Oh, yeah. Things crawl into our ears and mouth all the time when we're asleep."

S, his mom, and I now all sleep with ear plugs in and surgical tape across our mouths.

Itty Bitty Mite Facts #1

Okay, I admit it. I'm a little bit obsessed with mites. I wrote about them in the very long post, "The Itch List" (summer 2011), but I continue to think about mites a lot, whereas I don't think about mosquitoes and poison ivy all of the time. Mites just fascinate me. We and all of our stuff are just crawling with the little buggers, and there's not much we can do about it.

But, in keeping with the size of my subject, I'm trying to keep this post extremely short. So, with no further ado, here's Mite Fact #1. Yes, there will be more. If the subject of dust (or other types of) mites makes you squeamish, it will be easy to avoid these posts because they'll all have the words "Mite Facts" in the title.

"We may not realize it, but each one of us is a walking ecosystem. Minuscule, eight-legged Demodex mites nestle head down inside the follicles of the eyelashes, feasting unnoticed on skin cells. Microscopic bacteria live on the tongue, teeth, and skin and in the intestine*. Dormant viruses like herpes simplex may loiter for years inside nerve cells."   

--from discovermagazine.com