The Red Menace in the White Sands
You can’t see them in this photo, but trust me, they’re there!
So there I was, basking in the purity of the White Sands. The day before was unbearably hot… all… day… long. I mean seriously hot. In fact, we were supposed to visit White Sands yesterday afternoon but the thought of said dunes in that heat was too much. We opted for an early morning visit the next day instead.
Excellent choice!
The sand, (well, the gypsum) felt amazingly cool as we climbed the first dune. I left the rest of the hiking of the dunes to the more intrepid among us and I wallowed in the marvel that is this amazing place.
I was lying on my back, hat over my face, loving every second of this and contemplating making a sand angel cuz it felt like the appropriate thing to do. My arms were stretched out to either side, just about ready to go and, “Ow!”
I frantically brushed at my arm and as I looked to see what got me, a little red head was still attached to my bicep.
How could something so awful be hanging out in such a pure and marvelous landscape?
To be fair, shortly after arriving on the top of the dune, I looked down and saw a red ant. Then I saw many more red ants. I knew they were there and I should have paid heed. Alas. Live and learn.
Back to the red menace… I leapt up and got down the dune incredibly quickly. (Bounding down the dune was so much fun — if you go, forget the sled! They sell you a sled at the ranger station and then they buy it back from you for less than you paid. Sometimes you can find a perfectly good sled in the garbage, FYI.) I dug out my kit of 100 miniature vials of homeopathic remedies that always travels with me and immediately went for the Apis.
I did a couple doses of Apis but the thing was still incredibly painful. I then switched to Ledum. Still really not any improvement. Then, I looked at the bite and saw a large welt developing, coupled with the intensely painful itching… Staphysagria.
That one brought some relief, both to my arm and to my mood. I then alternated between Staphysagria and Apis every few hours for the rest of the day.
This was on a Sunday. By Tuesday, it felt like it was getting worse. It was hot. It was itchy. It hurt. It felt like it was getting much bigger. Infection setting in?
I moved to Hyper/Ars: Hypericum mixed with Arsenicum album. This, too, was helpful. It contained the spread and it shrunk in size just a little bit, but then it began to spread again.
I tried a little Plantain ointment. That certainly didn’t hurt, but it wasn’t the answer. By Wednesday morning, I had decided to try a completely different route and I dug out my little canister of PRID Drawing Salve*.
My one little bite was pretty big by now so I dabbed the sticky brown stuff on my arm and had to use 2 bandages to keep it from getting on everything.
PRID Drawing Salve has been around for over 50 years, and, as the package says, it is a “pain relief & irritant drawing salve” for splinters, thorns, ingrown hairs, insect bites, boils, minor cuts and scrapes.
What’s in it?
As I mentioned above, this stuff is sticky. Among its ingredients: beeswax and wood rosin (the internet tells me this is a natural resin from the sap of pine trees).
Homeopathically speaking, PRID contains low X potencies of Arnica, Calendula, Echinacea, Hepar sulph, Ichthammol, Silicea and Sulphur -- all excellent choices for infection.
I have written previously about Arnica, Calendula, Echinacea, Hepar sulph, Silicea and Sulphur. (You can search for articles on these remedies on Ruminating on Remedies.)
While digging a little deeper into Echinacea, I have learned some interesting things from herbalist Matthew Wood (I highly recommend picking up Wood's Earthwise Herbal books). (Note: I accessed this through Radar Opus software and I don't see which of his many books correlates to this title.)
The Indians of the Great Plains used the western purple coneflower, Echinacea, "to treat snake bites, insect bites, septicemia and various kinds of poisonings" (Wood).
Dr. Robin Murphy notes that homeopathic Echinacea is a great remedy "when boils progress to the stage where they appear about to point then stop and do not suppurate. Echinacea helps in carbuncles with similar symptoms, a bluish-red color and intense pain" (Murphy n.d.). (I have to say, this sounds a little like where it felt my ant bite was going.)
Ichthammol (or, Ichthyolum), however, is a new remedy for me.
Dr. Robin Murphy tells us this is an “unproved” remedy**, (made from shale oil), which comes to us from old-school therapeutics as an external application which has been used for psoriasis, eczematous dermatitis, leg ulcers, seborrheic dermatitis and furuncles (Boyd 2010).
Like Echinacea, Ichthammol is said to be a powerful anti-septic.
When I removed those first 2 bandages a couple hours later, the swelling and redness had shrunk considerably. I did feel the need to apply the PRID two more times and then that was the end of that. I am now a day shy of 2 weeks from the time of this bite and I have no pain, but I do have a residual reddish mark. The other day I could see and feel 4 little white bumps so I think I suffered more than 1 nibble.
The downside of using a combination remedy is that it is impossible to know which remedy worked. Having said that, who cares? I am interested in positive results -- it really doesn't matter to me how I get there. Might it be more elegant to take a single dose of the appropriate homeopathic remedy. Sure! In this case, might the drawing part of this salve have played a role? Could be.
Julia Coyte, CHom
Classically Practical homeopath
#wellnessawaits
* I have no affiliation with this company or this person.
** Ichthammol is listed in Bradford’s Index of Homeopathic Provings (1898), so 🤷♀️.