What could be biting my child at night?

If your child is showing bites all over his skin first thing in the morning, bed bugs could be a reason, but you should also consider a few others. It could be mosquitoes and other insects such as ants, fleas, spiders, mites, and many others. There’s a chance your child is becoming allergic to perfumes dyes, or a detergent you’re using to clean your bedding.

So, before reaching to the conclusion that it is certainly bed bugs, consider the alternatives. If your child is becoming allergic to dyes or a detergent, he will be showing an extended rash. This usually doesn’t look like small dots all over the body. When it does look like red spots, all of them are surrounded by a pinkish area. This is a rash, and not necessarily bed bug bites.

But if the red spots are independent from one another, reddened and swollen, it is very likely to be an insect bite. The most common is a mosquito bite, which is also itchy and may make your child uncomfortable and irritable. However, mosquito bites are usually dispersed in distant areas of the skin and you can see them more often during summer season. Similarly, flea bites can be found in distant areas of the body because these animals can jump from one place to the other.

Mites and fly bites are usually very painful, and your child will probably wake up and cry because these insects are not really worried about making their bite painless. As for spiders, their bites are very different from one species to the other. It is very unlikely they are spiders unless you actually see them in your house or around your baby’s cradle, but if you suspect this type of bite or see a dead spider in the cradle and your baby crying with a bite on his skin, go as fast as you can to the emergency room because they can be dangerous.

Compared to the above, if bed bug bites are biting your baby or child then its easy to detect: They are reddish, found in clusters, and not painful. They will not wake your child at night, and may sometimes be covered with an allergic rash similar to that described above in case your baby becomes allergic to these bites.