preparednessblog

We just had a harrowing little incident here at the house this afternoon.

When my daughters arrived home from school, my youngest, J., was crying and clawing at her chest, saying that it hurt. We pulled off her tshirt, and found that a small wasp had flown inside and was biting her repeatedly.

My boyfriend, S., quickly dispatched the wasp (saving the body in case J. had a bad reaction to the stings) while I grabbed a bag of frozen peas out of the freezer to use as an ice patch.

I was about to consult Dr. Google on what else to do, when  S. reminded me of an excellent remedy for insect stings: a wet tobacco compress. We don’t smoke, but, I had a tin of chewing tobacco in the garage that I bought for making an organic insecticide tea for the garden.

I wet small pinches of tobacco and put them over eat bite. We put the ice packs back over this, and gave her some Children’s Benedryl for good measure.

It’s about two hours since the stings, and you can’t even see where they were. She says the area itches a bit, but, other than that, she feels fine.

Research and preparedness pays off.