I will give some background about it. In the last couple months I have been getting these weird insect bites and they always occur in the same fashion. I will feel an itchy sensation on an area of skin usually covered by clothes, I will look at it and there will be a large red swatch of skin with a raised bump in the middle, now I know everyone will say it’s mosquito’s but these bites also occurred in winter and unlike mosquito bites these bites usually vanish within 30 minutes or so after they occur. Does anyone know what other non-mosquito insect may leave these “phantom bites” It is really driving me insane that I keep getting them
Do you live in an area that has gnats? Gnat bites to me are annoying but the irritation does not last long and do not leave welts; however, everybody’s reactions vary.
Where are you: Sudan? Iceland? Tonga? What’s your environment: are you living and working in a swamp, a goat farm, an igloo? Are the bites occurring at any particular time of day? Any particular geographic location? Do you have pets? Pests? Neighbours?
Any other information you can provide us with? Because with the information we have the question is impossible for anybody to even make a meaningful guess at.
If you scratch them, do the get worse, then almost randomly pop up elsewhere on your body a few minutes later and all settle down about a half hour later (if you stop scratching them)?
Also, do you get big red marks anytime you scratch yourself? Like, if you run a fingernail up your forearm does it leave a welt? If you itch your neck do people ask you if you just got attacked by an animal?
"While they resemble bug bites, hives (also known as urticaria) are different in several ways:
Hives can appear on any area of the body; they may change shape, move around, disappear and reappear over short periods of time.
The bumps - red or skin-colored “wheals” with clear edges - usually appear suddenly and go away just as quickly.
Pressing the center of a red hive makes it turn white - a process called “blanching.”"
Hives Triggers
Some food (especially peanuts, eggs, nuts and shellfish)
Medications, such as antibiotics (especially penicillin and sulfa), aspirin and ibuprofen
Insect stings or bites
Physical stimuli, such as pressure, cold, heat, exercise or sun exposure
Latex
Blood transfusions
Bacterial infections, including urinary tract infections and strep throat
Viral infections, including the common cold, infectious mononucleosis and hepatitis
Pet dander
Pollen
Some plants, such as poison oak and poison ivy
It doesnt seem to be hives or urticaria as the middle of the lump is particularly more raised, and the two areas are circular… (Hives makes for oval or funny shapped patches where the skin touches something or gets cold… )
Different people react differently to insect bites… Some people take days to get a reaction , or to get over it, and others can get the reaction come and go quickly,
Its possibly a bed bug bite. Its possible that you never felt the original bite, and it takes a while to develop into a blister . You feel the blister stretching, and then you pop it. After it pops the irritants are gone and it gets better in half an hour ?
There are other things like bird lice and dust mites that might do similar, whatever infestation it is, spray the carpets,loung chairs, mattresses with permethryn, that should stop them.
Are there blood stains on your bed now ?? where you squashed the bed bug and its feed of blood stained the bed ?
Another possible culprit is carpet beetles. They cause itchy spots which are similar to bedbug bites. but apparently they don’t bite like bedbugs do, the itching is due to an allergic reaction to something that they shed.