Make A Dent In Itchy Pillows And Mattresses

[brahmburgers]

If you're like me, you get annoyed at slight itchiness from pillows. If you were to take a microscopic look at your pillow you'd see bunches of tiny flora and fauna milling around. Same goes for your mattress, stuffed furniture, carpets, blankets. Those micro flora and fauna enjoy the warmth, decayed skin, and sweat of your head and body - laying there for hours on a hot night. Indeed, they feed on it and some of them squirm around to get in to crevices in your epidermus. hence: slight itching or worse.

What can be done to lessen that? Well, you can wash pillowcases, sheets and blankets, that helps. You can use tight-weave pillowcases (silk?) which might help screen out all but the tiniest intruders. However, you can't wash pillows, mattresses and stuffed furniture - other than a surface job once in awhile. Lysol spray would be a big help, but you can't get it in Thailand - at least not up here in Chiang Rai.

Actually, in the States there are places that steam clean mattresses, but I doubt anything like that exists in Thailand.

Here's what I do: I buy some large plastic trash bags and a couple packets of moth balls - called 'luk men' in Thai (smelly little balls) ....ok, settle down with the chuckles. I put pillows and whatever can't be laudered in the bags with the moth balls and cinch it shut for a couple of days. When done, I shake the pillows outdoors to get as much of the smell out as possible.

For a mattress, I buy a 4M x 4M tarp and lay it over top with moth balls spread underneath - and leave it stew for a day or two. Granted, the residual chemical smell is not good, but not as bad as the thought of spindly little things probing in to the minute crevices of your skin while you're lying there for hours like a beached beluga.

[pumpuiman]

Aren't mothballs just a repellent? Won't trapping critters in a bag with your pillow just cause them to seek shelter deeper in your pillow ?

Just a thought.

Your post makes me want to go and buy new pillows.

[Firefan]

Not a bad idea - even though I fear that the side effects could be a bit more risky that just the smell as the moth balls are basically naphtalene:

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Exposures in the home have been associated with headache, nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, malaise, confusion, anemia, jaundice [yellowish skin or eyes), and renal disease." As with many exposure situations, assessment of human exposure to naphthalene is often confounded by simultaneous exposure to other agents and the lack of clear identification.

Naphthalene is not known to cause cancer in humans, but it may cause eye cataracts (cloudy spots) and may aggravate existing blood, liver and kidney disorders. The primary health concern from both short- and long-term exposure is breakdown of red blood cells--a form of anemia called hemolytic anemia. It can reach the fetus and infants exposed in this way have been known to develop blood problems (hemolytic anemia).

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Above can come from handling/breathing it, and sleeping on a madras where they have been seems like pretty close exposure.

Instead get a hand steamer(gotten really cheap now), pop in a few drops of tea tree oil and lavender with the water, and steam the little bastards to high heaven once a month.

Cheers!

[wpcoe]

This may be way off the mark, but I'll toss it out for consideration:

A roommate of mine was plagued with crab lice more than once. His doctor, in addition to prescribing crab-killing lotions to apply directly to the body, told him to launder his bedding (in hot water if possible) then put the still-damp laundry in plastic trash bags and toss them on the roof to steam in the sun for a few days.

Could the "steaming in the heat of the sun" be effective for pillows? e.g. Dampen the pillows or put wet towels in the bag and let the steam penetrate the fluff inside the pillows?

I think the strategy is to break the reproduction cycle by steaming long enough to let larvae/eggs hatch and be steamed to death before they could lay new eggs, so the steaming would have to be long enough to do that.

[PhilHarries]

Bill Bryson, in his book A Short History of Nearly Everything, cheerfully informs us that around 10% of the mass of a six year old pillow consists of dead skin, live mites, dead mites and mite sh1t.

Y'all have an early night now, and sweet dreams.

[Boo]

putting blankets & pillows etc in the freezer for 24hr will also kill off mites according to a dust mite website I loked at a while back.

[Tony Clifton]

Mostly, people develop alergies or reaction not to the dust mites and other creatures but to their microscopic excrement.

Tossing your wet pillow in a bag on the roof will probably only help develop mold, you pillow will get stinky in a matter of hours or when heated from your body's warmth. Same stink as when you forget clothes in the washing machine for a while, half a day in this weather will be enough to bring that stink. You'd better leave it exposed to direct sunlight on a plastic bag.

I always add bleach when washing pillows and bedsheets, that killls everything.

Edited December 15, 2006 by Tony Clifton

[libya 115]

As much as I agree with all the advice and facts regarding microscopic mites and their excrement; I cannot help but wonder whether society is turning 'namby pamby'.

It is scientific fact that exposure to 'muck' provides biological resistance to many bacterial, viral and allergic disease and symptoms.

If my pillow is full of microscopic <deleted>, I shall not worry, I have 'roughed-it' in dirty unwashed clothes, slept outdoors, eaten rotting foodstuffs, washed in dirty streams, inbibed dirty water, swam in infested pools, pulled worms from under my skin, worn 'toe-rags' on my feet, struggled with rashes, had hair fall out in clumps, gums that have bled for days, eyes swollen with pus, halitosis of the devil and still survived with healthy heart and lungs.

Imagine the trench warfare of World War I.

Link Below:

Are we Too Clean?

[leisurely]

Well said Libya. A bit of dirt never hurt anyone. I think that this is the reason for the rise in Asthma and exzema in the west. All those anti bacterial wipes/sprays/tupperware boxes etc. I didn't read your link but imagine it contains something like that.

[wpcoe]

I always add bleach when washing pillows and bedsheets, that killls everything.

And, removes the color from them.

I've never mastered the art of washing pillows. No matter if I air dry them (usually on the patio in sunlight) or tumble dry them on low (or no) heat, the foam padding inside always manages to lump up.

[Jamie]

Why not just get anti-allergen mattress and pillow covers? You will never get rid of dust mites and breathing in moth ball fumes probably isn't the best way to go.

[brahmburgers]

If you're like me, you get annoyed at slight itchiness from pillows. If you were to take a microscopic look at your pillow you'd see bunches of tiny flora and fauna milling around. Same goes for your mattress, stuffed furniture, carpets, blankets. Those micro flora and fauna enjoy the warmth, decayed skin, and sweat of your head and body - laying there for hours on a hot night. Indeed, they feed on it and some of them squirm around to get in to crevices in your epidermus. hence: slight itching or worse.

What can be done to lessen that? Well, you can wash pillowcases, sheets and blankets, that helps. You can use tight-weave pillowcases (silk?) which might help screen out all but the tiniest intruders. However, you can't wash pillows, mattresses and stuffed furniture - other than a surface job once in awhile. Lysol spray would be a big help, but you can't get it in Thailand - at least not up here in Chiang Rai.

Actually, in the States there are places that steam clean mattresses, but I doubt anything like that exists in Thailand.

Here's what I do: I buy some large plastic trash bags and a couple packets of moth balls - called 'luk men' in Thai (smelly little balls) ....ok, settle down with the chuckles. I put pillows and whatever can't be laudered in the bags with the moth balls and cinch it shut for a couple of days. When done, I shake the pillows outdoors to get as much of the smell out as possible.

For a mattress, I buy a 4M x 4M tarp and lay it over top with moth balls spread underneath - and leave it stew for a day or two. Granted, the residual chemical smell is not good, but not as bad as the thought of spindly little things probing in to the minute crevices of your skin while you're lying there for hours like a beached beluga.

[brahmburgers]

Lots of good feeback! I'd like to double emphasize that if you gas your pillows and mattress with naphtlene laden mothballs, it's important that you air them out as much as possible. Same goes for newly bought mattresses. Is naphtelene the same as formaldehyde? Anyhow, it's a rather nasty gas for humans - at the very least it makes you dough-headed. I knew twin brothers who ran an Army surplus store in California. Every work day, they'd be in a room filled with fumes from piles of foam mattresses stocked in there. After awhile, both men got splotches on their skin, their eyes got bleary, and each died before their 60th brithday.

My older brother (Vietnam vet), who has a one-sentence solution for everything, says take bedding outside to air it out in full sun - that'll do it.

I buy cotton filled pillows rather than foam filled. I would prefer hypo-allergenic or even buckwheat hull-filled, but where to find them? (and the added cost).

Whenever I go stay in a guest house, I always drape a clean t-shirt (or similar) over the pillowcase covered pillow. It may not help much, but it may slow the microscopic critters from nestling in to the skin on my neck, head and scalp.

Is there a service in heavily touristed regions (Pattaya, Phuket, Bangkok) that steam cleans mattresses? If not, it could be a opportunity niche for a budding entrepreneur. ...just go door to door to hotels - and bring along some microscopic blow-up pics of what lurks within the crispy clean looking bedding. It would be a great marketing draw for hotels to say, "our bedding is professionally steam cleaned monthly!"