Real Men Itch
As an avid lover of (almost) all things outdoors, I hate to admit to being itchy. The word itself seems infantile, like saying you have a “boo-boo.” And the state of being itchy implies incompatibility with the environment. To be rubbed the wrong way. To be allergic. To chafe and chap. To itch.
To bitch.
And who remembers old man Eastwood ever swatting mosquitoes and tucking his pant legs into his socks? Dude’s sitting on a horse, which means guaranteed proximity to biting flies and gnats, but he just sits there staring at the sunset. Never is a head net part of the silhouette.
Well, cuss Eastwood. Real men itch. Women, too. (Even fetuses.) From sunburns and bugs to pox and plants, the biggest organ in your body – skin – is basically one giant itch network.
Itch: Builder of Cities
It’s hard to even fathom being constantly exposed to itch like our species must have been for millennia. Really, it’s only recently that we’ve escaped the perpetual curse. (And by “we” I guess I refer mostly to the First World and those tenements of New York City lucky enough not to have contracted bedbugs.) Because though we might occasionally make bad decisions that lead to bug bites or STDs, as a society, our day-to-day interaction with itch is immeasurably, inarguably less than the days when we slept in fields.
However, it only takes one batch of poison oak to remind us of our roots. Once it takes hold, this kind of itch becomes so pervasive, so consuming, you can’t remember what life was like before it. Forget about space travel and IRA funds and Sweeps Week. When a third of your body is covered in burning, bursting pustules that seep through your clothes and make you want to dig out your nerves with a cork screw, the brain is only capable of two thought patterns:
1. I’m itchy
2. I’ve done such damage to my epidermis that itch has turned to pain, which I now prefer.
Some would accuse me of dramatization. But some have never had chiggers.
So maybe we formed tribes to ward off lions. And maybe we built societies to protect us from aging, scarcity and each other. But look at waste management, running water, antibiotics, contraceptives and screen doors and tell me we didn’t build civilization to conquer itch.
What is Itch?
I’ll spare you all the “dorsal horn of the spinal cord” and “unmyelinated C-fibres” stuff. Itch, at its most basic, is the body’s response to certain stimuli. Until recently, scientists thought itch was a type of pain and that it was transmitted by the same cells, which would make sense since pain is also basically just a nerve’s reaction to stimuli.
Thanks to a few studies that’ll make your skin crawl, we now know that itches have nerve fibers all their own. Interestingly, these fibers conduct messages many, many times slower than similar nerves. So, as anyone that’s ever been duct-taped to a chair with an apple in your mouth knows, an itch can build and build and build until you find the strength to twist and writhe and scream and Incredible-Hulk-your-way-outta-there. What? We were the only ones that did that?
Anyway, we itch in response to all kinds of stimuli.* For instance:
• Chemical – mosquito saliva, poison ivy oil, serotonin and opioids
• Mechanical – wool, fiberglass, shirt tags
• Thermal – hot water, ice
• Neuropathic – various diseases and disorders of the nervous system
• Psychogenic – from OCD and phantom limb to hallucinations
So you see the topic is expansive. But worthy. Let’s call it a series. The Itch Files or some such.
While you wait, check out Atul Gawande’s New Yorker piece called “The Itch.” It’s about a woman with an itch so bad she “scratched through her skull during the night—and all the way into her brain.” (Gawande’s awesome and you’ll see a bit of the info for this post is from him – seriously, read this article.)
By the way, notice how all of this itchy talk has you scratching despite lack of ticks or dandruff? That’s a psychogenic stimulus, too. Powerful stuff, eh?
Next up on the Itch Train
Let’s start with the basics: Poison Ivy, Poison Oak and Poison Sumac
