A mom was horrified to find a tick in her 9-year-old son's scalp while tucking him into bed at night. He had spent the day playing outside, and the bug latched on.
Stephanie Gorecki discovered the insect while running her hands through his hair.
"I thought, 'Oh goodness, what could be in his hair? It could be anything,' " she told People. Grabbing a flashlight, she realized that a tick had embedded itself in her son's scalp. With a close friend having Lyme disease, she immediately considered the worst, thinking of tick-based viruses.
She used tweezers to remove the insect and stored it in a plastic bag. She also created a TikTok about the event, which soon went viral.
"All of a sudden, I'm hearing from all these 'TikTok doctors' saying, 'He needs antibiotics now,' " Gorecki said. "But antibiotics aren't just handed out for every tick bite. You actually need a compelling reason. Otherwise, we risk resistance issues."
Tick Nightmare
She adds, "So I'm trying to sort through strangers' advice, monitor my son's health and do my own research, all at once."
Instead of listening to social media comments, she reached out to a friend who is a nurse practioner.
"I messaged her right away and said, 'Okay, I found this tick. I'm terrified. It was attached to his scalp, but I think it had only been there about six hours,' " Gorecki recalls. "That helped calm my nerves. Once you start gathering reliable information, your panic eases. You go from 'Oh no' to 'Okay, I think we're going to be fine.' "
Fortunately, her son remains healthy today and shows no signs of any sickness. She also decided to have the tick tested, and it tested negative for any diseases. However, she did want to address those who questioned why she crashed out over one insect.
"We'd found them before, but after reading the comments, I realized some people deal with them constantly," she says. "For some, it's like, 'What's the big deal about one tick?' And honestly, that's kind of laughable. People love to share their own stories, and if I can be a place where they do that, I welcome it with open arms."
"Every day, I check my kids, and they actually kind of like it because it feels like a head massage," she jokes. "They're at summer camp and outside all the time, and ticks can burrow. Kids might not even notice them. But transmission usually happens after 24 hours, so you have to catch them quickly."
