Battling Bed Bugs
Warning - don't read this is you easily creeped out by bugs of any kind.
I'm still not 100% sure, but I think we have bed bugs. I think it was 6 or 7 days ago when I woke up with two itchy spots on my legs. Upon close examination I found two bites about one inch apart on the inside of my left leg, and two bites very close together on the outside of my right thigh. Both spots would have been in contact with the sheet because I generally sleep on my right side with my legs in a running position. I commented about them to my DH and said "I hope we don't have bed bugs" and his reply was "how could we have gotten those?". I went back to examine my bed closely and I noticed some specks of black - really tiny - resembling poppy seeds only smaller maybe, and they were right in the area where my legs would have been, and I thought "rut-roh - it's bug poop" as I'd seen this sort of thing in a couple of occasions when my house was infested with fleas.
Could it be fleas? I doubt it. As mentioned, I've lived in flea infestations before and it's really very obvious when that's the culprit. We have on kitty and she has long thick and fluffy fur, which I comb religiously almost daily to help prevent hairballs. I'm sure I would have seen a flea hop off of her by now.
Could it be spiders? Yeah, this house has tons of them, but generally I only get one bite at a time and rarely at that.
For a variety of reasons my DH and I sleep separately in two different bedrooms. He hadn't got bit at this point, but that doesn't mean much. As to how could be have gotten them, well he did go on a trip to Denver, CO a few weeks ago and stayed in a couple of different hotels - so he could have picked up a hitch hiker or two. From what I have learned this sort of thing is making a big come back.
It's very hard not to panic and go into fits of anxiety over this, but thanks in part to being on good meds, I've managed to remain relatively calm. I have done a tremendous amount of research and reading on the care and feeding of my new pets. I'm pleased to learn that they do not carry diseases and that the main suffering of hosting them is very itchy bites, and the fact that they are hard to get rid of.
I've learn of all the places they like to hide and I've searched and searched and I have yet to discover a single live bug, nor a shell, nor an egg. So at least I know that if we do have them that they are relatively new guests, and they have not set up a colony anywhere. I set up one DIY sticky trap and didn't get a single bug of any kind on it. It doesn't mean we don't have them though.
My plan of action is to start with my bed and my bedroom and systematically boil everything. That's an exaggeration of course, but not much of one since these guys are killed by heat and I will be steaming stuff and washing/drying in hot for textiles that can go into the washer.
Looking on the bright side - as there's always got to be one - this is forcing me to stop procrastinating about de cluttering and deep cleaning. I'm not the world's best housekeeper, but not the worst either. But I've learned that BBs don't discriminate. They will move into a sparkling clean home as soon as a messy one, but the problem with the messy home is that there are more places to hide, so I've got to get rid of a lot of unnecessary clutter. My greatest weakness in regard to that is saving cards, letters, photos and memorabilia. I had eleven boxes of the stuff (shoebox or larger) stacked against a wall in my bedroom - excellent places for bb's to hide. I still don't have the heart to just haul it all off to the dump, but I'm going through it and discarding two thirds as I go. This was one of the ways I whiled away the days of power outage after Irene.
This is going to be a long process and it's hard not to feel overwhelmed, but I am trying to just break it down and tackle it methodically. After going through everything and cleaning and steaming and washing, I will have to repeat a lot of the work because you can never get rid of these things with one swoop, but the next time around will be easier as I will have reduced the clutter considerably.
I've learned that bug bombs are not effective for this kind of thing, and in fact they can make the matter worse. I'm vacuuming and sealing the bags and disposing of them. I'm steaming, I'm washing in hot water. I may put some things in our chest freezer that's empty now as freezing kills them too. Down the road I may resort to calling in the professionals, but I'm not going to do that until I've finished my first line of attack and still have a problem. I would also like to find (well not really LIKE) at least one bug or casing before I call in the National Guard.
Sigh - this is not what I hoped to be doing to celebrate Labor Day weekend.
Still - it could be worse. It can always be worse. I recently saw an episode of the Hoarders program in which one guy who was a hoarder had his house get infested with BBs and the hoarding and clutter were so bad that a professional exterminator couldn't get in there and treat the place effectively. So the guy's answer was to move out into his yard - with his wife and a couple of kids in tents - so that they wouldn't get bit. His reasoning was that he would starve the bugs out, but the sad truth is that these critters can live even as long as a year between feedings. Very sad.... but good motivation for me.
I'm still not 100% sure, but I think we have bed bugs. I think it was 6 or 7 days ago when I woke up with two itchy spots on my legs. Upon close examination I found two bites about one inch apart on the inside of my left leg, and two bites very close together on the outside of my right thigh. Both spots would have been in contact with the sheet because I generally sleep on my right side with my legs in a running position. I commented about them to my DH and said "I hope we don't have bed bugs" and his reply was "how could we have gotten those?". I went back to examine my bed closely and I noticed some specks of black - really tiny - resembling poppy seeds only smaller maybe, and they were right in the area where my legs would have been, and I thought "rut-roh - it's bug poop" as I'd seen this sort of thing in a couple of occasions when my house was infested with fleas.
Could it be fleas? I doubt it. As mentioned, I've lived in flea infestations before and it's really very obvious when that's the culprit. We have on kitty and she has long thick and fluffy fur, which I comb religiously almost daily to help prevent hairballs. I'm sure I would have seen a flea hop off of her by now.
Could it be spiders? Yeah, this house has tons of them, but generally I only get one bite at a time and rarely at that.
For a variety of reasons my DH and I sleep separately in two different bedrooms. He hadn't got bit at this point, but that doesn't mean much. As to how could be have gotten them, well he did go on a trip to Denver, CO a few weeks ago and stayed in a couple of different hotels - so he could have picked up a hitch hiker or two. From what I have learned this sort of thing is making a big come back.
It's very hard not to panic and go into fits of anxiety over this, but thanks in part to being on good meds, I've managed to remain relatively calm. I have done a tremendous amount of research and reading on the care and feeding of my new pets. I'm pleased to learn that they do not carry diseases and that the main suffering of hosting them is very itchy bites, and the fact that they are hard to get rid of.
I've learn of all the places they like to hide and I've searched and searched and I have yet to discover a single live bug, nor a shell, nor an egg. So at least I know that if we do have them that they are relatively new guests, and they have not set up a colony anywhere. I set up one DIY sticky trap and didn't get a single bug of any kind on it. It doesn't mean we don't have them though.
My plan of action is to start with my bed and my bedroom and systematically boil everything. That's an exaggeration of course, but not much of one since these guys are killed by heat and I will be steaming stuff and washing/drying in hot for textiles that can go into the washer.
Looking on the bright side - as there's always got to be one - this is forcing me to stop procrastinating about de cluttering and deep cleaning. I'm not the world's best housekeeper, but not the worst either. But I've learned that BBs don't discriminate. They will move into a sparkling clean home as soon as a messy one, but the problem with the messy home is that there are more places to hide, so I've got to get rid of a lot of unnecessary clutter. My greatest weakness in regard to that is saving cards, letters, photos and memorabilia. I had eleven boxes of the stuff (shoebox or larger) stacked against a wall in my bedroom - excellent places for bb's to hide. I still don't have the heart to just haul it all off to the dump, but I'm going through it and discarding two thirds as I go. This was one of the ways I whiled away the days of power outage after Irene.
This is going to be a long process and it's hard not to feel overwhelmed, but I am trying to just break it down and tackle it methodically. After going through everything and cleaning and steaming and washing, I will have to repeat a lot of the work because you can never get rid of these things with one swoop, but the next time around will be easier as I will have reduced the clutter considerably.
I've learned that bug bombs are not effective for this kind of thing, and in fact they can make the matter worse. I'm vacuuming and sealing the bags and disposing of them. I'm steaming, I'm washing in hot water. I may put some things in our chest freezer that's empty now as freezing kills them too. Down the road I may resort to calling in the professionals, but I'm not going to do that until I've finished my first line of attack and still have a problem. I would also like to find (well not really LIKE) at least one bug or casing before I call in the National Guard.
Sigh - this is not what I hoped to be doing to celebrate Labor Day weekend.
Still - it could be worse. It can always be worse. I recently saw an episode of the Hoarders program in which one guy who was a hoarder had his house get infested with BBs and the hoarding and clutter were so bad that a professional exterminator couldn't get in there and treat the place effectively. So the guy's answer was to move out into his yard - with his wife and a couple of kids in tents - so that they wouldn't get bit. His reasoning was that he would starve the bugs out, but the sad truth is that these critters can live even as long as a year between feedings. Very sad.... but good motivation for me.
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