Mrs. B Posted July 23, 2015 Share Posted July 23, 2015 So thanks to a pp a few weeks ago, I have been thoroughly educated about bedbugs.. I had no idea what a big deal they are to eliminate. I thought lice was the biggest imaginable infestation culprit. We are having our house searched for bedbugs via a canine service in 2 long days. We decided on canine service vs. visual inspection because the dogs are supposedly more accurate about all the places the bugs are hiding. We shall see, it may not be the best choice, but we want to know if it's in every room. The pp a few weeks ago set me on alert, otherwise I would never had been on alert. My kids started having bites recently, I found some small blood splotches on my son's bed, I got up at 2 am last night and peeked under his sheets with a flashlight to try to catch them. I saw 2 faint black spots, touched one and a red smear immediately appeared on the sheets. Took his mattress cover off this morning and didn't find anything hiding in the seams. Then I went to my daughter's room and removed her bedding. In the tiny back corner against a wall, under the crease of the pillow top mattress I found 4-5 tiny bug casings. Same color as bedbug casings. We did travel out of town a couple months ago, and I faintly remember being grossed out by a blood smear on an extra blanket in the linen closet our hotel room, which we didn't use of course. Now, after research, I see that was a sign of bed bugs. Dh remembers us remarking about some gross looking thing on the linen closet floor, and we're just glad we were staying one night and didn't need to use the closet. We had know idea about bedbug signs as we never encountered them before in our lives, nor has our families. So if it is bedbugs (after screaming and crying for days) is heat treatment combined with pesticide treatment and my laundering and storing everything well effective? We know this will cost us lots of $$$$. We are very sad. But we want them gone whatever the cost. I plan to throw away tons of stuff and make a fresh start, but we can't rebuy everything. I plan to launder our clothes at the laundromat and store in ziplocks or airtight containers. After heat treatment, we plan to get new mattresses since ours are so old anyway and get mattress cover, our sofa is old too. We don't want to purchase anything new until we know they are gone for good. How do we know? This is terrible. I feel bad the kids can't have the neighbors in the house and they can't go to the neighbors' houses for a long while. I'm hoping playing outside will help. Thinking of getting a hotel room or something for a few days while I deep clean. Or send them to my mom's, but don't want to transfer bugs to her house. Nor do I want to transfer them to a hotel. Do I tell neighbors? How do I explain canines coming to search our house, followed by exterminators bringing in huge heating machines, followed by my husband making multiple trips to the dump, followed by the laundromat being my new hime away from home? How do you tell neighbors you have bedbugs? Is heating a quick fix if there is followup with pesticides, diligent vacuuming, storage of clothes in airtight containers, laundering in highest heat? How do we know if our vehicles are effected? We have toted our luggage back from a long trip and have gone on a weekend trip,with all that luggage. Plus I just de cluttered and gave a bunch of dolls and stuffed animals away to our church just a few days ago, and plan to have dh pick up the boxes and bring them back home to take to the dump instead. They have been in the car unbagged. Have they already contaminated the church storage room sitting there a few days? Am I jumping to conclusions that it is even bedbugs? I'm holding out faint hope it is fleas, but I doubt it. It's going to be a long 48 hour wait for the canines to arrive! My dh wants me to think of something else. He doesn't want me to obsess. Really? How? Will my schoolbooks on the shelf ready to go for the entire year be salvageable? Should I put them in ps while I deal with this? We were supposed to start school in Monday and I had it all ready to go! Will my son's huge lego collections and my daughter's doll collection be salvageable without sealing them up for an entire year? Help, please! Answer all you know. Assure me it's fleas, even though it is probably bedbugs. We do have a dog, but he's not scratching from fleas. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gingersmom Posted July 23, 2015 Share Posted July 23, 2015 My mother had them in her NYC apartment. Her neighbors were really nice about it :) She did get rid of mattresses and sofa. She also went to hotel for a month. Pretty sure they used dog and heat. It was several years ago and they have not come back. Hang in there! 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joanne Posted July 23, 2015 Share Posted July 23, 2015 (Many hugs) You are being so thorough and diligent. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sun Posted July 23, 2015 Share Posted July 23, 2015 Heat is supposed to be very effective. It sounds like you're doing things the right away. We haven't had them (knock on wood!), but I always worry about picking them up. We all strip and shower after airplane trips, and all our luggage and clothing from the trip goes into large garbage bags until I can "bake" them all in a heater we got for that purpose. DH thinks I'm nuts, but I'd like to avoid them if possible! They do have some sort of sticky trap that you can set under bed posts to help detect infestations. Maybe that would be helpful for reassuring you that they're gone after you get heat-treated? There is a bedbug forum somewhere where people share their experiences trying to get rid of them. As for telling the neighbors, we have neighbors who did tell people. I don't know if it was the right thing to do or not. We don't have the kind of relationship with them where we go to each other's houses, but if we did, I know I'd still be worried about it. On the other hand, I don't think there should be such a stigma around them, and the only way that will go away is by talking about it! :grouphug: Hugs and courage to you! 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El... Posted July 23, 2015 Share Posted July 23, 2015 We did not end up finding bedbugs. You have my deepest sympathies, though! DH didn't really understand why that possibility made me cry. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HeWillSoar Posted July 23, 2015 Share Posted July 23, 2015 No advice but I really feel for you and what you are going through. :grouphug: 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garga Posted July 23, 2015 Share Posted July 23, 2015 We had bedbugs. They can hibernate for 12 months. If there are things you want to keep, but them in big black bags, tightly closed, and store them for a year in a basement or attic. That's what we did with the leather jackets and things of that sort. (And our paperwork.) The guy we had doing the exterminations wasn't some poorly paid guy working for a company. He was the owner of his own business and took a lot of time with us. For books: he says it's safe to visually inspect them. Open the books and look along the inside of the spine. Look at the front and back inside cover. Flip through the pages. If you don't see anything, they're fine. Do you have neighbors who share a wall? If so, tell them. If you don't share walls, don't bother. We found our infestation within 3 months of a business trip. The bug guy said that it was a small infestation because we caught it so early. That's probably the case for you as well. We only had to have 1 room and 2 adjoining closets treated. Hopefully the dogs and a visual inspection will prove that true for you as well--that it's just the bedrooms. Places with couches can also be bedbug places, but hopefully it's not the case with you. In the room and closets where we had to have treatment, we bagged EVERYTHING. We lived out of those bags for weeks. I put labels on what was in what bag. It was amazingly inconvienient. BUT, the bug guy said that ours was the only house he'd treated where he didn't have to retreat. Since we bagged everything, he was able to put the poison on all the surfaces that the legally could, and it wiped out the bugs. Still, he came back every other week for 12 weeks to reinspect. During that time, he told us to start unbagging things little by little before he came on his visits. Hopefully your people will come back and reinspect to be sure they're gone. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Garga Posted July 23, 2015 Share Posted July 23, 2015 P.S. I wouldn't go to a hotel during this time. What if you pick up more bugs? Having bedbugs has greatly changed the way we vacation. When we go anywhere we put everything in large ziplock bags or in thick black plastic bags. We put the ziplocks in a suitcase for transport, then when we arrive in the room, we take the suitcases to the bathroom (no cloth in there where bugs or eggs could hide) and we empty out the ziplock bags and then we put the suitcases back in the car. Every single item that we have in the hotel room lives in plastic bags if it's not actively being used. It is really a pain. A big pain. There have been a few times now where we've decided not to go on trips (a weekend to the beach or something like that) because of the hassle of bagging up everything. But I don't ever want to live the nightmare of bedbugs again. We stay in our jammies until right before checkout. Then, we put on the last outfit (from the bags) right in front of the door, so that we know our last outfits aren't infested, and then we walk out the door and don't go back in. We don't sit in our last outfits on the couch or bed in the room. Then, when we get back home, all the clothes from the trip are washed at the laundromat and dried in the heavy-duty 120 degree dryers. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mrs. B Posted July 25, 2015 Author Share Posted July 25, 2015 Update: the issue in my daughter's room with the 3-4 casings was carpet beetles. And after researching online, I have seen a couple dead carpet beetles when deep cleaning in past months. But, in my son's room the dogs found bed bugs at his mattress/linens only. They searched the house and went to his room last. The 1st dog only paused at his bed, and positive ID is for the dog to sit and look at the place where the bedbug scent is picked up. So the handlers brought in the 2nd dog who also searched the entire house. That dog also went to my son's room last and that dog sat at my son's bed. I had washed his linens when I was freaking out the other morning before I decided to stop cleaning to not destroy any more bedbug evidence for inspectors. I'm glad the 1st company I called recommended a separate K-9 search company before calling them to the house. I had already throughly imspected before calling and they said they would do and find the same things I was telling them, and recommended the dogs to indicate the extent of the infestation. They are convinced it is in early stage, especially since the 1st dog only paused, so the scent was faint. I had set out our luggage from our trip 2 months ago and the dogs picked up nothing from that, so it's not from the suspicious hotel room. Thanks for all your advice and sympathies, I need them. I already threw away all linens from my son's room even though the exterminator says the dryer is fine. He understood my overriding him on that for peace of mind. Will still throw away most stuff in his room even though they say it's not necessary. I plan to attack this in overkill mode! may the force be with me! If it weren't for this coming up in a couple threads lately, I would not have thought anything of my children's bites and bedbugs never would have been on my radar. Thanks Hive for discussing these difficult things and educating us all. Otherwise this would have grown to a much bigger infestation. I am overwhelmed yet thankful we caught this early. Goodnight everyone, sleep tight, and don't let the bed bugs bite! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mrs. B Posted July 25, 2015 Author Share Posted July 25, 2015 I was trying to update the title and couldn't figure out, then accidently rated the topic because my finger pushed the wrong thing on the iPad. I'm not too literate in editing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Farrar Posted July 25, 2015 Share Posted July 25, 2015 Ugh. Good luck. We recently learned that the house where ds stayed had bedbugs in one room. They didn't stay in that room and it got discovered and closed off when they were there. Still, I laundered everything and left it on high heat in the dryer for extra time. I'm hoping, hoping that we don't get them. But I feel like it's going to take forever before I know. Sigh. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mrs. B Posted July 29, 2015 Author Share Posted July 29, 2015 Short story: we were nearly scammed and do not have bedbugs. Long story: After I calmed down out of my panic, I gathered all the data. The pest control company recommended the dog people, an independent company. The independent company casually put in a good word for the pest control company and a bad word for the other heat treatment company in the area while here, even though the dog inspectors also said they pride themselves in being independent of a pest control business so the customer knows they have no motive to lie about the dog's response. The pest company gave me a private number for the dog company instead of the listed business number, which makes me think the dog company knew the referral was through the pest company and not me randomly calling up for a bedbug confirmation . I never saw the dogs alert as it was upstairs and the man that came with the handler was downstairs talking to me during both dog inspections, saying we needed to stand back so the dogs can concentrate. Even so, the dogs stay leashed with the handler and there is no way to prove the handler doesn't tug the leash a certain way to get the dog to sit at the spot the customer thinks there are bedbugs. The pest control exterminator signed me up for treatment and quoted price on the phone without ever going over a contract or doing his own inspection to see if bedbugs actually existed. I questioned the lack of visual inspection, but the man assured me that after a month I wouldn't yet know for sure if they were there and the dogs are always right. He said it would be much later before I would see visible signs and then it would be too late to control easily. Then I thought, if I took the exterminator's advice and bought a metal bed frame to place in the center of the room to protect me from bites until treatment 2 weeks later, that would cause the bugs to crawl from the supposedly infected bed to the middle of the room, getting into everything. I also thought the exterminator had to be wrong in telling me the only mattress encasement that really works, if I chose to sleep on son's encased mattress instead of an air mattress for 2 weeks, happens to be the only brand the company sells. I slept in my son's supposedly infested bed for 4 nights with no signs of anything, inspected all aspects of the bed and surrounding area from head to toe each day. No signs of bed bugs anywhere. I even slept over a heating pad since they are attracted to heat. I got another inspection from a different company who assured me we did not have bedbugs. He told me the blood stains could have been from anything and what the black lint sized thing I smashed in the bed the night before my fiasco could have been anything. But it did not meet the description of bedbug nymph like the dog imspector told me. The poor guy at the other pest comtrol company felt so sorry for me for falling for the entire thing. I knew we had just gotten fleas from used stuffed animals given by a neighbor with multiple dogs. I mentioned it to the original company as a possibility, but they said I had enough data to suspect bedbugs to warrant the dog inspection since bedbugs supposedly are impossible to spot until an infestation is out of control. My son has stopped getting bites since I took care of the minor flea problem via linen changes, vacuuming, and washing and drying the stuffed animals. Tell me, is gullible in the dictionary? Someone once told me it wasn't and I believed them. My, oh, my! 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NorthwestMom Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 :grouphug: :grouphug: Holy cow, that is quite an ordeal you've been through. So glad you figured out what was REALLY happening. I don't think you were gullible. You called the (supposed) experts for a reason. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rose Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 I'm glad you figured things out. It might be worth contacting someone (like the BBB) about it or at least finding every place on the internet that you can to warn others. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mrs. B Posted July 29, 2015 Author Share Posted July 29, 2015 I'm glad you figured things out. It might be worth contacting someone (like the BBB) about it or at least finding every place on the internet that you can to warn others. I have done both things :) 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
El... Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 Are you serious!!? They scammed you with bedbugs!? That is one of the meanest things I've heard in a while. I'm so glad that your house doesn't have bedbugs, but I'm livid on your behalf. You were smart to check up on them like that! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
momto10blessings Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 Wow! Give lots of reviews online about these companies. How terrible!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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