Is it over?

NO it isn't! We went through all of that just to come home and "think" it was over!

We walked into our smelly house after five hours and examined what had been done. Our entire house took the exterminators less than 30 minutes? I thought it to be strange that they could thorougly spray our entire apartment and furniture? 
Upon our walk thru after the exterminators left we had noticed they had stored bed frames and mattresses in our walk in closets. Why would they do such a thing? I had no idea,but was trying to stay optimistic and started the unpacking to get everyone as back to "normal" as we could.

I started in the living room so the kids could sit and have quiet time while we put the rest of the house back together. We also had to cover the mattresses with vinyl zip up mattress covers as well as our pillows!

I finally got into my room and started putting plastic bins in my closet after re-assembling my bed along with our toddlers bed who still slept in our room. The toddler mattress was one of the bed bug homes according to the exterminators as they had noticed bedbug droppings on the underside. My toddler didn't have an ordinary vinyl crib mattress but one of those toddler futon mattresses so it was made of fabric and perfect breeding grounds for bedbugs.

I did a thorough look in my walk in closet to make sure there wasn't any bugs or anything in there since the exterminators put the mattresses in there. I saw this tiny black speckle at the celing near the back. I took a small step stool and took a closer look. What do you think I found? You guessed it! A bedbug, and he was still alive! Still, I wanted to stay positive and thought "well,maybe he was dying from the chemicals and it takes some time for them to die"

At that point, I didn't unpack my room. I kept everything out and only used what I needed and nothing more.

Extermination Date Set...Preparation Starts!

After waiting a week we have our extermination appointment set to be in another week. We are now at a total of 4 weeks having this problem along with the month before we knew we had them. A total of 2 months the bedbugs decided to move in with us.

We are still puzzled as to where we got them, but no need on wasting time thinking of that we have to prepare for extermination!

If any of you have had bedbugs, you know what I am saying when I say "prepare". I sure didn't know it was so much work to get ready for extermination. I thought it was a simple appointment, they walk in and do what they do and leave, bugs gone and life goes on.Boy was I wrong! There is so much to do in preparing to get rid of bedbugs!

First is first, I washed and dried all clothing,linens, and even stuffed animals. As soon as they dried,I immediately put them in black bags and sealed them while they were still hot! Bedbugs are very vunerable to heat and cold as I think any bug should be but I still sealed my bags to make sure if there were any eggs,or live bugs left that they wouldn't make it! I also did this to keep them buggers out! I started storing sealed bags in the kitchen as that is what I was advised to do from the first exterminator who found the bedbugs.

The only problem seemed to be in my bedroom which is connected to another apartment so could that have been where the problem started? Who knows? The children of mine that had been bitten are the ones who love to go into my room and watch television away from everyone else along with myself. I do have a baby,who by my surprise had not been bitten.

Everything that was in my room, I kept in my room and the rest of the house went into bags! All kids toys,cd's,dvd's,books.....everything! What a task! You have to really be committed in this if you want to get rid of bedbugs! They can hide in anything and anywhere! Be careful and keep all items that could be infected in that room!

We happened to have a patio so I did put alot of stuff out there since we are now in December and the weather is quite chilly,surely no bug can live through that!


Here is what it looks like all packed up!

You can't see the entirety of the bags,but this is just a quick snapshot. In the end we used approximately 75 big black bags.

We are ready!

More Bites!

Its so disturbing and offensive to wake up with more bites! Now three people in my family are being affected by these horrible bugs!

These bites appear to be raised but some of ours look like skin rashes too. They are super crazy itchy. We have noticed they itch more when our body heat is high or after a shower.

Here is the rash like bites. Some itched so much that the skin broke and I started using antibiotic cream to prevent infection. I have read horrible stories about infected bedbug bites too!

Right here, you can see broken skin from the itchy bites.

Now is the time for our second line of defense......OFF bug spray before bed!

I read Here about the Off spray along with a couple other good ideas!



The Battle Starts!

The exterminator left and I have to wait for an appointment for extermination! I sure wasn't going to wait and continue being eaten alive from these little blood suckers!

I did alot of research online and decided to start our battle!

I wasn't just going to sit around and wait while these bugs kept biting us! I took a bucket with bleach and water and started washing all walls and surfaces I could wash.

My first line of defense was rubbing alcohol.

Read Here 

You will read how something as simple as rubbing alcohol will kill these pests on the spot. I bought probably about 10 bottles of this stuff in preparation for the weeks ahead. I know when I went to the local pharmacy the cashier probably thought "what do they need with so much alcohol?" 

I bought an all purpose spray bottle but ended up only needing the nozzle as it fit over the huge bottles of alcohol I had bought.

I opened my windows in the bedroom and sprayed everything and soaked my bed  just in case there were bugs I couldn't see.

At this point, I had not seen any live bugs other than the one the exterminator showed me, so I still really didn't know what they looked like other than images on google.

I am determined to rid of these bedbugs!

We Have Bedbugs!

Since we lived in an apartment we did some research on tenant/landlord responsibility and rights. I found out that it would be our landlords responsibility to rid of any type of infestation.

I called my management office and explained what had been going on in my apartment. I also spoke with my neighbors to see if they had experienced anything similar,so we could try to fight whatever it was together!

The exterminator was sent out on a Wednesday, I showed him bites and told him we had experienced the itching late in the day and not early morning. He did some looking around in my living room and the walls,then he asked me to show him where we had slept. He flashed his little light,looked in my mattresses. Immediately, he confirmed bedbugs!

Here is an image of the bedbug the exterminator showed me

Here is the casing that wasn't too far away. I used a small magnifying glass and it's still too small to see with the naked eye.


Devastation took over my face and my gut just fell to the floor! Bedbugs? How? Why? Where did they come from? Am I going  to have to trash everything?

I just couldn't believe this!

He first showed me a baby bedbug that had just fed, then showed me the casing. This bedbug was found on my ceiling above my bed and nothing was on my mattress at all! He explained the procedure in preparing for the extermination and I just couldn't believe what a nuisance these tiny little blood suckers could be! He did say that we have caught it in the early stages so it shouldn't take much to get rid of them (yeah right!)

That day, after the exterminator left I had a good cry then I pulled myself together and prepared to fight!

More Mysterious Bites!

It was an ordinary day, we were all in our daily routine. The evening had  come and dinner was on the stove.

My son came to me really irritated and told me that his back was super itchy. I pulled up his shirt and there was a cluster of 10-15 bumps on his back.  I started panicking! I didn't know what they were or how he got them. He was so irritable because they were super itchy! I put some Cortaid on them and started to call everyone I knew! I took pictures of the bumps & started sending them out for people to look at and give me an idea of what it could be.

My husband happened to be working that night, so I had sent him these pictures.

Here are what the bites started out looking like, more like welts than bites!

Here are the bites a day after,they are more defined now and look less like welts. They itched my son for about 3 weeks!

My sister suggested they may have perhaps been chigger bites. I didn't think so after googling chigger bites.

I did some of my own google image seaching and everything kept coming up as bedbug bites. I saw a few images and the bites sure matched my son's bites!

I called my husband in devastation and told him I thought we had bedbugs! He sighed and said "no, we would know if we had bedbugs."

I called my mother who worked at a motel and had a little experience with bed bugs since motels are a place they also thrive! She told me to strip my beds and do a thorough seach along the seam of the mattresses as well as doing a search on the boxspring.

I was stumped, I found nothing! I didn't see any sign of bed bugs at all!

What were these bites? Where are they coming from?

Later you will see where it all makes sense!

Mysterious Bites?

We all have all heard this saying a little too many times while we were children and never thought anything of it other than it just being a little saying, how wrong we were!

It all started in Mid October 2010,we started getting these mysterious bites on our bodies.

My daughter came to me and showed me these horrible looking bumps she had. One on her arm and the other two on her neck.

I thought they were some sort of spider bites,so I just put some cream on them and kept an eye on them.

Here is the bite on my daughters arm. Size of a q-tip.

The other bite on her neck. She did say they itched,but it was October and seasons were changing so I pawned it off as perhaps spider bites or something from outstide.

Introduction

We are just an ordinary family trying to live each day as it comes and enjoy lifes journey!


We are a family that keeps our house clean. (we all say that, don't we?)


In October of 2010 we started our battle with bedbugs!


I am here to tell you my families story and share any tips that may be helpful to you and your families in helping rid of these pests!


I say no matter the size of infestation, whether big or small...either way we are all traumatized in some sort of way from these blood sucking "vampire bugs"!


Follow me in our journey with battling the bedbugs................