As I write, I itch, like some drug addict in detox...

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As I write, I itch, like some drug addict in detox...

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kimintheeast

newbite
Joined: Jan '08
Posts: 12

Posted 5 months ago
Sat Oct 10 2009 19:49:53
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As I write, I itch, like some drug addict in detox. I found bedbugger.com about two and a half years ago when I returned from Costa Rica on a Saturday night and woke up Sunday morning covered head to toe in welts and bites. I went to google of course, baffled by what I had found. And in my searching, I narrowed down my trails of red to either scabies or bed bugs. Off to the dermatologist I went, praying to my God that it was scabies or just something else! The dermatologist eyed my bites and reported that bed bugs it could be but he would not know for certain unless I found a bug. (and I learned that I could be bitten one night and not show the bites for 3 to 7 days! )So for the next month, I did not sleep. I vacuumed religiously, combed my mattress and sheets for blood, eggs, feces, something! I tossed and turned, constantly itchy. In fact, I often set my alarm for 3am, so I could pull back the covers with my flashlight trying to find one of those damn things! I never found one, no eggs hatched, they did not hitch hike home with me! I was relieved. The experience never left me though.

In the last two years, I have been vigilant about checking every place I sleep. I love to travel so this is a must... I have looked like a fool to my travel mates. I tell ya, that education on bed bugs from this website and others is helpful, but it also haunts you. I have become a bedbug guru to my own detriment, perhaps. In fact, when someone has bites, they immediately contact me to determine if I think it's bed bugs or not.

Just this past Spring, one of my co-workers and friend, called me to discuss bites she was getting. Bed bugs. Yep. She owns a row house with her husband and it turns out her neighbor had them and they migrated over for a little dinner at her house. Poor girl was in denial for two months before she attempted to deal with them. Interestingly, she consulted with an exterminator but decided not to go forward with it because they would just come right back if her neighbors didn't do it too. Instead, she encased her mattresses, has lived out of garbage bags, sprays alcohol on her frame, and puts DE wherever her bed touches the floor. She hasn't had any new bites for the last month. Nor has her neighbor...not sure how this is working given all that we know, but it is working for her.

She and I had to stay in the same beach house for a wedding. I hated to do this, treating her like a leper in my mind, but I asked her to take preventative measures to ensure she didn't bring the little guys on her trip. Of course she took the measures, because she always does now. I checked our bed thoroughly for signs. None noted. We slept in different rooms. Also during this time, she left the job and I took a new one which landed me in her old office. Um, yeah, I didn't really think that one through.

This was a time of great change for me. I had just bought my first condo, I had just changed jobs, and by golly gee, I was gonna quit smoking once and for all. Peace and good health I sought! Before I moved, I saw bites on my legs. They did not look like the bed bug bites I had before. They looked like mosquito bites and it would make sense that I would have them since I was inhaling my last packs of cigarettes on the back patio with the bloodsuckers. A little concern set in, so I started inspecting my sheets, and mattresses. Nothing that seemed out of the ordinary but you just never know.

I moved into my new home! Yay Obama first time home buyer credit! I was still nervous so I kept inspecting and also not sleeping well. A few days after I moved, I found a bite that was larger and red, more welt like...I freaked out. I got home late from work that night and started washing and heating up everything. I put on my camping head lamp and diligently overturned every seam trying to find something. Nothing. I vacuumed my bed frame at 1:30am in the morning waiting for my new neighbors to bang on my door. After washing and drying my down comforter, I laid it out on my couch, did a few tasks, and returned to find a small bug chilling on it. Not moving, round, very small...perhaps a baby bed bug? I looked at the pics online. It might be. Did it seriously survive the washer and dryer and deadly hung tight to the white fabric? In a Tupperware container, the bug went. It was now 2am. On the verge of a nervous break down, I cracked open the bottle of wine my Realtor bought me to celebrate, dug out my old cigarettes, and headed out to the corner. There I was shaking, in pajamas, cigarette hanging out of my mouth, travel mug of wine in hand, and head lamp pushing my hair out of it's elastic band in the middle of the night. I could not believe that this was happening to me.

I called out of work the next day telling them the reasons. I called someone to come from one of the pest control places that uses cryonite. The guy looked up my tupperware friend and said, yes, that's a bed bug. I had my condo frozen with the CO2, I packed up my wardrobe and fabrics and spent some time in the laundromat heating them up. I bought mattress and pillow encasements. For all my paranoia, I did not research these things, I just reacted. So who knows if the cryonite will have worked and who knows if my encasements are up to par (there is no research on them.) And seriously now, who knows if that little bug was a bed bug or if that guy was just out for my money. My once neatly unpacked condo was now disheveled. I hadn't slept in four days. All my home buying budgeting meant nothing. I was over a grand in the hole. Life has not been good.

That was all last week. I'm still looking. I'm still not sleeping. I'm washing and heating up laundry as we speak. I sprayed alcohol on my bed frame. I put DE on the floor. I find tiny little bumps from time to time that look vaguely like flea bites. My guy friend just got two bites that showed up the night after he stayed over. Looks like mosquito bites but could it be? I really just don't know anymore. Every piece of dirt, lint, mark, the headlamp goes on and I inspect. I haven't found a bug. I haven't found blood on my sheets. And really can one tell the difference between dirt and lint and eggs and feces? I'm caught somewhere between "it's ok" and "freak the f* out!" Excuse me my language but it is seriously how I feel. Have I gone overboard? I want my life back.

I sometimes play "Would you rather..." in my mind.
Would you rather have bedbugs or scabies - SCABIES
Would you rather have bedbugs or crabs - CRABS
Would you rather have bedbugs or lice - LICE!

I sometimes wonder "What are the chances?"
That my co-worker brought a bug or two to the office and I brought a bug or two home (my bag now goes on top of a filing cabinet.)
That my co-worker brought a bug to the beach house and I brought it home
That those bites were just mosquito bites?
That that one bug was something else and not a bedbug.
And wouldn't I be getting those welts again instead of these little pimply flea bite things. I do have an indoor cat!

Ugh!

Tonight, I just felt like I had to write. I'm at a loss. I mean I can't even discuss the guilt I feel thinking I might have brought them into this building...oh and then I think, maybe they are already here?

Seems like no one is safe anymore. I'm itching. I'm itching even when there's no red or bite...like a drug addict. Perhaps it a nicotine fit. Off to buy a pack of cigarettes. Alas!

Thanks for listening.
watkinsnewan

junior member
Joined: Sep '09
Posts: 333

Posted 5 months ago
Sun Oct 11 2009 20:00:36
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I hear ya!!
have you read this forum top-10-ways-to-know-youre-battling-bbs