Got Bed Bugs? Bedbugger Forums » Bed Bug Success Stories
When is the coast clear???
(10 posts)-
klotztheatre
newbite
Joined: Jul '09
Posts: 13
Posted 3 months ago
Sat Aug 1 2009 14:54:03
#
Login to Send PM
Well, I have been dealing with bedbugs for about a month and a half.( thats when we discovered the little devils) We have have three treatments with the PCO spraying the whole house and doing the whole pretreatment crap and we know where they came in from and we took the bed COMPLETELY apart, even ripping apart the slats that were glued and we got their hiding place. SO my question is...Its been over two weeks and I haven't seen any bed bugs and we haven't been bitten. I don't think it traveled to any other room besides my sons(where we first noticed the problem) and I inspect everyday...so have i killed them all off? How do I know when to breath a sigh of relief? How long do I continue the treatments with the PCO? I haven't had a treatment in 3 weeks and no sign, so I am extremely optimistic! Thanks so much for any info!
-
MyWorstFear
member
Joined: Sep '08
Posts: 266
Posted 3 months ago
Sat Aug 1 2009 18:15:41
#
Login to Send PM
I think people here say 55 days. I am not sure how they arrived at that figure, maybe someone else will chime in here who knows. But, since bed bugs are no longer a rarity and are turning up everywhere, until somebody comes up with something that can really be toxic and fatal to them on a large scale, the coast will never be clear as far as I'm concerned. I'm not sure I could go thru all this again, which is why I'm the "Bed Bug Police" in my house...no more sleepovers unless the person and their stuff goes thru "decontamination" according to my rules. No more bring home your dirty laundry etc.
-
klotztheatre
newbite
Joined: Jul '09
Posts: 13
Posted 3 months ago
Sat Aug 1 2009 19:01:16
#
Login to Send PM
Thanks:) I live in a single family home and my children don't have sleep overs yet, but I think I will be the same way. My entire family is very careful now as well. I don't want to be too optimistic, but I think that I may have gotten rid of them, forever with any luck. Any experience on when to know when they're "really" gone is great!
-
buggyinsocal
oldtimer
Joined: Jun '08
Posts: 1,130
Posted 3 months ago
Sat Aug 1 2009 19:41:46
#
Login to Send PM
The sad truth of the matter is that it takes everyone a long time to feel safe even once their residence no longer shows signs.
The general rule I heard around here is 55 to 60 days.
But I only just put a dark colored sheet on my bed for the first time, and I've seen no signs of bug activity since June of 2008.
I can tell you that the levels of anxiety drop dramatically the longer you go without sightings; however, slight stressors can retrigger new levels of anxiety.
Still, it really, really does get better.
-
Infofreak
junior member
Joined: Apr '09
Posts: 74
Posted 3 months ago
Sun Aug 2 2009 0:53:11
#
Login to Send PM
its never safe after you get them, you had them once you could get them anywhere anytime how careful could you be is the answer
-
Badwolf
newbite
Joined: Jul '09
Posts: 31
Posted 3 months ago
Sun Aug 2 2009 1:08:01
#
Login to Send PM
klotztheatre - be sure to check the walls of the affected bedroom for any nymphs. Even if you haven't spotted anything anywhere else, keep an eye on the walls. In my own experience, that's the one area that I initially didn't pay any attention to. After coming across only 1 dazed adult BB after the first week of treatment (I had already ditched the bed after the PCO spraying), I was confident that all was fine. But a few days before the 2nd treatment was to begin, I spotted 1 nymph on a wall in the bedroom. I then made it a point to inspect the walls carefully from top to bottom with a floodlight. After I started doing that, I ended up finding 6 more nypmhs on different days and times (Im guessing they were staying clear of the sprayed baseboards). A few days after the 2nd treatment, I came across 1 more nymph on a wall. Its been past 5 weeks now since then, and I haven't come across anything - but I still do my inspection rounds at various times of the day and night.
-
buggyinsocal
oldtimer
Joined: Jun '08
Posts: 1,130
Posted 3 months ago
Sun Aug 2 2009 12:54:29
#
Login to Send PM
Well, yes. When I responded to someone else's thread about inspecting hotel rooms and being sure they were bug free, I was reminded that, in fact, esp. with bed bugs (but also with most other things) nothing is a 100% guarantee.
The original poster's question, however, wasn't how will I know I'll never ever get bed bugs again. The OP asked what a reasonable length of time to be sure that the infestation was gone was.
Veterans in the bed bug war will (and have) tell people that getting rid of an infestation is not a guarantee that you'll be bed bug free forever. I still think that the wisest survivors of infestations or scares use that experience as an opportunity to educate themselves about how to minimize the risk of infestation in the future and/or how to inspect regularly to increase the chances of catching a future infestation early. People who live in multi-unit buildings with landlords not committed to eradicating the problem have a much harder fight in terms of decreasing the chances of reinfestation, to be sure.
Despite having plenty of issues with anxiety, I am not the kind of person who needs absolute certainty that there is no chance something will happen in order to live a good quality of life. I'm pretty sure being 100% certain that nothing bad will ever happen, or the sort of person who is inclined to view things that way, is not a good personality trait for anyone who lived in California, the Apocalypse State, for example.
So, sure. No one can ever be 100% certain that he or she will never be exposed to bed bugs ever again. As someone who travels regularly for work and to visit family and friends, flying about 25,000 miles a year (at minimum), and who works with the public in places where they hand me stuff that I have to take home, I'm, frankly, in the grand scheme of things, at pretty substantial risk of encountering bed bugs again at some point in the future.
I have chosen, however, not to dwell on the many possible ways that such actions increase my chances. Because the only way to reduce the number of possible interactions that have that possibility would be to give up things I love, and I'm not willing to let bed bugs force me to change my career or give up visiting friends and family who live thousands of miles away.
Sure, I'll follow common sense precautions. I've rearranged by bedroom to be easier to inspect and less bed bug harborage friendly. And if I make enough money in the fall, I'll buy a Packtite so I can routinely treat my luggage on return from trips.
But at its base, the decision not to despair about the possibility of a future infestation, unlike the possible future exposure, is something that I have control over. There's not a lot about bed bugs that I have control over, so I'm certainly going to take advantage of the few things that I can control--my attitude and my procedures to decrease the overall risk.
That's a whole different issue from what the general consensus says is a good guideline for if you make it this many days post treatment, you can begin to relax a bit because statistically your chances are good that your problem is gone.
-
55 days as a rule of thumb comes from entomologist Rick Cooper. It's a good rule of thumb -- the idea being that if you do not have any bites or see any bed bugs for 55 days, they probably are not in your home.
OTOH, it really applies only to homes where someone reacts to bed bug bites.
If you do NOT react to bed bug bites, it can take a LOT longer than 55 days for you to catch a glimpse of what may be -- at that point -- a very small infestation.
And buggy is right of course that reinfestation is always a possibility. If you picked them up from your granny, and you do not visit her again until day 75, well, that may be your next exposure, and you may bring them home again. It would take some bad luck -- walking into an infested home does not guarantee you bring them back -- but is just an example.
-
klotztheatre
newbite
Joined: Jul '09
Posts: 13
Posted 3 months ago
Sun Aug 2 2009 16:19:16
#
Login to Send PM
Thank you everyone! I definitely know that I may; as anyone else, may get them again in my lifetime. I am definitely making better choices now that I am experienced in the matter of bb's. I know exactly where I got them.I live in a home, not an apartment... We bought a bunk bed on Craigslist and that's exactly where we found the bulk of them two months later. I am fairly confident that we have them all, but I am crazy about checking the walls, the beds, and on the encasement etc.. even after three pco treatments and stripping the bed and sanding it( I recommend this if you have any rough edges on the inside slats etc... by the way)I will take this experience and use it wisely!! But I also don't want to live "in fear" of them either. I have started to relax and get things out of their black bags ect... I am hopeful for the future and I just wanted to know a relative time line that I can look forward to, you know? So anyway, thanks so much! I will post in another three weeks if I still don't have any more bugs and I will write my "success" story for getting rid of them.
-
Ottawabugs
newbite
Joined: Mar '08
Posts: 8
Posted 3 months ago
Wed Aug 5 2009 14:43:38
#
Login to Send PM
Hi Everyone,
Congratulations to all success stories. I have not posted in almost 18 months. We picked up our bbs in Ottawa in Feb. 08. Thankfully we caught ours early only 4 weeks into the problem and we were only sprayed/dusted once, the entire house. But we still have one of our kids' bedrooms as the storage room. We have about 20 Ziploc bags still sealed with the "unneccessary" things we didn't need. We lived out of Ziploc bags at the front door and did not have anyone over for 4 months (just to be safe). After that time period with no evidence/bites, we finally allowed people into our home again and it was weird to not change our clothing before going out! Things will never be the same again as other people have said. We rarely travel and when we do (like I just got back from summer camp) I took my Ziplocs with me. I just finished doing the last load of linens/clothing on hot wash hot dry (you know the routine). But yeah, we never travel with regular luggage anymore only our giant Ziploc bags (that company has made a fortune on our family haha) But we are very excited to be coming up to our 18 month anniversary in September when we will finally deal with the rest of the stuff in storage, and our daughter can have her own room back again. Yeah to success!!!!! BTW, we tell as many people as we can about bbs because the more people that know about them and how to avoid them, the better for all of us!!!
Reply
You must log in to post.
