Bed bugs

Ahh I bet you felt like ramming that mattresse down your husbands throat 😂
Anyway thanks for updating us on your mammoth task.
You deserve a sit down now 😊

Sorry, cant help but just to say you poor thing having to deal with It on your own

Really silly question but how do you know if you have bed bugs? Do you wake up covered in bites or can you see them or both?

Plevey08

Do they only come from holiday travel?

I don’t think so.
I was born in 46 and lived with the little critters ( as did most houses that were demolished in the London slum clearance) for the next 16 years.
My mum was always out with the Flit spray.
When we got the letter saying that we were going to be demolished the council also informed us that everything would be fumigated by them before we moved into the new property.

I am in the US - Friends were in Chicago recently and were taking a ride share. They opened the door to the ride share and there were bed bugs crawling across the seat. They refuse to get in and notified Uber immediately. They were on corporate business so the employer hired a limo for the remainder of the trip.

The Uber driver was terrified he would take these bedbugs home to family and was directed to get "diatomaceous earth". It is a fine powder that can be used to coat surfaces. You should use a mask and gloves but its safe.

Bestgrammaever
As you can see from the post above I was very familiar with bed bugs. I’m amazed that your friends could recognise a bed bug so quickly considering they are roughly the size of an apple pip. That is unless they too were familiar with them.

Depends on how long you have had them.
Loads on YouTube about bed bugs.
I made the mistake of watching a couple before travelling to London.
One clip showed a bed bug travelling up a guys leg on the underground 😩
Read also that they shut down two libraries in London due to bed bugs. Now if I get a book from the library I put it in the freezer for a few days. You are probably more likely to pick them up this way as people tend to read in bed.
Also second hand clothing. So if you do buy second hand (I bought two lovely tops recently from a charity shop) bag them, freeze, then wash.
We are really now a small world with all the travelling, so they are becoming more common for sure.

Hello, it's me again. Thank you to everyone who has posted - it's nice to know I have some support, even if it's only from a distance. This whole episode has thrown me for six and turned home life into a living nightmare. To those posters who mentioned the dust, I wasn't suggesting that my lack of housework skills caused the infestation, merely saying that I was embarrassed at the amount of dust that I saw while the pest control people were inspecting. I was cringing!

The house will be sprayed again tomorrow. Then I can start putting clothing , possessions etc back where they belong. One thing that has amazed me is the amount of 'stuff' that my son had in his tiny box room. I've always known he's a compulsive buyer but really........I've been nagging him all week to start going through his bags of clothes - he has enough to start a shop - but he keeps making excuses. I even found two boxes of face masks that he ordered during Covid, unopened. Lord alone knows what else is in those black bags.

The back garden is covered in dozens of black bags, clothing, bedding, personal possessions. That will all have to be hauled back in. One good thing at least, there is no sign of rain.

The whole thing has been a total nightmare. I've paid for a one year warranty to the pest control company, just in case any of the little sods manage to survive. That at least gives me a bit of peace of mind.

This whole thing has been an absolute nightmare. Can you imagine trying to empty a three bedroom house in 24 hours? It's impossible.

At 79, I didn't need this. But I'm more than halfway through the process now, so hopefully the end is in sight.

Thank you all for your support.

Councils will remove large items for a fee, no need to tell them it has bugs

Personally I would contact relevant bodies in the uk, social services,help the aged etc, this is an awful predicament your in and you need outside help to take the burden off you, my prayers, maybe someone on here knows who to contact, bedbugs are not dirt but just one of those nasty situations, please let us know if it went ok, I will be praying for you

jakuss Our local council website specifically states that they will not handle anything with bed bugs. That was the first place I went to, to get some help, but they're quite clear that they won't help.

supernanauna1

jakuss Our local council website specifically states that they will not handle anything with bed bugs. That was the first place I went to, to get some help, but they're quite clear that they won't help.

It wouldn’t be fair to council not to let on you have had a problem with bedbugs as they may use those vans for other purposes.
🤞 you have got rid of the little blighters.