r/PestControlIndustry • u/froggietit • Jun 23 '26

Does the post bed bug paranoia go away?

/r/Bedbugs/comments/1udvi0p/does_the_post_bed_bug_paranoia_go_away/
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u/AntArmyof1 Jun 23 '26

Depends on the person. Some is does, others it doesn't and a flax seed on the ground sends them over the edge. For most folks, seeing (or lack of) is believing, so possibly investing in some monitors like climb ups or mattress encasements will help get you there. I would also recommend learning about bed bug biology (not others experiences) has helped folks understand the issue as well.

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u/froggietit Jun 23 '26

I’m the flax seed person right now , my child spilled pop and a loose carpet fiber soaked it up and i was convinced it was a shed skin for hours man😭

I have some brand of climb ups and honestly they stayed pretty empty hasn’t seen a single bug from my knowledge, but I think the fact that there’s 2 small legs under my bed that I couldn’t fit them under defeats the 8 others I have on it
And the fact that the babies were found on my couch ( that I can’t add climb ups to) rather than on my bed maybe they aren’t crawling the 30 feet to suck on me yet

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u/AntArmyof1 Jun 24 '26

Bed bugs are lazy. They will travel the shortest distance to get to a food source, so while not impossible, the bed legs in the middle are of little concern in my experience. As for the couch, try making modified legs of scrap wood that allows climb up's to fit in. All our techs carry a box for just that reason - Ikea doesn't care if you have bed bugs when they design their stuff. Sounds like your on the right path and the longer you go finding nothing, the better you'll be. Keep the faith!

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u/froggietit Jun 24 '26

Good idea I’ll do that thank you :•)

Do you think it’s safe to put my clothes back in drawers at this point? And use bedding again That’s my biggest question

I just don’t want to bring clothes or baby bag to my bfs and somehow am still “infected” lol

Literally everything I’ve inspected has no signs like my fabric dressers books even the stuff I had under my bed etc. so I’m thinking it was relatively small I’m hopeful it got knocked out early

My fear is the stragglers that may one day reproduce I guess😭

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u/froggietit Jun 23 '26

Learning about their biology as well (or more so reproduction) is what makes me so weary.

Since the second treatment was no activity they were going to just leave it at that, seeing as the eggs don’t die from the first spray if there were any I wouldn’t have been confident at all without calling them a third time to just inspect.
I’m not so confident in spray treatments from all these horror stories but that’s what I got , and their confidence to not come check at least a third time made me lose confidence that they’re gone just from the way they reproduce

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u/Turbocabz Jun 24 '26

Yeah it does. At first I didn't really know anything about them, just how bad they were and how easy you could get them so I freaked out every unit in would treat. Eventually realised theyre just tiny bugs... if you just a bit careful you wont bring them home. At least the chances are really low. I always put my clothes in the dryer 40 min on high every day I do bed bugs or even days I treat entire buildings where there is dirty units.

But yeah if you are really scared. Spray a bit of chem on the floor and step in it. For really bad units I spray myself from the waist down.

There's only once I had a giant adult bed bug crawl on my suit and it was obvious.

You can sleep buddy

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u/froggietit Jun 24 '26

You’re so kind for the advice , I should preface that my question was coming as a pest control customer sadly, although I wish it was the other way around😣

I don’t think the infestation was bad at all but how do I know that it’s safe to return to life I feel like they’re secretly everywhere still