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FormerlySaleenl wrote:
The only thing that works to kill bed bugs reliably is heat. You absolutely need to heat treat everything before it enters your house and the hot car suggestion is a great one.
If you didn't open your bags at the hotel, you might be able to get away with just your clothing and the outsides of your luggage getting to 125. If this happened to me, I would buy black trash bags and a couple of new outfits/socks/a pair of shoes, head to a rest area or gas station bathroom, change and bag what you're wearing, and leave it sealed in the car along with your suitcases for as long as you can. Once you are at a new hotel, shower in the hottest water you can handle and change into another new outfit. Bag the first one and put it in the car.
When your trip is over, I'd wash and dry everything on hot and leave everything not washable in a hot car for as long as you can before bringing it into the house.
My sister ended up with bedbugs from renting an apartment in an infested multi-unit building. After months of fighting them, she ended up having to pack all of her belongings into a truck and take it to a facility that heat treated everything before moving into a new house.
All good advice. Mark Rober recently did an in-depth fact-finding video about bedbugs-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JAOTJxYqh8
Spoiler- The dedicated sprays don't work, but other things do.
A friend of mine got them in an apartment. He discovered quite by accident that Formula 409 cleaner, the lemon-scented variety at least, kills bedbugs dead, instantly, on contact, with a level of effectiveness that roach sprays have only ever dreamed of. According to him, one direct hit leads instantly to a death spasm and that's it for the bedbug, no crawling away while you go get something to sweep it up with as is the case with roaches.
He said he called the 1-800 comments number on the bottle of 409 to tell them about his discovery, but the lady he spoke to got thoroughly grossed out when he mentioned bedbugs and didn't seem to pay much attention to what he had to say after that.
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pqrst wrote:
Sorry to say but I’d play it safe and go somewhere else.
When I made the decision to leave and get a refund, the manager, possibly owner, suggested that maybe I brought them with me. I know for sure I didn’t bring the second one. It crawled out from the sheets and I didn’t lay on that bed.
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Yes, panic! There is never "just one bedbug".
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Just reading all of this is making me itch.
Sorry you have to go through this.
When our kids come home from camp, everything stays in the garage until it goes directly into a hot wash and extra-hot dry.
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Make sure to use these tips after a hospital stay, as well. I have a sister-in-law who prior to retirement worked in the radiology department of a hospital. Trust me, you need to assume the worst.
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