I'm new here, but have been on this site before because I've been dealing with this on and off for almost two years and I'm about to give up.
I moved into an apartment complex almost 2 years ago.
My first apartment ever, before I lived in houses. So we've never been in a complex before.
The first 4 months I had no problems. Whatsoever.
Then we had new neighbors move in upstairs, and almost a week later, I was finding bed bugs on my porch. Yes. On my porch, in the middle of the day, coming from the rocks in the open area of the complex. They were crawling under my fence.
We hadn't found any in the house, and I took pictures and reported it to the office.
They had someone go around and spray the rocks and grounds a week later.
No problems for another couple of weeks.
Then I went and sat on my porch to watch my kids play.
I must be extremely sensitive to the bites, because I felt a small itch a couple of times and then a warm feeling around the back of my neck when I was sitting pressed up against my fence.
My husband pulled a big off the back of my neck.
We put it in a Ziploc bag, and took it to the office.
Exterminator later confirmed it was a bed bug.
They came in and checked our apartment and found nothing.
So another couple of weeks to by, and I'm starting to feel more comfortable that the bugs are gone this time.
I've never, ever, ever had bed bugs before. And I've heard and read that they are almost impossible to get rid of. So I didn't want to go through this.
Eventually they came back though.
And this time I found them in the house.
I was taking a bath, and above my tub, there is an AC cent. And I saw something crawling out of the vent, and then disappeared into the metal slat of the vent and the wall.
I got out of the tub, grabbed my phone and started taking pictures when I found the bug.
And it was definitely a bed bug.
My husband pulled off the vent, and found three more.
Took more pictures.
Now, we live a very solitary life.
We don't stay at hotels, we don't go to movie theaters, we don't use public transportation, and we don't bring or buy used ANYTHING into our house.
Most of the stuff I purchase is from online and we get all of our grocery shopping done in one or two days of every month.
I have an autistic toddler and I'm a stay at home mom.
My husband works in a deli.
So, we really don't do anything that would put us at risk of bringing or introducing these bugs into our home.
Well, I talked to my complex, and they told me I must have brought the bugs in.
I was pretty irritated,especially since we had been finding them outside on the other side of our porch, and the sidewalk leading up to the 6 units on my side.
Exterminator came in and checked. He found absolutely no sign of them in the house, except for the vents.
The exterminator said they were most likely traveling from different units.
He had treated 10 units, just on our side of the building, that week, and said the ones we were finding were most likely escaping to different units.
So I was irritated that the complex tried to tell me I brought them, when clearly they knew that 10 out of the 18 units on my side of the building had bugs.
Well, bugs died off for a while and didn't come back.
And then I kept finding them in my tub. The vent is right above my bathtub.
I found more in the vent, and some around the drain on my tub.
So I was figuring they were falling/crawling from the vent.
I told the apartment again.
And never saw or heard from them.
So I decided to take matters into my own hands and sprayed the most highest percentage of rubbing alchohol I could find in the vent.
And it killed them almost seconds later.
So big seemed to disappear again for a while. Then I started getting bit in bed. And at this point I knew the bugs were winning this battle to get into my home.
I had killed one that night in my bed. Put it in a bag, and showed the office.
They told me again this was my fault and if I wanted to get rid of them, i'd have to pay an exterminator.
Every since then, on and off, I have found bugs.
I went from the end of December until last night with no bugs, no bites, no sight of them.
I'm never finding more than 10 though, get them killed, treat again in case of eggs, and I'll go 2-3 months at a time with no bugs, and then find stragglers again.
So I don't know if I have a hidden infestation somewhere, if they are getting in from neighboring units or what.
I am 100% sure I am not bringing them in. We literally do nothing that would cause it.
I don't go to thrift stores, I don't stay at hotels, travel, movie theaters, public transportation, I don't bring in furniture that's tossed, I don't take used furniture from people.
I don't go to resturants or places where they can easily carry home on people.
So I don't understand what's going on.
I've never had bugs before in my life.
The neighboring unit behind me just moved out about two weeks ago.
Found a single bug since last night, but nothing else.
II'm getting ready to have a third child, and I don't know if I want to keep doing this with these damn bugs anymore. It's driving me insane.