The Realization

Early Saturday morning my son came into my room and woke me up. He'd wet his bed, needed to go to the bathroom and needed me to be there in the scary dark. All cleaned up and ready for more sleep he heads with me to my bed (as his is wet and the plastic mattress pad got torn, so now the mattress has a wet spot too). It's a warm and humid summer night, the A/C is on, but I keep it at 77/78, so there is no need for the down comforter that is still on my bed. It is piled in a mess off to one side and as my son slides into bed I flop the comforter over some to get it more at the end of the bed and out of the way. That is when I see them, two black bugs about the size of lentils. Instinctively I swat at them and I catch one. There is a blood stain now on my comforter. hmm my tired brain says, small bug in my bed that is full of blood, I know what that is. ugh gross yuck, oh no, please no, really no no no.

My son is quickly back to sleep, but not so for me. I am up and on the internet. Google "Bed Bugs". I read for maybe 15 minutes, realize that I need to get a sample of the bugs to make sure that is what it is (otherwise, the sites tell me, I will need an exterminator to do a full inspection). I also need to contain them to as quickly as possible stop the spreading. So back to the bedroom, this time with some clear tape in hand and a large Space Bag. Luckily I had some unused ones in the front closet. I go to the comforter and slowly, carefully open up a folded area in the dark, nothing in the first one, but the second one reveals another 2 lentil sized bugs and what seems to be smaller ones, or maybe they are eggs. ugh gross gag. I grab a tissue and squeeze it down as hard as possible over the area, then I transfer the two large ones to the clear tape and fold that over on them squeezing again as hard as I can just in case they are still alive. Then I fold that area back down and the rest of the comforter around it and smoosh it as slowly as I can muster into the space bag and then zip that mother shut. Then, to be perfectly honest, I do a small heeby jeeby dance.

There is still no chance that I am going to sleep, so I go back to the internet. I find bedbugger.com and I read, and read, and read some more. I Google "Bed Bug Exterminators New York City" and several variations thereof. I find an exterminator highly recommended by people in more that one website. Bookmark that. I find advice about the tons of work I will need to be doing to contain and avoid the spreading.

When my son wakes up, early, but no longer dark outside, I am still online reading and bookmarking and making mental lists. I get him settled in for Saturday morning cartoons and my first day on my Bed Bug Journey begins.