COPING WITH BED BUG ANXIETY

‘Goodnight, don’t let the bed bugs bite!’ is fun to say until you experience a real life bed bug infestation. After that, your sense of humour can be overtaken by crippling bed bug anxiety, and there is no fun in that.

Bed bugs are one of the most unsettling and worrisome pests to have in your home. It’s not because they are difficult or timely to eliminate, or because they are unsanitary and pose a health risk (which they don’t). It’s because these sneaky little bloodsuckers invade your home unnoticed, take over your most sacred space (your bed and bedroom), and feed on your exposed skin when you are most vulnerable (asleep at night). 

Sleeping, which is an essential part of everyday life, becomes almost impossible because you feel like you have a real monster under your bed. And if that’s not scary enough, depending on the level of bed bug infestation you have and your sensitivity to bed bug bites, you may wake up scratching and find one or more walking on your skin or feeding on you. These experiences can be traumatic. They can trigger very real and very raw emotions and reactions that you have never felt before or experienced this heightened.

Bed bug anxiety is real, and this anxiety can last well after the bed bugs are gone.

The Emotional Toll & Psychological Impact of Having Bed Bugs

You never really know how you will react to something until you experience it in real life. What’s more interesting is that your response may catch you totally off guard and seem totally out of character for you, which can actually stress you out more. This is a common occurrence for people dealing with bed bugs. 

Lots of people can cope perfectly fine when dealing with bed bugs (or any pest for that matter). They don’t lose a wink of sleep because it’s really not a big deal. For others, having bed bugs can be traumatizing and negatively impact their day-to-day life, and take months or years to get over. 

What Does Bed Bug Anxiety Feel or Look Like?

People suffering from bed bug anxiety may experience any (or all) of the following:

• Insomnia, sleep disturbances or chronic fatigue – Loss of quality sleep can cause severe irritability and loss of focus, making it hard to function in everyday life.
• Heightened anxiety.
• Chronic stress.
• Irrational feelings.
• Deep sense of helplessness and dread.
• Constant scratching, feeling itchy all, or skin crawling sensation. 
• Self-isolation - Due to the negative stigma around having bed bugs, many people feel too ashamed and embarrassed to talk about their experience. They may also worry that they will give bed bugs to others, so they close off their home (and themselves) to the outside world and avoid going places.
• Consuming fear of bed bugs - They are genuinely afraid that bed bugs are still hiding in their home or are terrified that they will come back and will never really go away.
• PTSD symptoms – Since having bed bugs can be a traumatic experience, individuals may experience PTSD like symptoms such as paranoia, depression, obsessive thoughts & behaviours, and hypervigilance.

Why is it so Challenging to Cope with Bed Bugs?

You still have to live with them to get rid of them. This means:

• Remaining in your home - not moving into a hotel or staying with family or friends.
• Sleeping in your bed each night as per your ‘regular’ routine - not on your couch or in a spare room. 
• Still getting bitten by live bed bugs during treatment because different solutions work differently - some take more time than others.
• Not throwing away any mattresses or furniture that has, had or may have bed bugs.
• Not tearing apart your home in a mad or desperate frenzy to find all the bugs and deep clean everything.

To get rid of bed bugs, you NEED and WANT these pests to stay where they are and keep doing what they are doing with minimal disruption. Here’s why: 

1. Disturbing them or taking away their food source (you) can cause them to harbour deeper into furniture, baseboards or behind walls. They could even move to other rooms where there is human activity to feed. This can make the issue larger and more complicated to treat, which can take more time and money to resolve.  

2. For a treatment to effectively kill bed bugs and their eggs, the professional pest control product must be applied on and around where they are nesting and feeding. This ensures that the product directly targets them or that they will come into direct contact with it. If you start sleeping somewhere else, throwing things out, moving things around, or deep cleaning, you will disturb them, making it harder for the pest control technician to treat with accuracy and be effective.

How to Cope with Bed Bug Anxiety

While having bed bugs can negatively impact your psychological well-being, there are things you can do to help cope and heal from the trauma.

Advice for Coping with Bed Bug Anxiety:

• Focus on what you can control – Keep your home clean and clutter-free, vacuum often, don’t put dirty clothes back in your closet or dresser drawers, keep books or magazines off the floor, and check bed bug registries before you travel.
• Knowledge is power – The more you know about bed bugs, the more in control you will feel about your situation, and the more equipped you will be to handle your feelings. In addition to doing your own research, ask your licensed pest control professional about their life cycle, how the treatment works, what you can do to help make sure treatments are effective, and for more general tips and advice for how to prevent them in the future. They are a great resource to utilize! Our blog is filled with lots of information so be sure to check that out.
• Reach out to friends and family for support. - You have nothing to be ashamed of so stop self-isolating and reach out to your friends and family for support. You may find out that they have experienced something similar and they can help you get through this.
• Sleep and self-care matter – Despite how scary your bed is to you at the moment, you need sleep. It is very important to try to maintain a regular sleep schedule. It’s also important to take care of yourself, so do not neglect your own self-care. Indulging in something as simple as an extra-long soak in the tub can be therapeutic. 
• Get help from a health care professional - A health care professional (family doctor, psychiatrist, psychotherapist, etc.) is equipped to give you coping strategies, resources, and treatment options to help with insomnia, anxiety, stress, PTSD symptoms, and the other feelings or behaviours you may be experiencing.  

Get Relief from Bed Bugs with Help from Environmental Pest Control

We understand the emotional and psychological impact having bed bugs can have and we want our customers to sleep easy and worry free.

If you are losing sleep over bed bugs or not seeing results in your efforts to eliminate them, contact our team for help. We’ve been successfully helping people get rid of bed bugs since 1988.