12/19/2025
Bed Bugs - how bad is this?
I have found 2 bed bugs like the one pictured. One about a week ago and the other tonight. I cleaned up and found whatever I'm seeing on the carpet. I think some of that is larvae of carpet beetles or something else. However, at the seam of the box spring enclosure is evidence of some sort of casing (?) and a bit of the bed bug p**p. But that's all the evidence I could find anywhere. I'm thinking they are in the box spring.
There are holes worn in the zipped enclosure so i assume they can get in/out just fine. I taped those holes up and all the seams.
I vacuumed the surfaces too, including mattress and under seams. I found no more or evidence in mattress at all.
My daughter's bed has no evidence of a bed bug but I will look again. I just thoroughly cleaned our living room, including all behind our sofa, in sofa, etc. (we had a bat get in the house from attic) and there was no evidence of bed bugs there either.
Does this seem like early stages of them? I'd think if it were more of an infestation that I'd find more evidence. We'd be getting bitten too and we haven't until this morning my wife says she had a bite on hit arm.
If it is early... what are safe ways to handle this ourselves?
I want to just throw out the box spring. It's inexpensive to get new one, might get lower profile anyway.
I can get a mattress enclosure though the mattress itself is easy to investigate and vacuum. Are eggs hard to see it invisible? Does vacuuming kill them?
What about clothes throughout the home? Do we need to go through and rewash everything? Even if it was in the closet or dresser?
Can we clean, dust, vacuum and of course clean all bedding and dirty clothes? Will that + keeping up with it be sufficient? Also, throwing out box spring if that seems to be where they settled?
Worst case they are hiding at edge/under carpet but can't I sprinkle something like diametus earth so they die when they come out?
Any and all help appreciated. We have honestly had a rough few months between kidney stone, bat in house, another health scare and just overall difficult life with 2 young kids... I'm exhausted.