Bedbugs and Mental Health

A call for help may mean more than remediation.

When I was approached about addressing the topic of bedbugs for this issue of R&R, I instantly knew I wanted to put product and remediation talk aside. This article has a very difference focus that in many ways is more important.

The office staff at Noble Pine has morphed into junior psychologists and private detectives. When we receive a telephone call from someone who wants to buy Sterifab, we have become accustomed to hearing about their specific bedbug concerns.

After numerous symposiums, seminars, and repetitive lectures, one can recite the complete evolutionary path of the bedbug, its eating and intercourse habits, and where it prefers to hide from its next victims. The speakers are armed with statistics about this tenacious insect’s habits and lifestyles, genetic make-up, and more. One topic always touched upon is the mental anguish bedbug victims suffer. Sadly, “touched on” is as far as it gets. They don’t dwell on the psychosis, depression or anxiety that many people end up suffering. As restorers, it is important for you to understand what your client might be dealing with as you start remediation.

Scores and scores of stories appear weekly, yet bedbugs are unlike other insects. Along with a rash often come anxiety issues. Some people become so overwhelmed that serious emotional problems have been reported to us.

We often receive calls about fleas, ticks, silverfish, roaches and more, but people don’t seem to become despondent about these insects as they do with bedbugs.
If you have fleas or ticks, it just means your dog or cat that picked them up outside of the house.

If you find silverfish in your home, you may be keeping your firewood too close to the house.

Cockroaches? A more common problem in apartments, but their occurrence often occurs by bringing them in in supermarket paper bags, or from a neighbor’s dwellings.

But bedbugs? What is wrong with me? The stigma that a bedbug infestation inflicts upon many is overwhelmingly emotional.

Read the entire article: Bedbugs and Mental Health which will touch upon a few bedbug situations.