fter the night of discovering the bed bugs, I never slept there again and moved out to another, safer location. Before moving, I checked in with my neighbors. Turns out many of them had bed bugs, and none had bothered to report it!! (Huh??) There was only one neighbor who says he coincidentally reported them to the apartment management company the same day as me, however he had noticed the bugs for a number of months.

The other apartments in that building which I know were infested as of February, 2009 were #17 and #9. The other neighbors weren't home when I went around to knock. However when I drove by a couple of times, I kept seeing more mattresses outside, so I expect multiple units (if not the whole building) had the same problem. My mattresses had to be discarded because it was so bad.

squash and kill it. I gingerly lifted the mattress to see if there were anymore, and sure enough, there were 3-4 more (and evidence of feces.) I killed these quickly with a kleenex as well, and flushed them down a toilet. I was abhorred, and resolved to sleep on the couch in the living room. Before going to sleep, I checked for information online at bedbugger.com. I saw the tip about saving a speciman to show the professional pest control. The next morning I actually found one more on the bathroom wall. I quickly found some scotch tape, gently used the tape to stick the bug onto it (so I didn't have to touch it), then taped it to a piece of paper. I called my apartment management right away, and fortunately they took it very seriously (and knew right away about it.) I'm the first to register this for Bloomington, IL, yet the management didn't seem too surprised with my news. They are sending a professional out in a few days, and they dropped off within hours an official letter with strict rules about what I must do to prepare for the first treatment. They will pay for the first two treatments (two weeks apart), and they think this should be sufficient. Any treatments beyond that, I must pay for at $150 each. They will also be inspecting all of the apartments surrounding mine for evidence of bed bugs. If I or any of my neighbors are found out as not complying with every rule and guideline from the professional pest control company, they will impose charges (make tenants pay for treatments.) I was pleased with this quick and serious response from the management (Apartment Mart.) The company they are hiring is called Liberty. I hope the treatments work as promised.