AIBU about changing my sheets?

[CarmineRose1978]

I had a conversation at work this week with a few of my colleagues about how often we change out bedding. I and several of my friends say they should be changed once a week, once a fortnight at least. But a couple of my younger colleagues (I'm talking 28, so not teenagers!) said they change theirs every couple of months to every four or five months. Ditto their towels because "they are clean when they get out of the shower". Were we unreasonable to a) practically boak and b) tell them they're old enough to know better, in no uncertain terms? Should we have held our peace instead of hoiking our judgey pants sky high?

Oh, and they've become immune to the pesticides we used to use. It's not just because people take holidays.

In a word, YANBU! Bed-linen once a week (naked sleepers). Towels at least once a week (naked showerers), often more frequently.

Absolutely QuinionsRainbow. I always shower naked too. It keeps the bedbugs at bay. I do always keep my eyes tight shut though. (Lot of mirrors in the bathroom).

Bedbugs are an occupational hazard for airline crew, as well as other who's jobs involve hotel stays. We have experience of the former as a family 2 x over.

And I think its only a few months ago that an airline with a household name had to fumigate one of their planes after a passenger had a bed bug crawl across their seat.

Yep - here it is, but they're not alone in this.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1360492/Bed-bug-Airways-BA-grounds-jumbo-jets-businesswoman-tells-long-haul-flights-left-covered-bites.html

Bedbugs would not be fun and a pain to get rid of I've heard.

And to those meeping on with third world stuff.. I'm really not interested, albeit a bit bemused. Go count your own blessings.

Now I'm going to strip the beds and put a hot wash on to make the most of the weather care to join me.

I don't understand what is harmful about dead skin. Who really cares about dead skin?

I understand people wanting to clean their sheets often but I don't understand the hysteria about dead skin. I assume that every time I go to someone else's home I leave with some of their dead skin on me. I have no problem with the thought of lying in my dead skin, I am pretty sure that when I sit on my furniture I have my husbands and children's dead skin on me too!! It's not harmful ffs.

I win the prize for saying dead skin so many times in one post.

I have to say that 'dead skin' worries me a lot less than 'chemicals that remove skin'

but such thinking seems to be few and far between.

Bedbugs would not be fun and a pain to get rid of I've heard.

True, but if you know they're an occupational hazard you're kind of on your guard just the same way a teacher might be on their guard about nits.

It sounds charming eh? But its really not like the old days where they were always a sign of poverty and overcrowding and to have bed bugs was a disgrace because it meant that not only were you poor etc you were also a dirty bugger. I grew up in the days of tenement living and can recall women being thought very badly of because their home was infested with bed bugs. A lot of bosom hoiking went on and having bed bugs was a disgrace.

And to be honest, these days if you get find them quickly you can get rid of them easily with a steam cleaner.

Ooooh would a steam cleaner work? I'm going to store that in the back of the brain

I caught a bit of a tv program once - following a specialist company e who cleared and decontaminate flats etc where the owners were disgusting/hoarders/had died and not been discovered for a while...
There was a bedbug infested mattress - it was gross...
Just googled to see if I could find it - found loads of youtube videos instead ...
Don't watch them! - I am itching like mad and feeling slightly sick...
And on the worse one the sheets actually looked quite clean...

Gamerchick, we regularly check for the blighters given the amt of aircrew in the family, and the steam cleaner method of dealing with them was discovered when my daughter was running round her bedroom screaming like a banshee. She had been using it on her tiles and in her panic she grabbed it and hey presto.

Its also very common to take them home from a hotel and checking the sheets are clean, and they're usually pristine, just doesnt cover it.

Change sheets on a Saturday, towels twice a week.

Apart from when I hit menopause. Bloody sheets needed changing every night. And one god awful night twice a night. :(

I know someone who had bed bugs, their whole house had to be specially treated with chemicals, there clothes and linen etc had to be stored in special bags for a year! They think they picked them up on holiday at a rather posh and well known chain that has lovely swimming facilities , wont name it as it wasnt proven it was there.

I am paranoid since I found that out, I check religiously at home and I go mental when we go away. The most likely place is in the seam on the edges of mattresses. And if you get three bites in a row on you, I think they call them breakfast dinner and tea bites, then chances are you have one.

their not there!

I'm scratching now.. I think YouTube vids would finish me off.

Cheers for the tip granny.. might come in handy

Or hopefully not come in handy.

We do ours every other day.

Oh I had bed-bugs once from a nasty old mattress in a rented house. My mum took great pleasure in telling me it was because I didn't change my sheets often enough but then my clean-freak housemate who changed her sheets twice a week had them much worse....

Steaming the little buggers to death is really satisfying. Ok, you have to throw away things like a mattress but you'd be surprised where they hide and I can recall taking apart a wooden bed with my girl only for the blighters to start running when we took the footboard away from the base. God knows how they were able to hide where they were hiding.

We felt like something out of Ghostbusters

I'm not sure you can pick bed bugs up from somewhere and bring them home with you I can understand people wanting to kid themselves though

So where do they come from then? dame

Just two of the many many articles available on google regarding bedbugs.

insects.about.com/od/truebugs/f/what-causes-bed-bugs.htm

www.health.ny.gov/environmental/pests/bedbugs.htm

dame yes you can. They can get onto clothes, into your suitcase, on a towel, anywhere. You bring it home and bingo, you got bed bugs.

They dont just materialise out of nowhere!

For bed bugs to infest your home, they've got to hitch a ride on someone or something. Bed bugs don't usually stay on their human hosts after feeding, but might hide in clothing and inadvertently go along for the ride to a new location. Most often, bed bugs travel in luggage after someone has stayed in an infested hotel room. Bed bugs may even infest theaters and other public spaces, and spread to new locations via purses, backpacks, or coats.

C&P'd from the first of Grannys links

And from the NHS info sheet on bed bugs

How bedbugs spread

Once introduced into your home, bedbugs can spread easily from room to room. They do not fly or jump, but can crawl quickly.
They can soon spread within a building by getting through holes in walls or pipes, and can potentially invade blocks of flats, hotels or hospitals. The bugs can also be transported in luggage, clothing, furniture and bedding from one building to the next.
This makes is easy for tourists and commuters to unknowingly spread bedbugs.

Omg omg YUCK! I've just been googling why you've all been correcting my post.