Hello! Long time lurker and really appreciate all the information being provided on here helping us fight against our bed bugs. Finally decided to make a post now as we've arrived at a bit of a strange situation and would like to get some advice!
Bit of background:
My partner and I live in a one bedroom flat in an ex-council building in London, and first started noticing bites in January but chalked them down to something else. A few weeks later we realized we may have bed bugs when we found one crawling on the living room sofa, and another week passed before we found another in the bedroom. We combed the bedroom and living room looking for signs of an infestation but found nothing, and we also stopped getting bites.
Fast forward two months. We've both recently started being bitten again and decided to hire a pest control company to deal with the issue. A technician came, did a thorough inspection of the bedroom but did not find any signs of bed bugs. We asked him why nothing was found - he said we most likely have a light infestation and managed to catch it early. For the first treatment, he sprayed Ficam over the bed, mattress, footboards, drawers, and the living room sofa as well at our request.
The evening after the treatment, we found the first bug we've seen in months on the kitchen wall. Then suddenly we started finding them everywhere - the vast majority on the living room carpet and along one particular window/wall in the kitchen. We've also found a few around the sofa and the bathroom, but curiously enough not a single one in the bedroom! The bugs appear to be from different life stages and have been confirmed by the pest control company as bed bugs.
So my questions are:
Is it normal to see more bed bugs I've ever seen in my life appear immediately following treatment? Prior to treatment we found maybe 4-5 in the span of 3 months. After treatment we caught more than 50 in a week and a half. We have also started receiving new bites daily following treatment.
And is it normal to see them in unexpected places like the kitchen (especially along one window/wall) and the bathroom? The pest control technician will be returning in a few days (two weeks from first treatment) to do a second spray. Should we request that he treat the areas where we have been finding the bugs as well?
Thanks!