A Crumbling Paradise

When I first moved to North Carolina, and saw the little trailer home where I would be living, I was excited. A fully furnished place to stay at such a cheap price, free water, and located in a cute little spot in the woods; what could be better for newlyweds? It was my first little paradise.

As we continued life there, adjusting to things, enjoying the wildlife and beauty of the trees, things seemed just fine. There were little bugs here and there and the occasional thunder storm, but it wasn't too bad. Yet.

When it comes to bugs, I like to think that I'm a little braver than most girls. I don't like to touch them, but I'm not afraid to kill them in most cases. Yes, they make me jump sometimes, but I can tolerate most things. But not all of them.

The problems started with itty bitty, seemingly harmless baby cockroaches. Well, I knew they weren't really harmless, but they were small and we only saw a few of them, and then had no problems for awhile. So I threw the sightings out of mind. They were dead. All was well.

Then the centipedes started showing up. Lots of them. I assumed at first they were taking shelter from the rain, becuase we saw most of them on the rainy days. But after the first few rainy days, they seemed to stay. It got to the point where we were killing and disposing of anywhere from 12 to 20 centipedes a day. They began appearing in sinks and the bathtub, even on the stove top, above our bed and on the walls. They were everywhere.

I kept telling myself I would not be kicked out by bugs, so we upped the anty on the raid and I lived my days mostly on the couch, but things only got worse. One night, at 3 am I recieved a tropical storm warning via my cell phone. (A tropical storm is just short of a hurricane) I was absolutely terrified. Rhett would be leaving in 2 hours and I don't do well with something as simple as a lightning or thunder storm.

As I sat on the couch all morning, unable to sleep, all I heard on my phone and the tv were to stay away from windows, get out of trailers and trailer homes, and find a solid building, preferrably a storm cellar. I could hear the wind and rain outside rattling the windows and roof. The thunder was horribly loud and shook the trailer held up only by cinder blocks. I knew absolutely nobody, and Rhett had gone to work. I was completely alone in exactly where I should not be. I could see and hear the trees bending in the strong winds all around my house. My paradise quickly became hell.

My anxiety sky rocketed. I had no idea what to do. I sat bawling on my couch, not knowing what to do. Then, one of the worst things that could have happened happened. Icing on this cake of Hailey horror. You may think it a silly thing, but I was absolutely mortified. In the midst of the storm, my tears, and the thunder, a 1.5 inch cockroach runs out right into the middle of the living room.

It was the last straw. I went into a full on panic attack. I was frozen on the couch, tears and screams drowned out by thunder. I felt as though I could do nothing but watch as this invader moved freakishly fast over to the desk. In an attempt at some kind of insane courage, I grabbed the raid and sprayed like there was no tomorrow. Despite the "kills on contact" label, the thing kept moving. Kept running. Kept climbing. Kept living. It eventually crawled into the desk. I could take absolutely no more.

Fighting tears, I called Rhett. Luckily, he hadn't started work and was able to answer. Getting a phone number for someone in the ward eventually led to a lot of phone calls and phone tag, but eventually, I was picked up by a neighbor ward member, and was able to relax and feel safe in her sturdy, built-to-last storm ready home.

After a long day spent at the lovely Truman home, Rhett got off work and came to pick me up. The storm had passed. Only a few trees had been felled. The sky was sunny as though nothing had happened. Feeling much better, we had a lovely dinner. And then it was time to return home.

As we pulled up to the trailer, Rhett informed me he had found the cockroach from earlier and that it was dead. (He had stopped at home to change before picking me up.) It helped, but my anxiety still began to come back as we pulled up to and entered the trailer.

We saw two more cockraches in the next 24 hours. I lived in constant anxiety every day until Rhett came home from work from that day on. The experience traumatized me. It affected me so greatly, more than almost anything I had experienced up to this point in my life.

I hated it. Living in costant fear every day. It was a horrible way to live, and one that I could not escape. To push things just a little farther, we still had a problem with centipedes. I would kill 5 on the way to brush my teeth, and 5 more to go sit on the couch with my breakfast. Things were out of control. All I could do was sit and watch nervously for cetipedes and roaches.

In the middle of all this, I noticed as we started seeing more centipedes, we started seeing less cockroaches. This pushed my curiousity, so out came the laptop and the research began. I was absolutely horrified when I discovered what I believed was going on. The centipedes in our trailer were roach eating ones. They had moved in because they had a plentiful food source, and the only way to get rid of them would be to take that food source away. With so many holes and drains and being right smack dab in the middle of the woods, getting rid of roaches was quite literally impossible. They lived under our house, in the shed, in the trees. They were everywhere. Therefore, so were the centipedes. It was a dead end.

My wonderful husband could see my discomfort and anxiety living in the trailer, so we began to prepare for a move. I always told myself I would never let bugs kick me out of my house, but I had had it. I didn't care anymore. I was done.

We found our new home in some apartments a few days later. After two weeks, we were moved in. No more bugs. No more fear. No more tears. No more couch life. One happy Hailey.