Roach Wars

This blog is not for the faint of heart, nor the faint-stomached. So if creepy crawlies just gross you out immensely, skip over this one.

I (Rachel) had one of the most disgusting experiences of my life last week. We’ve seen a roach or two in our bathroom, no big deal. There is a plug in the sink drain and a small black rubber mat over the shower drain to prevent them from getting in. So, there I was, a Thursday morning at 6:15. The rain was pouring down outside and I was looking forward to the weekend. I turned on the shower, took off my glasses (effectively blinding myself), stepped into the shower and slid the black rubber drain mat away, so as not to flood the bathroom.

In my visually impaired state all I could see was a seething mass of brown under the drain mat. Shrieking, I hopped backwards out of the shower and grabbed for my glasses. Placing them on, my “grossest experience ever” nightmares were confirmed. Roaches now covered the floor of the shower and were starting to scurry their way onto the bathroom floor. I shrieked again, louder, and grabbing a towel, I ran out of the bathroom.

My shrieks had awoken Eric by this point and he got up to see what was going on. So there we were, me in a towel and Eric in his boxers, frantically putting on our shoes so we could squash roaches before they invaded our bedroom. We counted 22 by the time we finished our killing rampage, maybe not tons and tons but a sizeable number none the less. I was so disgusted that I couldn’t use the shower until someone cleaned it out (being covered in roach guts and all). I ended up using the shower in the room next door.

Oh, if only it would have ended there. The next morning, feeling slightly PTSD, I again inched the mat away with my toe (glasses still on this time, prior to turning the water on) and there were about 4-5 baby roaches hanging out. Ew! This had to stop. So we enlisted the help of a powerful aid, our new friend and ally, Mortein (Bangla-Raid). Twice a day, we spray the roach poison (with insect seeking technology!) down the drains. I did forget one day and found a roach sitting in my retainer case that afternoon. I will never forget again.