When my oldest was a toddler, I became pregnant with our second child. As winter turned to spring, we found ourselves in the midst of the biggest flea outbreak our home had ever seen. We have always had an inside dog, so we had battled fleas on and off for years. As a part of our routine, we put out flea powder 3 times a week and let it sit on the carpet overnight and then vacuumed. The dog was on a regular flea pill and received weekly baths and bedding changes. We sprayed inside and outside on a consistent basis; we shouldn’t have had a flea problem.

            So, the day we left for vacation, I decided to go ahead and completely get rid of our fleas by setting off a flea bomb in the house. We would be gone for five days, I could vacuum up any flea bodies before my toddler started crawling around on the floor. It was a good plan. But then we came home and walked through the door. My white socks literally turned black with fleas.

            To say I came unglued was an understatement. By the time my husband got home from work the next day, my big, pregnant-self had ripped up every ounce of carpet in our house and threw it into a giant pile on our front porch. The idea of my toddler and soon to be baby crawling around with all of the fleas just sent me into psycho-mama mode and I knew it was either the fleas or me.

            And do you know what I found under that old carpet? A quarter inch layer of dirt filled with fleas and flea eggs! I was flabbergasted. All of the treatments. All of the vacuuming. All of the chemicals. None of them did any good because I was only treating the top layer. It wasn’t until I ripped that carpet off of the floor’s surface that I found the real culprit: a whole breeding ground for those disgusting fleas.

            I learned three things that day. I will never have carpet in my house again. Pregnant moms who are pushed to the crazy level can do some pretty irrational things. And sometimes we will never know the full extent of a problem until we are willing to do the hard work of ripping of the protectant layer.

            So, I ask, what carpet in your life have you been continually treating with topical solutions? Are you finding that no matter what you do, the fleas still keep coming back? Maybe it’s time to do the extreme work of ripping up that protectant layer in your life and dealing with the fleas and eggs underneath. If you don’t, those fleas will start taking over every area in your life and will soon be bigger than what those topical solutions can handle.

            If we don’t do the hard work, it will only get worse. Let’s rip that carpet up and deal with whatever we find hiding underneath.