Update about my bugs - it's a Christmas miracle
Moving from my apartment to my house, unfortunately I brought a few roaches with me.
I tried everything to deal with the problem but it didn't work. And here's the scoop about cockroaches - you can be clean & neat and still be stuck with them. You just need a breading pair in there and you're *)#%)%.
I had worked with Terminex for almost 3 years. They'd come and spray every 3 months, set out a few traps but yet I still found them. It was frustrating and embarrassing. I hated having company over because you never knew when one would pop out of nowhere freaking out guests. It was a shame I dealt with for the past 3 years even though I had spent close to $1500 these past 3 years trying to rid them.
Last month I dumped Terminex and hired a local guy. I figured he couldn't be any worse than what I already had plus I'd be supporting a local businessman (second generation bug controls). He was slightly more expensive than Terminex but only by about $25 or so.
All I can say is it's a miracle. It's a God Damn Miracle. I was in tears when he left Friday morning (his first follow up visit). He said he only found one living bug. In the past month I found hundreds of barely living bugs, usually in the middle of my kitchen floor dying from the bait he put out from them. Every night I'd sweep another floor full of them up until about 2 weeks after his initial visit I was rarely seeing them. My problem is not solved, I'm just finally winning it. He'll be doing 4 more monthly visits until we have this problem licked and then after that it may still be 1-2 times a year to be sure.
Yesterday my best friend needed a last minute baby sitter but to be honest, I was in my jammies and in for the night. So she asked if she could drop her daughter off at my house while she ran her errands. The entire night we didn't see one bug and trust me if we did that girl would have been screaming. We had fun, played Mousetrap on the Wii and had fun feeding treats to Abbott, my cat. It was the best night in a long time because I felt a huge problem was being solved.
So I have this to say to you if you have seen roaches in your house. First, you are not a bad person, you are not some unclean heathen - sometimes they happen because you just happen to be near another home with a problem. Roaches love to travel.
Fixing the problem isn't as expensive as it seems but there are things you shouldn't waste money on. Exterminators that only spray do so for one reason - so they can have a lifetime commitment of spraying at your house. Sprays will kill some bugs but most usually just scatter and hide out until the coast is clear. If you hire an exterminator you want one that uses the baits and make sure it's the hardcore stuff like Advion. Most roach sprays at your local stores are a waste of time. Roaches evolve and most are adept at avoiding the stuff you buy over the counter. Boric acid does help some but you have to dust it over places. The best analogy I've had about Boric Acid is this - if you saw a giant snow pile in your path would you walk thru it or around it. Big piles of Boric Acid are like piles of snow - they just walk around.
If you can't afford an exterminator there are options. I would suggest this website - http://www.domyownpestcontrol.com/. Advion is roach crack. They eat it like I eat a pile of doublestuff oreo cookies - I won't quit til I'm stuffed. Of course my oreos aren't filled with poison that kills me but Advion is. Start with the gel but make sure you get under the counters and into the cracks where the bugs can be found. It's safe around pets - normally because you don't put it where your pets go but if they do nibble a little they would probably just spit it out. I also got the Advion traps to use between visits just to make sure. It also helps to have traps. They won't work on their own but they help give you a guideline of how bad the problem is. My traps are getting awfully empty these days (BTW I like the victor ones). Finally there is something called Gentrol, which is a growth regulator. Basically it speeds up the aging on the roaches to the point that they can't reproduce.
I wanted to post this for a reason. If you have bugs you aren't a bad person and there are solutions that work. Persistence is the best thing to have when dealing with this. But I feel that my problem is getting better and my house can be open for visitors without the shame of the bugs. If it can happen to me it can happen to you too!
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I don't think one could ever be bug free.
But I feel I'm winning the battle.
You just can't ever declare victory because it takes just one breeding pair and 
Palmetto bugs are what they call them in Florida.
And they are disgusting, and can't be exterminated since they do not really live in the house---they just come in from outside occasionally.
Tree roaches are why I have cats. I didn't even know I had them in the housewhen I lived in Houston, except for once or twice. I brought a cat home from work for a holiday weekend so she wouldn't go hungry, and the next morning there were three dead tree roaches. Needless to say, she did not go back to work with me. 
That's how mine got here - from my old apartment
How do you think those poor cockroaches feel being compared to republicans??!!!
I mean, where another person was present, and somehow he never even saw it.
He was a cable repair guy, was moving my TV to get behind it and I was standing behind him watching when all of the sudden I looked down and right next to this guy's hand was this GINORMOUS bug, the likes of which I'd never seen in my life, but it took every fiber of my being to stifle any reaction while I covertly covered the bug up with something and removed it all the while the repair guy had no idea that he was about one inch away from this monster!
but I think they are Jerusalem beetles. Huge scary looking things that our cats used to drag in the house and leave for us to find.
They were everywhere in Taiwan and the fly. I hate them with a passion.
It's amazing. If I see one I won't freak out. Heck if it's a spider I'll even help assist the spider to be free of the compounds of my home and take it outside. I had a semester of Invertbrate Biology - you got over the creepy crawlies real quickly in that class unless you wanted the others in the class to mock you.
But the one thing in my house that does bother me is anything that flies. I think if these roaches could fly, I would have burned the house to the ground trying to get rid of them.
Good for you
It creeped me out the first time I had to sweep them all up.
But so worth it in the end
