Our mold story

  • Air Quality
    Air quality is something that we all seem to not even think about, and this is not a good thing because there are a lot of people who are affected in a negative way and become very ill just from the air they breath.

  • Histoplasmosis
    Our older daughter was affected by Histoplamosis when she was in high school. This is her story.

  • Buying or Renting A Mold Free Home
    Home inspections are needed when looking at a new home to buy or rent. You can do a good inspection on your own with just a little know how. We will walk you through what to look for.

  • Perspectives on Mold
    A closer look at toxic mold and the dangers of toxic mold to the environment and our health.

 

The writtings below are our story, a diary of the events if you will, about our families battle with toxic mold.

I am sick of being sick! 7 years ago after DH injured his back and could no longer work, we lost our home. We moved into an old farm house, which at the time we thought was way cool, until 4 years later when we found black mold growing on our bedroom wall. This find came after we all started getting very sick, and could not get better. Well that mold was not only on that wall, it was IN that wall, under the floor, and in other walls throughout the house. We had no choice but to stay there until we could find a clean house to live in, unfortunately being poor due to hubby's back injury that was not an easy task because it cost a bundle to move these days, between a first and last on the rent, and deposits, and not being able to work the job we were able to work which was the Internet. When you move you have a little down time with no connection.

We did finally find a brand new modular that was clean and we were able to afford. Unfortunately, this house had problems with the central air system. It blew insulation throughout the house from the attic and walls, and sucked dust and derbies up from the crawl space. This did not help our already sick lungs, and hubby nearly died from it. Hubby was able to see a doctor, who said he had COPD, asthma, and possibly mold infection in his lungs. Unfortunately we could not afford for me to see a doctor for the severe pains throughout my body, but I felt I could cope, and hubby needed a DOC more than I did since after all, he couldn't breath and thought he was going to die from suffocation. He had me scared half to death! Anyway, the owner of the modular refused to fix the central air, and when the heat of summer hit, we all thought we would die from the heat and humidity, because the AC did not work at all. We kept complaining for the problem to be taken care of, but it was such a big job and costly, he refused to fix it, and left us sitting in a house that caused myself and our autistic son to have multiple heat strokes through one of the hottest summers on record for Indiana. This of course upset me and I complained more, and the owner told us, he was not doing the repairs and we would have to get out!!!

After looking for yet another house we could live in that was not moldy, (the farm made us all very allergic to ALL molds, as well as a lot of chemicals too), our choices came down to, a moldy home that would kill us all, or get out of the state to a state that was dryer and not so much mold. So we sold and gave away every single thing we owned, all we kept were a few clothes for each of us, craft and jewelry supplies so we could make a little money on our creations, our lap top computers, the kids school books and supplies, (we homeschool), and a tent and camping supplies! We placed a few things in a very small storage unit, and we headed West, leaving our life and belongings behind for a second time in a year, as we lost everything on the farm to the mold, it was all too moldy to take with us. So we left with what we could pack in the back and on the top of our mini van with 200,000 miles on it, and headed for dry Country. We camped all the way, with the exception of a few motels we "tried" to stay at. Most of the motels all had mold in them too. Remember, we are very sensitive and the tiniest amount makes us all very sick. Camping was fun, but I was very sick from staying at hubby's mom's for a few days, (not sure what was in her house other than dust, which I am also sensitive too), but even with that issue, we all had a good time on our journey across the Country to find a new home.

We had absolutely no clue at all where we were going, all we knew is we had to get to the dryer states and take it from there. We ended up in Colorado and fell in love! The air was clean, and fresh, and we could finally breath again, (Indian was so bad it made me sick to be outside!), so we started looking for our new home. We looked in Trinidad, but there were no rentals there, so we kept going North, and came upon the small town of Walsenburg. Here we quickly found a nice little house that had hardwood flooring, (I am sensitive to carpeting too), and had just been remolded. We were turned down at first because there were too many of us, (5), and we had brought or cat, (no way were we giving her up now), so we offered an extra $50.0 a month on the rent. That was accepted and we were told we would have to pay an addition $100.00 on the deposit for our cat.

Here's were our story gets really sad. After all we have gone through for the last 6+ years, our new home that appeared to be free of any mold when we first moved in, acquired a leak in the basement, and by the time we found it, the mold had already begun to grow! It only takes 24 hours for mold to start growing, if the moisture issue is not taken care of right away, then you have a major problem on your hands. We did what we could to stop the problem from getting worse, but the water kept coming in and we could not figure out where it was coming from. We took bucket upon bucket of dirt out of the basement that was down there, until we got it all up off the concrete floor, (this took many days of working on it when we could, remember hubby has a bad back, and I have a hernia so hubby refused to let me carry it at all, there was a lot of dirt), and we have been running a fan down there to dry it up 24/7 for the last 5 weeks or so. We finally have figured out where the bulk of the water has been coming from, the water heater! The heater had problems when we moved in, and the contractor who did the remolding repaired the element, and put on a new pressure relief, but that did not fix it. Last week we found the pressure relief valve leaking, okay, it was pouring out when we found it at 3:00 am! Needless to say, the mold is so bad now, that it is making us all sick, and just when we thought the hell we left behind in Indiana was over. We are now waiting for a new heater to be installed, and in the meantime, we are doing without hot water. We turn the power to it on at night long enough to heat the water, then we all quickly take our bathes and cut the power. Not only are we dealing with all of this, but the water heater not working properly, is causing the electric meter to crank, and costing us big money, (the light company told us that was why our bill was so high, close to $100.00 for 2 weeks! We only have a fan, fridge and two laptops and a few standard lights at that time!)

So here we are, nice dry state, and right back in the same boat, living in a house with mold. If we owned the house ourselves, we could have taken care of things long before now, but since we are renting, we've had to wait, and waiting has created a situation we can not live in much longer. We sleep with the windows open so that the mold gases do not build to high, but once the temps start cooling down in the fall, that will be out of the question. At this point I am ready to live in our tent, it seems the only way we are going to be able to not deal with mold, is to either build our own log home, buy an RV, or just live in a tent. Needless to say I am frustrated, aggravated, irritated, and plain sick on being sick! Oh and if I failed to mention it, contrary to popular believe, ALL molds can make you sick, even kill you if you are sensitive to them, not just black molds! When I complained about the mold growing in the basement, I was told, "we don't have a problem with black mold in Colorado"! All molds are harmful to someone who is allergic to molds, and I am highly allergic to all molds, including the mold growing in my basement right now. Oh, and there are molds much more toxic that black molds out there.

The bottom line, molds, all molds, can be very dangerous, and can make any person very sick, especially if you live with a mold problem for very long. There is a whole host of illnesses linked to molds to, a few are, asthma, lupus, cancers, fibromyalgia, arthritis, bleeding lungs, nose bleeds, and the list goes on.

You can find more info, and links to some great info by going to our web site at, www.thejoyofhope.org Please do not take mold lightly, it is a very serious problem and it is growing like a cancer across the country. It is becoming more well known and talked about, but still not enough. People are dying in the homes with no way out, and no one wants to help. Please don't let yourself become one of these people, it is not a bag of tea, in any way at all.

Mold is something we all know about, or do we? I thought I knew about mold. It smells musty, it looks gross, and it's found everywhere. Right? Well that is true, but it should not be in our homes, in the walls, and under the floors, or in the basement, or attic. Mold can make some people very, very ill, and in some cases it even kills! The story below is our story. Our hope is that by telling what we have been through and we continue to go through, that others will learn about the dangers of mold, how to deal with it and when to leave it altogether.

5 years ago we moved to what we thought was "Our dream come true". We had a couple of acres of land to grow our gourds and a place for a veggie garden. A nice 3 bedroom 2 bath house. All nestled on a 194 acre farm.
In January of this year we all became very sick. High fevers, lungs full of gunk, head full of gunk. Our youngest daughter got a horrible infection in her ear that looked like white mold was growing all inside her ear. The doctor gave her antibiotics which did NOTHING for her! Our daughter is 9 years old and this was only the second time in her entire life that she has had to take an antibiotic, so it was not because she took them all the time that they did not work. I think it was because the doctor was treating one thing and it was actually something else that she had. It took two weeks for the infection to be totally gone. After the antibiotic not working for our daughter, we all started taking Olive Leaf Extract. Olive Leaf is a natural, (God's) antibiotic. It does not build up in the body as antibiotics do, and it will treat viral infections as well as, bacterial and fungal infections! After starting on the Olive Leaf we all started feeling better, but not 100%. We remained "almost well" for weeks and weeks. Then one day for some odd reason I don't even remember now, we moved our bed from where it was and when we did, we found black mold growing on the wall. The mold was growing on the corner walls where our bed was up against the wall. We immediately threw the mattress and box springs out, because the mold was all over them. With this discovery we began to understand WHY we had all been so sick for so long and WHY we were not getting entirely over it. We also began to understand why the outer east wall of our bedroom had always looked like something was eating the drywall under the paint. Moisture and mold was eating the drywall and had been since before we moved in. I also began to understand why our older daughters room had always smelled musty and moldy, and why she always seemed to get sicker than anyone else in the house. There was a serious mold problem with our home and it was making us all sick. We got all the mold cleaned off the walls, threw the bed out, and got an air mattress. We then started researching mold on the web. We learned more than we had been ready for.

By this time we all still were not 100% over the sickness we got in January, and it was now March! So we decided that we needed to get out of that room all together. So we moved our foam padding pallet, (the air bed broke!), and our clothes to the living room. We then called out the health department to check for mold. That was a joke actually, they check for moisture and look to "SEE" mold, but they do not test for molds. The man that came out did say that he could smell the mold so it was there, and he said there was moisture in the walls and the carpet. The carpet actually had mold growing in it! He also found moisture in our daughters room and in the wall. (This explained why I had smelled a musty, moldy smell in there since we had moved in).
Us like many people in this country think of mold as I explained it above. A musty odor and gross black or green or some other color that is growing on a wall or other surface. What people do not know about molds and funguses is that high levels of the stuff can make a lot of people very ill, and in some cases can be deadly! Some of the symptoms of toxic mold exposure is, Nasal Congestion, Irritation of the eyes, Inflammation of the sinuses, Irritation of the skin, Breathlessness, Headache, Runny nose, Fatigue, Cough, Sore throat, Hoarseness, Inflammation of the ear, Bleeding Lungs, Nose Bleeds, Memory Loss, Arthralgia ( Pain in the joints without swelling ) and the list goes on. For more in depth information on different types of molds and the dangers of them visit the links below.
 

Dan did most of the research and put together a number of web pages pertaining to what he found. You can see his pages by clicking here.

Once we had everyone moved into the living room, we had to decide what to do next. We felt that if we covered the hallway and stayed at the front of the house we would be safe from the mold while Dan cleaned it all up, or tried to clean it up. So Dan started working on the clean up. He had to first fix the moisture problem, which was a lot of cracks and holes in the mortar of the brick work of the outside of the house. So he started there. As he was filling gaps, cracks and holes, he got to a window that had severely rotted wood all around it. There was a huge piece of wood that had broken away and Dan looked in through the opening and found lots of pretty colors growing inside the wall of our bedroom!!! Same wall we had been sleeping against for a few months!
Next he had to till and re - landscape the ground in front of the house so it would slope down away from the house instead of into the foundation like it was. He made some ants pretty mad too, now they are invading our house by the thousands! He also had to tear out carpeting throughout the house. The allergens the carpet was holding was causing allergy trouble for me. A plus to my allergies, I can no longer live in a house with carpeting : ) I have always hated carpeting, it is one of the nastiest thing man ever invented!
Dan has spent so much time and has worked so hard to clean up the mold here, but it seems the more he does at this point, the more mold he finds and the more him and I both get sick. Dan's breathing has gotten to a scary point, he has times that he just cannot breath in without a lot of difficulty! The kids do not seem to be affected by it like we are so long as they stay out of that end of the house.

We've arranged a converted room in the garage so that the kids have their own "domain" to go to and work on their school work or read or play games. It wasn't practical to do during the summer because their is no AC in that room, but with cooler temps upon us it works as it is heated : ) This will make our situation more bearable over the winter while we work on saving up enough so that we can move to a healthier home.

Not only do we have to save in order to move, but we have to replace over 50% of our belongings because we had no place to store our things, so they sat in all the contaminated rooms and now they are contaminated to the point they have to be burned. All our clothes we did not get out may be able to be washed with vinegar, but will the vinegar smell come out when we re - wash them will be what decides if we can keep those or not. All the wooden furniture has to go, the kids stuffed toys, all the Bible study books that were in our bedroom. All our beds have to be replaced, our dressers, all most everything. I thank God for the sense to wrap all our wedding albums and my dads burial flag in plastic or we would have lost those too. We've lost so much, but the worst of it is loosing our health. For someone who is highly allergic to molds, which I now know I am, it can be very devastating, and sometimes a very painful ordeal.
I have always had a sensitivity to just about everything, certain plants, pollens, dust, chemicals, medications, etc. We moved to the house we live in now 5 years ago this November. The second Spring we were here I noticed that my allergy to tomato plants, (I can eat the fruit), had gotten much worse, and I could no longer mow the grass without breaking out in a red rash all over my face and arms that itched and burned something horrible. Over the past 5 years it has gotten almost unbearable. Not that it is excruciatingly painful. It's just aggravating to burn and itch just because you picked a few tomatoes, or mowed the grass. It's even more frustrating though, when the same thing starts to happen when you dust or sweep, when it never was a problem before.
My allergies have grown and are now magnified to the point that I'm almost constantly itching, sneezing, coughing, have a runny nose, headaches all the time, swelling and extreme pain in my legs, ankles, feet and knees as well as my wrist and hands. My whole body hurts. I have horrible pains in my chest, ribs, and back. It hurts so bad in my chest at times, that in the beginning, I questioned if I wasn't having a heart attack! When I leave the house for extended periods of time I feel better to a degree, unless I end up in a building that has mold in it. Then I know it pretty much right away. I will either begin coughing, sneezing, itching, or get an instant headache.
I honestly believe the reason for my increase in allergy's is from my mold exposure in this house. There is no doubt in my mind at all that the mold has been here since before we moved in, that means myself and my entire family has been exposed to it and breathing it in for close to 5 years now! The thing I do not understand is why it got so bad over the past year.
 



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