I know from personal experience how important this issue is, please read and at the end is my mold story.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9257610/"The conditions now are ideal" for mold to grow, Wasserman says. "The mold problems will be very significant."
Advice for returning home
Before people settle back into their homes, the buildings should be inspected by health officials and proper steps should be taken to deal with the mold, says Dr. Dorsett Smith, a respiratory specialist at the University of Washington in Seattle and a member of the disaster response committee for the American College of Chest Physicians.
Damp wallboards should be removed and the studs behind them inspected. Mold grows on the cellulose in wood, and as long as moisture remains the mold will flourish, Smith says.
"With moisture, heat and food it can survive for years," he says.
Airing out the house and spraying wood with fungicide can help, but in some cases walls will have to be completely torn down to properly get rid of the mold, experts say.My mold story:
I am on a mission to help others become aware of how simple mold in your home can have potentially catastrophic affects. I am not wanting to have my home declared a “super fund” site, nor have I any desire to sue anyone, I just want people to be aware of, and know the harmful effects of household mold.
I have been taught since childhood that if I work hard, be respectful, and do the “right” thing that everything will be ok. Then life happens, and your plans, hopes and dreams somehow go wrong, and your world is suddenly turned upside down to the point of questioning your own sanity. But deep down what I was taught still guides me, and despite all, I know it will be all right in the end, even though the end is not yet here.
It all began for us in May of 2002 when we purchased our “perfect” home. A nice 1929 bungalow with 1.5 acres, and the right price. We sold our home, moved in and jumped right into the needed repairs, and making it ours.
One month later I began to get sick. After 6 months still sick and enduring test after test, doctor after doctor nothing could be found “medically” wrong. I was finally told maybe I needed a psychiatrist, and was labeled a neurotic, menopausal, hypochondriac. Wow, I knew, I was a little high strung, and some may call me a little crazy, but these problems were not in my head. I kept searching for the answer as to why I and now my family were so sick.
Then I opened the newspaper one day and began to read a mold story and decided to do some research. The first thing I discovered was the many varying opinions on mold and how serious a problem it could be and that this went way beyond my knowledge base. I tracked down an environmental consultant to do an assessment of our home. This was one of the best decisions we made and I learned a lot. Mold needs food and water to survive. Molds are not all bad, but when there is a moisture problem in your home mold will begin to grow and feed on any available food source. Mold loves construction materials; i.e. wood, drywall, fiberboard insulation etc. Once it begins to grow it develops roots and begins to rot the materials and mix with the chemicals and this in turn produces mycotoxins. As mold grows it produces spores and even when the water is stopped the mold cells will go dormant, but the spores don’t. The spores are the principle carriers of the toxins and these are what become airborne. Once airborne these spores are just like pollen, every time they are disturbed by touching or just walking by more spores are released into the air. Breathing in the mycotoxins are what caused the symptoms I experienced. Headaches, extreme fatigue, joint pain, digestive problems, cough, nose bleeds, skin rashes and open sores.
We did not have visible mold growing on the walls, it was all hidden, and even the mold consultant did not think we really had a bad mold problem. He suggested we remove the paneling from the basement walls and he did an air quality test.
That weekend it was raining and I convinced my husband and sons to start taking down the paneling in the basement. That was when the fun began. We discovered the main water line into the house was leaking. A drip, drip leak onto the wood frame and fiberboard insulation for the paneling. Perfect, a 24-hour water source, food and darkness, a mold spore’s dream! Then as we took more paneling down we also discovered a room! What we thought was a small crawl space under our sunroom was actually a room with a 6’ ceiling, dirt floor, brick walls and filled with cardboard boxes and old wood doors. It was completely sealed off with no ventilation and very wet. The perfect haven, a hidden room. We now knew that there were two major mold sources.
Where do you begin, what do you do, and how? The first thing was to call the mold consultant. After discussing what we found with the consultant, we sealed the stairway to the basement and put duct tape over all the air vents. The basement needed to be gutted, vacuumed with a hepa vacuum and sprayed with a biocide chemical. Then remove and replace the heating and AC system and clean the duct work. Also, the whole house needed to be emptied and everything either cleaned with the biocide or thrown away. A plan, ok, we could do this. Ohhhh the power of denial.
We could not afford to hire a mold remediation company, so we began the work ourselves. The guys worked in the basement and I started upstairs. Three dumpsters later, what was left and could be cleaned was in our garage. We had to throw out anything paper, since it cannot be cleaned. Books, pictures, office paperwork. Our couch, chairs and mattress’s also could not be cleaned, gone. Dried flower arrangements, small kitchen appliances, Christmas decorations, and all our food, gone, gone, gone. Anything that was not hard and cleanable was thrown out.
Our neighbors must have thought these people have lost their minds. Our garage was full, the back patio was piled with all our clothes waiting to be washed, and behind the barn was another pile of debris from the basement and most of our furniture. We were up by 5:00 in the morning and never stopped before 8 or 9 at night. We slept in the house with the windows open and no heat for a week.
After the house was emptied, we hepa vacuumed every square inch, then spayed and wet wiped it all with the biocide. We ended up taking what personal possessions were left out of our garage, one at a time, spraying and wiping them down then taking them back inside. Little by little our house was beginning to be put back together. In all this took about a month. My husband and boys were wonderful through all of this. We all took our turn having a little nervous break down, but then back to work. Of course we were really stressed, because my husband and I were still working full time and the boys were still in school.
We had to keep the basement dry so the next step was to trench around the foundation, tar the walls and install drain tile to carry the water away from the house. We also have two dehumidifiers going to keep the humidity down and the basement dry.
By September we were ready to begin gutting the walk up attic. (I don’t think “ready” is the right word, it should be no choice but to begin gutting the attic) it was we hoped the final step. We had sealed the attic off while we worked on the rest of the house because it was just too much at the time.
Soooo, we began and I was feeling really good, the end was in sight! Then my husband came downstairs. He had discovered more mold! We knew the roof was not done correctly by the previous owners, but had no idea how bad it was. The insulation and old drywall was filled with mold from previous roof leaks. There was no flashing around the chimney or vents and they were leaking. The ceilings were plaster and lathe and there were signs that the lathe board was moldy. We had now found the 3rd source of mold and realized the rest of the house needed to be gutted.
I cannot describe the range of emotions we experienced. We were worn out and beyond exhaustion and looking at losing everything. I have to tell the truth, we seriously considered just walking away and giving the house to the bank. But pride or stupidity (however, you view it) kept us from taking that step. We decided not to give up but to borrow more money and get rid of the mold.
After finishing the attic we started on the kitchen. The mold in the ceiling was really bad and no matter how we tried the seal off the area the spores were everywhere and I was really sick. It was now painfully obvious that we could not live in the house anymore and complete the work at the same time. We moved out.
It has now been six months. Every room has been gutted, cleaned, sealed and floors sanded. Drywall, paint, flooring and finish work is done and the “for sale” sign is in the front yard. We have been through too much.
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