May 15, 2008
The Mold Hard Truth
Wasn’t sure what to title this post. I went back and forth on “The Mold and the Beautiful” and “Molded Masses Yearning to Breathe Free.”
I’ll just lay it out. One of Caleb’s doctors suggested we have our house inspected for mold. We did, and yes, we have it. It’s in our basement, our HVAC unit, our AC ducts, and our sofa. It just so happens that Caleb is allergic to mold. For months, he has been unable to breathe through his nose and has had a sinus infection that won’t go away. The doctor won’t allow him to come home until the mold remediation process is complete, so he is recovering from surgery at Mimi’s house.
So how are we dealing with this news? We’d like to take it sitting down, but like I said, we have mold in our SOFA and in our big COMFY CHAIR!! So we’re having to take it standing up…or lying down.
We’ve felt lots of emotions through all this. Here are a few of them…
- Guilt. We should have had our house inspected for mold earlier.
- Anger. Our previous owner never disclosed the water damage.
- Fear. We’re having to spend way more money to fix this than we can afford right now. Who knew clean air costs about as much as a new car?
- Hope. We hope that fixing the mold problem (along with having the sinus surgery) will fix Caleb.
- Relief. Just knowing what is making him sick makes a huge difference.
So there you have it. On Tuesday we’ll toss our furniture in a dumpster. On Wednesday the men in hazmat suits remove the mold. On Thursday and Friday our new air conditioner, furnace, and dehumidifier will be installed. On Saturday the air ducts and carpets will be sanitized. Saturday night we will lie down in bed…breathing non-toxic air.
We’ve thought about throwing a fresh air party. Seriously, we could sell tickets to come stand around in our house and breathe pristine, clean air.
2 responses so far ↓
1 Zachary Foster // May 16, 2008 at 11:02 am
Andy, Having two girls and living in an 100 old house that we know has asbestos in it I know how you feel. As our second little girl (18 months) is always sick and coughing I have this feeling/guilt that it’s mold or the asbestos… I’m glad you know about it, but I’ll be praying that you can get a new comfy chair.
2 Mrs. Kramer // May 16, 2008 at 4:14 pm
Oh yea, I remember those days. What was it? We would be out of the house for two weeks back in 2001? A little problem: The mold remediators were untrained, uninsured and had no clue what they were doing. They cross contaminated the entire house. The airborne mold spore count was higher AFTER they finished then before they started.
Two years and $80K in litigation costs later, the matter settled favorably but we never went home agian. I have a child who requires sinus surgery from time to time, too.
A word of advice, do not take a child whose immune system is already compromised to the point of needing sinus surgery in a newly remedated house. Even in the best of cases, the house will not be safe for this child until the air has settled.
For some people, this stuff is nothing to mess around with. The very young, the very old and those who already have immune system complications are the most vulnerable.
Don’t bother asking your doctor. Most likely he will know little to nothing.
Here is a good source out of UConn
http://www.oehc.uchc.edu/CIEH.asp
Talk to me, Goose