The source of all evil

The source of all evil is mold. At least it is here in my house.

Frank came home tonight and said, "Hey, the hallway floor is all wonky." We opened up the hall closet with the HVAC and, lo and behold, dripping water from the AC unit. Water that has been dripping since we turned on the AC in May. That has soaked the wallboard, wood under the AC unit, wall to the hall storage closet, the carpet in the hall closet, the Pergo flooring on both sides of the hallway. And grown mold.

Mold, eh, not so bad right?

Wrong. See previous post on how I've felt bad for about, oh, a month. Since we turned on the AC. We've been blowing mold through our house. We've been blowing known mycotoxins through our house. Me, with my stellar immune system, has felt awful. Sarah has been sick, Frank has been sick.

Symptoms of mold health problems:

runny nose
sore throat
scratchy eyes
red eyes
sore lungs
cough
coughing blood
tight chest
sinus infection
lung infection
asthma
skin rashes
bad dandruff
fever
general malaise


Out of those, I have 12 out of 15. That's bad. So far I'm not coughing blood, don't have any new skin rashes and I haven't had any asthma attacks.

What's worse is I decided that to test if it really was the mold making me feel bad, I should try to pull the carpet out of the closet. There was moisture in there, it smelled funky, so I knew there had to be mold. I pulled the carpet up and sure enough, mold. Pulled out the carpet pad, mold. Pulled off the wall trim, mold. Pulled up the carpet nail wood stick thingie, mold.

Apparently there was a lot of mold. My lungs are hot they feel so rotten. My eyes feel like there is sandpaper inside my lids. I can feel the nastiness inside my chest and it scares me. I don't have health insurance. The best I can hope for is good mold eradication and no long term asthmatic affects.

Now we have to thoroughly clean all affected areas. Possibly clean the ventilation system. Replace the hall closet floor, the hallway wood floor and possibly the support wood and wall of the utility closet. But we figured out where the water was coming from and fixed it. There was a clog in the pipe that drains the condensation from the AC, we blew it out with the water hose and now it seems OK.

Because the only thing worse than a house with mold, is a house without AC. Because tomorrow it's supposed to by 101 degrees. Thursday? 106. All the way through next week, over 100. Not a good time to be without AC.