Need Help. Not quite sure what to do.

Not been to Arizona or Nevada. Allergy testing indicates just as severe allergies to the 'dry weather molds'. But it's possible the spore count would be lower elsewhere, so total exposure lower.

Wet wiping is the best method of removing settled particles from the environment, followed by HEPA filtration. I have been maintaining various Honeywell HEPA certified air filters in each room for as long as I've lived with my wife, who has (more socially accepted) pollen allergies. Go for a minimum of 4 air changes of room volume per hour (ACH).
Any recommendations on a HEPA Vac? How about the model numbers for the Honeywell HEPA? (Want to buy some machine tools??? :cry: )

Right now the battle is the HRV system bringing in contamination. Also, a drain line with 'chimney' effect bringing air to the furnace room from a 'wet daylight' area. Blocked the drain line correctly now. Ordered inline filter box with Hepa+MERV13 prefilter, and a booster fan to catch input to the HRV. Cleaned the HRV often, but couldn't get into the flex duct. Replaced flex duct last night, cleaned connectors, and HRV again.


General practitioners will sometimes not be willing to go to bat for you because the science is weak surrounding the condition.
I beg to differ on the science. Read up on Shoemaker Protocol / CIRS. The diagnosis and treatment is science based. LOTS of labs. The problems is cost of the specialized labs. Gene testing is even part of the diagnosis.

I'll have to ponder the rest of what you are saying. I hear you, and I believe you. I just don't want to hear you or believe you right now...
 
The reason I say the science is weak is that doctors follow the CDC, and the CDC follows statistics. With rare conditions like this, it takes much much longer for the statistics to reach the point of rulemaking and acceptance. It just doesn't affect enough of the population to even be on radar. Most of what I know about mold is guidance direct from CDC and NIOSH. They both have web pages for Indoor Air Quality (IAQ), sometimes called Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ), and mold. Those are your search terms. I'm trying to give you fish here.

As for HEPA room filters/air purifiers, we've had 3 generations of Honeywell-branded stuff in a range of sizes, and every bit of it has been high quality. I'm a stickler for quality, and the Honeywell stuff is institutional grade. Hospitals can use recirculating HEPA filters in tuberculosis isolation rooms to make up for low numbers from central dilution ventilation (up to 50% of the total). Just poke around Amazon for the current offerings. Inhalation is the route of exposure for spores, so filtering the air continually will reduce the amount you inhale, which should reduce your symptoms within hours. If your house is painted with matte dispersion paint, consider re-painting with gloss latex paint (assuming you don't have a latex allergy) or a gloss polymer like acrylic. That provides less spaces for spores to settle, and is easier to clean/disinfect. Every time you shower or boil a pot of water on the stove, you are providing moisture to cooler surfaces like interior walls. Get rid of carpet. Buy vinyl furniture. Install a higher flowing bathroom fan in rooms with baths/showers. Don't use the stove without a canopy fan on. Your gas furnace, depending on age, may contribute to high air moisture. I'm only as serious as you are, this stuff is in the IAQ Guide to Mold, available online. EPA also has guides for "the built environment" targeting "sensitive persons" such as yourself.

The best way to prevent mold in your house is to do as you've done, eliminate all moisture incursion. Mold can't survive without water and a substrate to grow on. Since everything is a substrate, remove the water and spore production stops. Remember the fire triangle? It's equivalent to removing oxidizer from the fire. No water, no mold.
 
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I help a couple friends with Summer and Fall grain harvest here in Kansas and have fought allergies all my life. I've found that I'm symptom free all day long while driving a tractor with a pressurized and filtered cab. It would be a godsend if an entire home or workplace could be filtered like the inside of a tractor cab.
 
I help a couple friends with Summer and Fall grain harvest here in Kansas and have fought allergies all my life. I've found that I'm symptom free all day long while driving a tractor with a pressurized and filtered cab. It would be a godsend if an entire home or workplace could be filtered like the inside of a tractor cab.
Have a HEPA filter box and booster fan coming for the HRV inlet to the house. Turns out that inlet is one source of contamination I'm dealing with. So, the molds that grow outside are getting in.

Am actually considering setting that up for constant positive pressure. The only issue is our humidity level, so care would need to be taken. Still contemplating the pitfalls.

But for now, I need to make sure I'm not getting more contamination into the space, while trying to get existing contamination out. Not easy, when you start looking at all the sources.

The more I study this lifebreath unit, the more I dislike it. Now, they won't talk to homeowners directly. So, I'll call my HVAC guy and get permission to be "his employee" for the day, so I can talk to technical support to verify when the auxiliary terminals actually operate. Have to tie the booster fan to the HRV operation. Manual isn't clear on this.
 
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Thanks for the resources. They are added to my reading list. Every bit helps. Some comments in line below.

The reason I say the science is weak is that doctors follow the CDC, and the CDC follows statistics.
I'll not disagree. However that's policy, not science. Even very rare diseases get a lot of 'press'. I'm really wondering if it's just too expensive to deal with.

With something like 50% of buildings in the country possibly having water damage, no one wants to go there. If what the genetics says is true, 24% of the population is susceptible to mold illnesses. So the numbers are there, which might be the problem. It's too big of a problem to admit exists. A lot of people with these type problems end up spending HUGE amounts of money. Way more than the average family income in this country. I'm close to breaking into my retirement funding just to start working on the issue.


Inhalation is the route of exposure for spores, so filtering the air continually will reduce the amount you inhale, which should reduce your symptoms within hours. If your house is painted with matte dispersion paint, consider re-painting with gloss latex paint (assuming you don't have a latex allergy) or a gloss polymer like acrylic. That provides less spaces for spores to settle, and is easier to clean/disinfect. Every time you shower or boil a pot of water on the stove, you are providing moisture to cooler surfaces like interior walls. Get rid of carpet. Buy vinyl furniture. Install a higher flowing bathroom fan in rooms with baths/showers. Don't use the stove without a canopy fan on. Your gas furnace, depending on age, may contribute to high air moisture. I'm only as serious as you are, this stuff is in the IAQ Guide to Mold, available online. EPA also has guides for "the built environment" targeting "sensitive persons" such as yourself.
All good points. And agree totally.

House is new (5-6 yrs). Avoided carpet, furniture is leather, etc. Knew going into the build allergies are a problem, so built accordingly. The exception is maybe the paint, Eggshell. Do all the due diligence air handling maintenance, etc.

Didn't expect mold issues to this extent when planning the build. Might have done things differently knowing that. There are building protocols for severe mold allergy patients. They are draconian. Things like treatment of studs with anti fungal, and not using OSB (porous, grows molds easily), etc. Special drywall, etc. Going that route would basically require starting over from scratch. That's not on the table right now.

The best way to prevent mold in your house is to do as you've done, eliminate all moisture incursion. Mold can't survive without water and a substrate to grow on. Since everything is a substrate, remove the water and spore production stops. Remember the fire triangle? It's equivalent to removing oxidizer from the fire. No water, no mold.
Yep, agree. I don't EVER let moisture even condense on a window even. If it gets to that point I'm on it immediately.


If the issues what I suspect, cross contamination from outside sources may be the biggest unknown and hardest to control. I've identified several external contamination sources on my own (Scientific method type experimentation). Unfortunately those contamination sources/processes EXACTLY match the pitfalls outlined in the Mold Illnesses book. THAT is what scares me. Because that evidence points towards something that's a LOT harder to fix and VERY expensive to get a under control.

My wife works in the oldest building on her campus. She comes home with her bag, jacket, pants, etc. That can bring contamination in.
That's the sort of stuff that's hard to get a handle on. I work in an old building, and have found historical water damage. That may be the source of contamination in my brand new truck.

I don't remember the practitioner, but the quote was "... And some people need to get in their car naked and drive away.".
 
This thread has been quiet for a while now.

It is NOT mold growing in the home. It is mold getting into the home from the outside environment. Other buildings, the woods, the yard, fields, etc. Other buildings that grow their own molds are particularly bad.

So 10 months in, and there really isn't much change. Although I do have a better understanding of what is happening. Responses to molds and other allergens are triggering system wide inflammation. Blood work confirms very skewed numbers that point right at inflammation, and all of the other symptoms point towards inflammation. The times I'm able to clear my system (few and far between), a following exposure results in exactly the same pattern of reaction over several days. The problem is there isn't enough time between exposures to clear and heal. It's constant.

This is also not a histamine reaction. None of the typical 'seasonal allergies' type stuff going on. Drugs for those do nothing to slow this down. It has to do with the allergens entering the body.

Many thousands of dollars out of pocket in the last 10 months, and haven't really gained anything. Working with several Dr's on general health, gut health, and everything else, and they're not finding anything amiss. I know this is mold, I know this is a reaction to mold, but so far have been unable to stop it, eliminate it, or even slow it down.

The final nail the the coffin for this was a week out of state. A day after traveling, no symptoms. I fully expected to start getting sick and it never happened. I started pushing things hard to see if I could react. Walking 5-7 miles a day on windy days, sand, dirt, grime blowing in my face. Nothing, zero response. Flew back home, and within a few hours I was sick again. The following days home have been horrible. Was hoping the break would reset my system, it appears to have allowed me to rest enough to react even more now.

From here, there's really only two options that make any sense. Long term prednisone (which shuts this down), or leaving the area (which also appears to shut it off). Neither are viable right now, of course doing nothing isn't viable either.
 
This thread has been quiet for a while now.

It is NOT mold growing in the home. It is mold getting into the home from the outside environment. Other buildings, the woods, the yard, fields, etc. Other buildings that grow their own molds are particularly bad.

So 10 months in, and there really isn't much change. Although I do have a better understanding of what is happening. Responses to molds and other allergens are triggering system wide inflammation. Blood work confirms very skewed numbers that point right at inflammation, and all of the other symptoms point towards inflammation. The times I'm able to clear my system (few and far between), a following exposure results in exactly the same pattern of reaction over several days. The problem is there isn't enough time between exposures to clear and heal. It's constant.

This is also not a histamine reaction. None of the typical 'seasonal allergies' type stuff going on. Drugs for those do nothing to slow this down. It has to do with the allergens entering the body.

Many thousands of dollars out of pocket in the last 10 months, and haven't really gained anything. Working with several Dr's on general health, gut health, and everything else, and they're not finding anything amiss. I know this is mold, I know this is a reaction to mold, but so far have been unable to stop it, eliminate it, or even slow it down.

The final nail the the coffin for this was a week out of state. A day after traveling, no symptoms. I fully expected to start getting sick and it never happened. I started pushing things hard to see if I could react. Walking 5-7 miles a day on windy days, sand, dirt, grime blowing in my face. Nothing, zero response. Flew back home, and within a few hours I was sick again. The following days home have been horrible. Was hoping the break would reset my system, it appears to have allowed me to rest enough to react even more now.

From here, there's really only two options that make any sense. Long term prednisone (which shuts this down), or leaving the area (which also appears to shut it off). Neither are viable right now, of course doing nothing isn't viable either.
Se a Rheumatologist, It may be you have that. Rheumatoid is all about inflammation.
 
The final nail the the coffin for this was a week out of state. A day after traveling, no symptoms. I fully expected to start getting sick and it never happened. I started pushing things hard to see if I could react. Walking 5-7 miles a day on windy days, sand, dirt, grime blowing in my face. Nothing, zero response. Flew back home, and within a few hours I was sick again.
Try that again to verify that it is location specific.
"... And some people need to get in their car naked and drive away.".
Destination, the desert SW!
 
I would try to reach out to a doctor who is willing to look at three things with you: 1) Gut health [boosts immunity], 2) De-toxifying [using anti-oxidants to improve your liver function] and 3) Addressing inflammation.
I remembered this post. It was all right on point, and it's exactly what we've been doing for 10 months now. It's breaking the bank, as none of that stuff is cheap. The only thing it isn't helping. And yeah, you're right there with liver function. Those are the markers that keep showing inflammation. The cycle up and down with the weather. Snow on the ground = good numbers. Snow gone = bad numbers.


@Harry Knutz , have a followup with the Dr again next week. Will ask about Rheumatologist consult.
 
Destination, the desert SW!
You'd think so. Allergist said the desert won't help, just as allergic to dry weather molds too. But don't know for sure...

What helped was being near the coast. I think it gets hotter there, but maybe it's the occasional sea air (salinity) helping. The unknown, it was only 1 week out of 52, who knows how the other 51 would be.
And that's really the hard part. How to determine if someplace else would be better year around without trying.
 
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