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Serious start:11 September 2019
I also live in the UK. We don't have the problem with mold that you do but we do use a dehumidifier and find it helpful. I use it mostly to dry washing in the winter but if we are getting a lot of condensation on the windows I'll switch it on and it makes a significant difference.
One of the most useful things we've bought.
In areas that you can see and clean the mold, I have an idea (perhaps you already know this)
Clean the area first (borax also works for this) and then once it is clean leave a solution of borax water to dry on the area. This ended my battle with mold on my bathroom ceiling.
De-humidifier and borax have made a huge difference!
Thank you, @lil-chick and @ourania. I use very concentrated hydrogen peroxide but will try borax as well. I started to run the Dehumidifier for most of the day in my bedroom (where the mold spot seems to always form) and the air is really dry. I slept better last night as well. Work in progress!
Our family has had a multi-year "adventure" with mold avoidance, which started in 2016 when we discovered a (very small) garden of mold on our basement floor, which had been flourishing for a year or more due to a slow plumbing leak. At that point, one of my children was having severe digestive, behavioral, and psychiatric symptoms that were quite alarming. For the next three years, we practiced pretty extreme mold avoidance, moving to the desert and not going into many buildings, etc. The symptoms did not improve very much at all. At the time, we were eating a GAPS-style, very-high-in-veggies-and-liver-"superfoods" sort of diet.
In July 2019, we started the Low A Detox, out of desperation because our child was still so very unwell. Six weeks later, for the first time in this child's life, we started to see actual improvement - cessation of horrendous headaches (which would end in screaming and vomiting from the pain), near total resolution of a 7-year-long eating disorder, and many other improvements in this child's skin and hair, etc.
Exactly a year later, we rented a house in Santa Fe, NM - should be easy to find a rental in the desert, I incorrectly assumed. The rental was immaculate, yet a moldy smell was apparent when we first arrived, and mold spots could be seen on some of the window frames - but we crossed our fingers and hoped that everything would be fine. Three days later, my child who had been so well for an entire year...began to deteriorate rapidly. After a year with only two headaches total, headaches and vomiting started to occur every few days. Severe anxiety, panic, and psychiatric symptoms began again, increasing in severity. "I'm starting to feel....like I used to feel!" my shivering, crying child told me. We were still eating Low A, but it was obviously not enough to help this mold-sensitive person stay well.
We left the rental as soon as we could, three and a half weeks later, driving 12 hours back to our own low-mold house. The symptoms resolved within 24 hours - all the anxiety, headaches, and panic were gone.
All this is to say that in our experience, avoiding vitamin A foods is not enough - and neither is avoiding mold on its own - for a mold- and A-toxic person. Both are poisons in their own ways at certain doses...
@sarabeth-matilsky Are there simple ways to test if a home has a mold issue? When there is none openly visible.
My guess might be that our delicate tissues are not adequate for protection from molds.
@sarabeth-matilsky. Thank you so much for sharing your story. I think that you have experientially uncovered the reason for un-wellness in many of us. It really ring the bell for me! I have always been sensitive to mold. As a child I could see a large spot of mold on the wall in my room - and I had asthma and was sick with chest infections about every 2 months for several years in a row.
I remember sleeping over at a friend’s house in the area that smelled moldy. I could not sleep and had an attack of rhinitis for the entire night.
I have been living by the woods now for 10 years and soon after I moved here, I started to have health issues that I didn’t have before. My search for the “best diet” intensified and lead me to diets extremely high in Vitamin A. Both together were not helping of course.
Unfortunately I cannot move at present. But with low vitamin A diet and a dehumidifier running 24/7 I hope to be ok...
@orion. Yes, there are mold testing kits available like this one here.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01GOVL746?tag=oss-mold-test-20
I have never used one because I can see the mold with my own eyes but I think they can be useful when the mold is not visible.
Hi @Orion,
I'm pasting below some notes I recently took during consultation with a well-regarded mold inspector, as we wanted to thoroughly look through the house we are planning to buy to be as sure as possible we won't have any Mold Surprises... He sez:
A modular home that was built indoors then assembled on site will go a long way toward preventing mold growth inside walls from the beginning (avoids “lumberyard mold” that afflicts conventional construction when wet wood is buttoned up tight). Meticulous owners are also an asset. No carpet is wonderful.
There will always be some mold, and it would be suspicious if there were none found at all during an inspection. The questions are, how much is there, and where are any higher concentrations? Expensive to remediate: mold inside walls, floors, ceilings, and behind tile.
During inspection look especially carefully, with a flashlight, at problem spots: behind washing machines, under sink cabinets, inside kitchen cabinets next to sink (use your nose!), on ceilings that have plumbing directly above (under bathrooms and kitchen and laundry in crawlspace; can remove fiberglass batts to see if leaks above - they will get wet but not visibly moldy, so the mold would be on the wood under/above the batts. If fiberglass batts are wet, should definitely be replaced and can take that opportunity to apply clay/mineral spray and use rockwool instead. If fiberglass is in good shape, you can still remove it and apply the clay [to coat with a fine layer of clay will help avoid moisture condensing, and instead facilitates moisture-to-vapor then evaporating], and then replace batts.)
Improperly sized HVAC systems are Really Bad because they cycle on and off in such a way as to encourage condensation within the ducts and therefore mold growth, since the air cycling through will always have some bits of dust and pollen etc. = mold food. A geothermal system will have been installed by more knowledgeable people to begin with, and so will be much more likely to be the right size to begin with as well. Good to partner with such a company to do yearly duct cleaning. To start, they can do a blower test to determine if there are any leaks in the system.
Replacing soft ducting is fairly inexpensive. It unfortunately has fiberglass as a component, and while there are newer and better rockwool soft ducts becoming available, they are not easy to get yet. The HVAC folks should be able to see if there is anything growing near the plenum, but it will be harder to see, the deeper into the system you get, obviously. The best test is to smell: there will always be some odor when you turn it on, but if it smells consistently of mold for a while after, that’s Not Great and indicates that replacing the ductwork would be a good idea.
Mold inspector should take 5 or 6 air samples, and be sure to do them in the following locations: crawlspace, attic, perhaps a kitchen undersink cabinet and/or laundry room, and definitely at one of the HVAC outtake vents right after the system has been turned on.
Find out: how is the crawlspace and attic conditioned? Does the HVAC system handle air for the living space as well as the attic and crawlspace? If so, it should be re-done so that there are independent systems for living area, and one for the attic and one for the crawlspace. Depending on the size of the crawlspace and attic, one set of ERVs 12”x12” for each will be sufficient, with perhaps dehumidifiers as well. The attic and crawlspace should NOT have open vents to the outside, even though that’s what code says should be there - humid and organic-matter-filled air will be circulating if there are open vents, and in this case it’s better to have the spaces closed up, with constant air moving through but after it’s been somewhat filtered.
Blown in insulation in the attic is quite good, while continuous open venting can be dangerous if improperly done.