Our story starts back in 1998 when we moved into a rental home to accommodate our soon to be family of 5.  That included my father-in-law who was wheel chair bound and in need of our assistance.  I was pregnant with our daughter, Lexi, at the time.  Prior to moving into this house, my son, Austin, my husband, Don, and I were all in good health.  We had no serious health problems and were active, energetic individuals.  Within six months of moving into the house, we began to experience strange health problems.  Our son, Austin (5,) started complaining of severe headaches.  He was diagnosed as having migraines and experienced them several times a week.  He also began complaining of severe leg cramps and insomnia.  His seasonal allergies became year round allergies and he began exhibiting chronic upper respiratory problems. 

Lexi was born in March of 1999. We were told that she was a normal healthy baby, but from day one, she exhibited chronic upper respiratory problems. I began having difficulty sleeping and suffered from extreme fatigue.  I began having muscle soreness and cramping.  My symptoms then progressed to having daily migraine headaches, and allergy like symptoms.  I wound up having to give up a lucrative career to stay home and care for Lexi’s and my illness.  I made the most money, so we soon spiraled into financial turmoil.  When I had to quit, we lost our medical insurance and quickly accumulated over $10,000 in medical debt between the 4 of us.

At about 7 months old, Lexi developed Henoch-Schonlein Purpura, a rare blood disorder that could not be explained.  What first appeared to be a diaper rash on her bottom, quickly progressed to large red bruises across her body.  Her body was bleeding out underneath her skin.  It would start as a dot or two of blood seen under the surface of her skin, and within 30 minutes, it turned into a large pool of blood.  You could literally sit there and watch it progress.  Within 12 hours, her joints, face, and ears swelled to twice their normal size.  Her ears swelled so badly that they actually fell away from the side of her head.  She became unrecognizable.  The bleeding out from her capillaries progressed into bleeding into her kidneys.  After constant monitoring by doctors, her bleeding stopped just in time before her kidneys could develop severe damage.  It was a horrifying experience that we could do nothing about.  Using medications could cause the condition to worsen, and all we could do is sit and pray for it to stop.  Luckily, it did, but it took over a month for the remaining visual bruises to diminish.  The doctors had no explanation for what caused this phenomenon except that it usual follows a long history of chronic respiratory problems and antibiotic use (Lexi had both.)  Lexi also had insomnia.  She awoke every 2-3 hours a night and would not nap during the day.  She did not sleep during the night until she was about 10 months old.  Lexi also had a reaction to each of her childhood immunizations.  She was always that "rare percentage of children."  She got the chicken pox from the chicken pox vaccine.  She suffered from the intussesception that caused the whooping cough vaccine to be suspended.  And she'd have colic after receiving each of the other vaccinations.  She also had severe constipation.  She’d scream an entire day prior to having a bowel movement.

Donald started suffering from allergy symptoms, headaches, and fatigue.  He experienced numbness and tingling in his legs while at work, and  insomnia.

Donald's father, Don Sr., began complaining of itchy eyes, nose, and ears.  He developed more colds and viruses than usual, and exhibited upper respiratory problems.  Don Sr. was a diabetic since childhood and had both legs amputated due to complicating vascular disease.  He also had heart surgery, but prior to moving into this house, he was doing very well considering his past health problems.  He exercised daily, ate healthy, and was only 52 years old. Prior to moving into the house, his diabetic seizures were pretty well controlled.  Within a few months of moving into the house, Don Sr. began having more and more diabetic seizures.  He did everything in this power to try to get them under control, but they became more and more frequent.  On several occasions, I with my two small children, witness his seizures and had to administer first aid until the paramedics arrived.  His health seemed to be demising very quickly.

We soon realized that there was very old plumbing throughout the house.  We started to notice mold growing under the bathroom and kitchen sinks, as well as under the floor tile in the bathrooms.  We tried to get our landlord to fix the plumbing, but after receiving no cooperation from him, we replaced faucets, washers, etc.. and cleaned up the visible mold problems.  Soon after, we discovered dark green mold growing on our basement wall.  We realized there was a crack in the foundation so we requested our landlord to fix the problem.  When he refused, we contacted our local health department.  The health department inspected our house and agreed that we had a problem, but said they could not force our landlord to make the repairs.  The inspector just did a visual inspection and filed a report.  He recommended that if we could not get cooperation out of our landlord, we should consider moving.  After consulting our Doctor about the possibility of our home making us sick, we decided that it would be best for everyone if we relocated to a new home.

With our health deteriorating and being unable to care for ourselves, we decided it would be best to move Don Sr. into an assisted living community.  After doing so, Donald felt very guilty about not being able to assist his father in the way he needed to.  Within a couple of months of moving out of our moldy house, we received a call that Don Sr. passed away at the hospital after Donald's sister had taken him there when he complained of severe leg pain.  He passed away prior to being evaluated by a physician, and the autopsy reported that he died of a possible heart attack, caused by long term complications from diabetes and vascular disease.  Since his health seemed to be controlled prior to living in that house, and it quickly deteriorated while living in that house, we live with the question of what affect the mold may have played in complicating his health even further.  Could the mold have weakened his immune system?  Could it have weakened an already fragile heart?  I guess we'll never have proof, but we feel in our hearts, that the mold stole priceless years with our Father from us.  Donald suffered from depression for many months due to everything he experienced.

Moving on with our lives, we moved into a cute rental home near my family.  We didn't know when we inquired, but the house was owned by the local housing department, and was part of the public housing program.  This seemed like a godsend, considering our income had been cut by 3/4ths.  The house was adorable, clean, and recently renovated.  It seemed like the perfect place to start our new life.  We were excited thinking that now that we were out of the other house we would get progressively healthier. ....WRONG!!!

We became very perplexed when our already delicate health became worse.  My aches and pains became more widespread and constant.  I hurt all over and could not sleep at night.  I had no energy and wanted to sleep all day long.  I suffered from daily migraines and diarrhea.  Everyday became a struggle to get out of bed. 

Here's a look at what a normal day became for me:

In the morning I would hurt very badly, everywhere.  I sleep on my side, and in the morning my shoulders would feel like they had been shoved up into the side of my body.  I would feel like I was in one big knot.  I'd be stiff and slow moving.  My legs would throb from serious cramping in my calves.  My fingers and toes would ache and throb.  I felt bloated and gassy.  My gut would cramp as if I had a stomach virus.  Within 30-40 minutes I would be forced to get out of bed to use the restroom because I would have diarrhea.  After being in the restroom for awhile, I would have to drag myself back to bed and lay there having hot flashes and cold chills.  Those would last for about 30 minutes until the effects of the bowel problems would subside for awhile. Donald would have to bring me a pain pill, usually Lortab or Vicodin.  I would have to take the pill and then wait 30-40 minutes to see if it would work well enough for me to get out of bed that day.  That was just the start of my day.  Many days my body was so fatigued that it was hard labor to lift my head off my pillow.  It felt as if my head weighed a ton.  I would be bedridden all day, sometimes for several days; only getting up to use the restroom.  Donald would have to serve my meals to me in bed.  At night, I'd toss and turn, bouncing my legs (restless leg syndrome?) due to being uncomfortable.  If I managed to get any sleep at all, it was in small amounts, in between awakenings.  Many times I'd have to get up to use the restroom due to interstitial cystitis or chronic diarrhea. Then I'd return to bed only to lay awake for hours.  When I'd awake the next morning, I'd feel like I never went to sleep.

On the days that I could get out, I would get winded just trying to walk normal distances.  I would sometimes feel faint and experience dizzy spells. One one occasion, I did completely pass out in public.  My legs would often feel so weak that they would sometimes buckle under the weight of my body. Many days, I was wheel chair bound.  Climbing stairs was usually out of the question. If I could walk anywhere, I usually felt weak and shaky.  Going to the mall or to a department store was a great feat.  If it could even happen,  I would have to take frequent breaks and sit before being able to go on.  I would also become very hot and flushed.  I found out that I had a chronic ongoing infection caused by the Epstein-Barr virus.  This caused me to have a chronic fever.  During the time that I developed the symptoms of this infection, I had not been out or in social settings that could have resulted in my exposure to this virus.  We could not figure out how I contracted this virus, just like we couldn't explain Lexi's blood disorder.  I began having difficulty concentrating and experiencing short term memory loss.  I'd forget if I took my medicines, and then I'd double dose myself.  I became depressed and suffered from severe anxiety.  I would experience chest pain and rapid heart beat. This resulted in several hospital visits.  Tests always came back normal. For two whole months I demonstrated pneumonia-like symptoms.  I was treated for possible pneumonia and asthma.  Both to no avail.  I now know that I was suffering from acute hypersensitivity pneumonitis.  I became bed-ridden for over a month.  I thought I was doing the right thing by resting in bed,... little did I know.  I had to have family and friends come over every day and pick up my kids to watch them.  From day to day, my children did not know where they were going to be spending the day.  I had to have my church family prepare and deliver meals for us.  I had to have them also grocery shop and clean my house. Every diagnostic test I took came back completely normal.  Nothing could explain why I was experiencing these symptoms.

Donald began developing more numbing and tingling sensations in his legs.  He started aching all over and feeling fatigued.  He lost a great deal of weight.  He pushed through it all and went to work everyday, feeling like he didn't have a choice.  He became depressed and suffered from mood swings. He also couldn't sleep at night.  Many nights we'd both happen to roll over at the same time and just look at each other and shake our heads in disbelief.

Austin and Lexi both became asthmatic, for the first time, during the same week.  Neither had ever had asthma before.  Lexi would not sleep at night.  She'd be restless and cough all night long. Her coughing would become more and more severe until she would stop breathing.  At times, her tongue would turn blue.   Austin would become overheated during normal activities and start wheezing.  I would be up all night just listening to them breathe, being afraid to go to sleep.

Lexi began having chronic nosebleeds.  At first we thought it was due to childhood nose picking, but after countless times of checking her finger nails and notating how the bleeding started, we realized that it didn't matter if she was playing or laying down, she'd have a bleed.  The bleeding was very scary.  It appeared to be a lot of blood in a short amount of time.  Sometimes covering her from head to toe before I could get something to put over her nose.  She'd awake in pools of blood  and often vomit blood first thing in the morning, due to an overnight bleed, while she was sleeping.  This resulted in numerous hospital and doctors visits in which they could do nothing except wait until the bleeding stopped.

Austin began showing symptoms of anxiety.  He began having anxiety attacks and hyperventilating.  Any strong emotion, like fear or crying, could send him into an attack.  He became depressed and developed a low self esteem, despite our constant assuring and complimenting him.  We showered him with love and attention.   Austin lost the ability to focus in school and his grades began to suffer.  He couldn't concentrate and absorb the information he was being taught.  Austin had a urinary reflux and had to undergo surgery to correct it.  I don't know if it's related to the mold or not, but I can't help but wonder if the fungi could have caused his chronic urinary tract infections; in turn causing the deterioration around his kidneys valve.  He had to undergo repeated catheterizing, VCUG's, and other horrible tests.

In a nutshell, we were a mess.  Our lives were fading away.  I became unable to cook, clean, socialize, or play with my children.  Donald had to take on double the responsibility, working full time, and coming home to take care of the 3 of us.  Our marriage suffered. Intimacy became a thing of the past.  We didn't have alone time.  We didn't even have time together outside of the house.  Our faith in God and our loving family and friends are truly the only reason we made it through everything together.  I couldn't be a mother, a wife, a daughter, a friend.  I no longer was myself.  I mourned to be that person once again.

1 1/2 years after moving into that house, we found out that the back external faucet had a leak. One day when I went to fill a kiddy pool, the faucet leaked under the kitchen cabinets and out into the kitchen.  I called my landlord to have them fix it.  When they arrived, they had to move the kids bunk-beds to reach the outside wall of their room.  When they moved the beds, we discovered that the carpet was wet.  When we realized that the carpet smelled moldy, they called a carpet cleaner to come and clean the carpet.  During his inspection, the carpet cleaner used a moisture detector to punch small holes in the wall.  It detected moisture from the ground to 1/2 way up the wall.  He said the wall needed to be cut out to dry out the moisture.  When he told my landlord this, they arranged to tear out and replace the wall.  Little did we know that was the worst thing they could do, while we were living there.

Upon removing the drywall, we discovered black mold growing about 3-4 feet from the ground and about 8-9 feet across in width.  To my horror, I realized, that this was the culprit of our health problems.  AGAIN!!!  What are the chances?  I knew in my gut that this was toxic mold.  I did not however, know enough to know that this had to be handled very delicately, and in a precise way to remediate it completely.  I watched over a 2 week period while workers came in and out of my home, at their leisure, while cleaning it up.  They left the mold exposed, and did not take any precautions at all to contain it.  In fact, they used fans to dry it out faster, sending the spores even more into the air.  Some days they'd show up to work on it, as promised, other days they did not.  Several days, I sat in that house, feeling ill, and waiting all day for them to show up.  On the days that they didn't show up, I was in the house, waiting, being poisoned with every breathe. After wising up, I began wearing a face mask while in the house.  The workers looked at me like I was being ridiculous.  They made me feel like I was over dramatizing the situation.   Also, during the same time, we experienced 2 gas leaks.  One from the gas line to the furnace. The other from the flew not being installed correctly when they installed the new furnace.  During that time, I became ill and almost died due to the gas poisoning.

The workers claimed that they cleaned up the mold, but something told me that I needed to do further investigating.  I requested my landlord to perform mold testing, but they refused.  One day I just snapped.  I had had it.  Unable to find anything else, I used a large butcher knife to cut a hole into the drywall that they had just replaced. I swabbed the inner wall with a cotton swab and it came out black.  They had just replaced this wall 2 days before.  How could it be black in there?  I placed my sample onto a self test kit petri dish with a median on it.  I waited 2 days and was amazed at the black and green mold that the dish had cultivated.  I sent the dish off for analysis at a laboratory.  The lab reported high counts of Stachybotrus, Aspergillus, and Penicillium-like molds growing on the dish.  All three molds are potentially toxic.  Furious,   I demanded that the maintenance supervisor for my landlord come to my home so I could show him my findings.  Feeling pressured, he agreed to pay for professional mold testing.  The professional report showed proof of numerous molds, including toxic, in the air, as well as in 3 different rooms of the house.  

Now knowing this, we left all of our belongings and moved in temporarily with my parents.  We were instructed by an Environmental Hygienist, and a lawyer, not to take any of the belongings from the house.  We were told that it had to be professionally cleaned or destroyed.  Fibrous items such as furniture and bedding could not be cleaned properly.  If we took anything with us to our new home, we could cross contaminate our new home.  We left with nothing.  We had no money to buy new things.  We were furious with our landlord for the way they had handled the situation, and exposed us even more to the mold.  We had no money to find a new house or an apartment.  They even tried to charge us for trimming the bushes and cutting the grass at the moldy house while we were staying at my parents.  They claimed it was still our responsibility to keep up that house while we had a rent agreement.  They said that if we didn't make a special trip over there to do the yard work, they'd charge us $35 to do it themselves.  When I argued that we shouldn't have to do yard work for a house that we couldn't stay in, they told me that the bushes not being trimmed decreased the "street value" of the home.  Ah, hello!  The house is wrought with mold.  I don't think it has much of any value at this point.  We couldn't come up with money for a deposit and we couldn't afford to pay rent that wasn't based on our income,  so we were stuck. Feeling forced to plea with our landlord to help us, they agreed to re-locate us to another house of theirs.  Now being highly sensitive to mold, we requested that they conduct mold testing at the new home prior to our moving in.  They agreed.  2 years later and numerous requests from us and our lawyer, we have yet to see the mold test results for our new house.  We moved in because they said they were mailing us the results that day, but we never received them.

After much negotiating, we got them to buy us new living room furniture and mattresses.  They only agreed to pay for $2000 of it though.  We needed all new living room furniture and 3 posturpedic mattresses.  We already had insomnia, we couldn't sleep on cheap mattresses.  The mattress we lost was an $1800 mattress.  The 3 piece sectional sofa we lost was $1500 alone.  But we had to settle for what we could buy with $2000.  As far as the rest of our belongings, they said it would be too expensive to have everything professionally cleaned, and they drug their feet for weeks on making a decision about it, all awhile our things were still in that house.  They finally offered us $2000 for all of our belongings because they didn't want to pay to have it all cleaned.  This is a government subsidized agency that we're dealing with here. They only offered us that much because we threatened to sue them.  We knew this was not enough money to replace our things, but after much arguing, we realized we'd better take what we could get out of them.  So we accepted their offer.  Ultimately though, we wound up losing an antique heirloom upright piano that belonged to my Grandfather.  We lost Don Sr.'s electric wheelchair and regular wheelchair.  We lost precious pictures, artwork, 3 televisions, 3 vcr's, a Sony Playstation, a microwave, and much more.  We lost many valuable things that could not be replaced.  When we went to pick up the measly $2000 check that they offered us, they tried to get us to sign a release form for our personal belongings.  In the fine print, it said that we would give up our right to ever take legal action against them in any way, including for medical bills, medical treatments, lost wages, punitive damages, and more.  Yea right!  We didn't sign it.  We had to have our lawyer renegotiate the wording  just to sign so that we could get the check.

We are now 2 years out of that house.  Our health, as expected, has improved in some ways.  Austin's headaches and cramps are fewer and fewer.  Lexi's rare disorders have subsided.  Austin continued to suffer from anxiety and depression for awhile, but it's better now.  Lexi, overall, is very healthy now.  She still has nose bleeds, and both her and Austin have asthma problems.  Over all, Austin and Lexi have rebounded quite nicely.  Both were tested for allergies and we found that Austin has mold allergies, but Lexi does not.  Her symptoms were not triggered by allergies to the mold, they were triggered by the toxicity of the mold.  We are having a hard time identifying what triggers her asthma.  We are also having a hard time controlling it.  She responds well to the Albuterol, but it seems different than what I imagined asthma to be. I think the mold is still affecting her.  She also had an irregular chest x-ray. Her lungs were under inflated. The doctor we had didn’t really take our mold claims seriously and he blew the x-ray off saying that she’s so small, she probably didn’t take a deep enough breathe and hold it.  That is very possible.  I don’t doubt the possibility, but when I requested a second x-ray just to be sure, I was denied.  To this day, I still wonder if there could be a possible problem with her lungs.

Donald has mold allergies, but I do not.  My symptoms were not caused by allergies, but by toxins.  I am also chemically sensitive now.  My pain has decreased significantly, as well as many symptoms, but I still live in some degree of pain on a daily basis.  I suffered a miscarriage several months after leaving that house.  I truly believe that my miscarriage was a combination of my body being so weakened due to the mold, the stress, and all of the medications I had to take.  Like we hadn't already been through enough, but now the loss of a baby?  I get out a lot more now, but am yet to be able to return to work.  I've been turned down for disability, and our credit has been ruined, due to not having the money to pay our bills.  Donald's pain has decreased significantly, but he still aches and tires a lot more than any 35 year old should.

We've considered legal action against our landlord, but are still living under their roof.  We fear eviction if they get angry with us.  We started the legal process, but have not been able to fund the necessary tests and fees needed to continue.  We've also had difficulty finding a doctor that is willing risk his reputation and testify that he believes the mold is the reason for our health problems.  I've actually had doctors tell me that they believe me, but since there's so much controversy surrounding the subject, they're not willing to testify.  I don’t even really care about the lawsuit.  I just want to get us all healthy.

We have now been out of our moldy home for nearly 2 years.  Since moving out, our health has improved somewhat, but the children still suffer from severe asthma attacks.  Alexis suffers from chronic bronchitis and we are in the process of diagnosing a possible sinus disease. Although I am somewhat better, I am still unable to hold a job outside of my home, despite 2 failed attempts.  I am in the process of appealing my denied disability claim.  Don manages to work 40 hours a week, but suffers daily from headaches and muscle pain.  We are grateful for our improvements, but we are by no means healthy, even 2 years later.

We have overcome the battle with the mold. I'm beginning to wonder if that was the easy part.  We've now found ourselves in a new battle.  A battle to bring the issue of mold to the forefront.  Through the media, you're hearing more and more stories like ours, yet the government ignores cries from survivors to pass legislation to protect people from mold.  They refuse to pass legislation to assist victims in remediation.  They refuse to force insurance companies to take responsibility for clean up.  They refuse to force home builders to take special precautions against the possibility of mold habitation.  They refuse to take the same stand on mold that they've taken against other environmental hazards such as lead and asbestos.  We're also fighting to force the medical community to better educate physicians on prevention and treatment of mold related illness'.  Despite the fact that mold poisoning dates back to biblical times, time and time again, the government and the medical community have turned a blind eye to this topic.  It's either too costly, or too time consuming to work to protect innocent families from being destroyed. Mold is destroying bodies, marriages, family units, and most importantly souls.  Ignorance is not an excuse.  Even celebrities are experiencing the wrath of mold, Erin Brockovich, Ed McMahon, and others have experienced these horrors. Yet we've been, made by physicians to feel like hypochondriacs.  We've been made out to be Drama Queens.  Well we're not!!!!  We're victims!!!  If we had lost everything we had in a fire, would we be hypochondriacs if we complained about our burns?  Or Drama Queens if we cried over our loss?  Wouldn't our insurance companies, as well as charitable organizations and government agencies work to help us rebuild our lives?   Our battle is far from over.  We're constantly trying new medical protocols in hopes that one day, we'll be completely better.  But we'll be spending the rest of our lives trying to prove, what we very well know to be true,  Mold Kills!