Mold in our house

[Guest guest]

Hello,

I just joined and have a few questions about mold in my house.

I have suffered from allergies ever since I can remember. I have

migrains on a regular basis. My migrains can last anywhere from a

day to months at a time, with little relief. I am sensitive to most

all medications including advil, and asprin, so I take nothing for

the allerhies or the migrains.

Around the begining of this year my entire family started getting

very ill. We all had what appeared to be a bad flu. We all ran high

fevers, our heads were full of infection, as were our lungs. We

fought this for about 3 months before we found that there was mold

growing on the wall in the master bedroom. We cleaned the wall with

a water and bleach solution. We got rid of our bed since the mold

had gotten on the matress and box springs. We still remained sick

though. I seemed to get the worst effects. Not only did I have the

flu type symptoms, but I also started having problems with my entire

body aching terribly. It seemed to come from deep within my bones.

My legs, knees, ankles, and hips were the worst affected. They

started swelling up huge, and the pain got so bad that all i could

do is sit, or lay and cry as I rolled from side to side trying to

stop the pain that was shooting through me. I also started getting

lumps growing under my skin on the bones in my leg.

This is when we started questioning the outer wall of the bedroom

which had been damaged by termites before we moved in. We now

question if that damage was indeed caused by termites and not by

moisture. There were most certainly termites, and there are termites

again now, but there is also mold.

We ended up vacating that room, along with the other two bedrooms

as they started smelling strongly of mold. The master bedroom also

had a strong mold odor. We all finally started feeling better, with

the exception of my legs, hips, ankles, and knees, which still hurt

and swell from time to time.

A few months ago the owner of the house crawled into the crawl

space and found mold growing on the floor boards under the master

bedroom. WE do not know if he looked under the entire house or not,

but my husband is going to take a look himself as soon as the mud

under the house dries enough to grawl in there. He plans to wear a

good mask for protection.

We have closed off the entire back half of our house with a huge

thick comforter, but there is no way to stay out of that area

entirely, and everytime I go into one of the bedrooms, I can feel

something going into my nostrils and throught and I start coughing.

I try to stay out as much as possible, but my clothes are still back

there as we have very little room to put anything, unless it is in

one of the three bedrooms.

My questions are...

Is there any long term health risk involed? Or will we all get

better once it all is cleaned up?

Is there a possible conection between the mold and my body aches and

swelling?

Is the mold why my son has caughing fits after going into his

bedroom for a short period of time.

Could the mold be why my migrains have worsened recently?

Should we all be in the house while the carpets (the mold came

through the floor, into the hardwood flooring and then into the

carpet and padding in the master bedroom), are being removed and the

mold under the house cleaned up? Is there any precautions we should

be aware of in the clean up? And is a water bleach solution going to

be enough to clean it up good? We had someone out from the health

department and he said to get the area dry, (easier said than done),

use a water bleach solutioon to clean, and get the carpet up. He

also said that if we get under the house and there are grape like

clusters, to get out fast and call in the proffesionals.

Please note... We do not own this house, and it is going to be

torn down sometime in the next year or two to make way for a

subdivision. Therefor an exspensive cleanup is not feasible.

Thank you to any and all who can help us with this problem. Any

and all help would be very greatly appreciated.

Carmella Dunkin