I need to explain to people what's troubling me but no book is quite appropriate

[Guest guest]

Let's imagine the following situation: Your house or flat is

pretty much free of mold and you don't have excessive moisture

problem anywhere in your house. For some time you are healthy and

have no problems whatsoever.

Then, one day you go to a friend's house, or visit some public

place that's rampant with mold, or buy a commodity that's infested

with mold spores. If you are particularly sensitive to mold toxins,

it's highly likely you'll feel the negative symptoms right away.

If you are still unaware that the problem is caused by mold,

you'll behave recklessly and, when you return to your mold-free

house, you sit on upholstered chairs, beds, and basically touch many

objects that are in your house.

Since you don't have moisture problem in your house, it is very

unlikely that the spores you brought with you will flourish so

much that the mold becomes visible. But nevertheless, it is VERY

likely that those mold spores will continue to live and proliferate

in accordance with air humidity and the food they find on the

surface they landed on. They will continue to cross-contaminate

other objects, especially if you live with other people which are

not sensitive to these " low " concentrations of mold toxins.

It is also very likely that they will continue to cause you symptoms

and errode your health and immune system.

One day you find out that your symptoms are exactly the same as

those in people who live in mold infested buildings. Also, it turns

out that chemicals that are known to kill mold do help you in many

cases, but due to excessive cross-contamination and due to the fact

that some objects (e.g. upholstered furniture) sometimes cannot be

decontaminated, you are unable to get rid of the problem completely.

Some objects always remains contaminated and you're not allowed to

throw threm away...why? Because people you live with think it is all

in your head and you are acting out of whim.

You try to persuade the people you live with that the health

problems you have are caused by mold, but they don't believe you

AT ALL. They will put forward statements and " facts " such as

these:

1. Mold must be visible in order to be considered a problem. We have

no visible mold in our house, and thus your health is not

compormised by mold, it must be something else.

2. The furniture you say that is contaminated is always dry, and is

exposed only to air humidity which is almost always the same. Even

if there were some toxic mold spores they wouldn't have

conditions to thrive here.

3. Mold spores cannot live for that long! Are you referring to that

incident that happened five or ten years ago? You mean that day when

you returned feeling ill from your friend's house? How, on earth, do

you think those spores could have survived until now? It has been 10

years since then, nothing can live so long on clean surface!

4. How is it possible that nobody in the whole world has any

problems like you do? We don't feel anything and we live with you.

There wasn't even one case in the newspapers! Nobody has ever talked

about any problem that remotely resembles yours, so you must be

imagining things! If mold was so dangerous as you describe, people

would be sick all over, and it would be a known issue. And it is not.

Of course, all these four statements are completely WRONG, and are

said because of sheer ignorance. I'd like to know if there's some

book about toxic mold that would be good for education of this type

of people. The book mustn't center on sick buildings per se, it

should have a wider scope.

It should be a book about toxic molds by a reputable author which

explains the dangers and properties of toxic molds (along with the

removal instructions), but in a general way, not only in relation to

sick buildings.

According to most reviews of books dealing with mold problems which

I've read, the majority center on visible mold on walls of the

buildings and what its spores and mycotoxins can do to your health.

In short, you can show such books to a disbeliever only if you've

got a big ugly patch of mold in your bathroom or basement etc. He or

she might read the book and start believing that your problems are

indeed caused by molds. That way you might get financial and moral

support from your relatives and friends.

But in the case I just explained I don't know which book might

be suitable. I don't need books that have lots of pictures of walls

infested with black mold, and how to remediate them. Those kind of

books will only reinforce wrong beliefs about mold in people who

need to be educated. I need a book that treats mold and its toxins

in a serious way, but not only when the mold has grown so much as to

be visible.

Could someone recommend such a book? I would translate it then from

English to my first language and show it to my folks.

Of course, this doesn't mean I am not fighting the mold in many

other ways. I always try to throw away contaminated things that I

can, and to decontaminate things that can be decontaminated. I am

also seriously thinking about moving out of this flat.

But after 17 years of suffering I really feel the need to have some

sort of proof, something written by a scientist which I can shove

under their noses when they start babbling nonsense about mold. I

really need at least some moral support, because I feel that this is

unfortunately going to be a life-long issue, and no matter where I

go and live there will be people who will be destroying that little

optimism I've still got with their ignorant remarks.