A doctor who finally gets results

Our journey with Dr. Randy started in July of 2019. Part of the treatment plan was to do comprehensive detox; heavy metals, toxins, and even parasites. We began to see gradual improvements as the months progressed. We were excited, because Dr. Randy told us that usually his patients weren't seeing improvements as quickly as Stephen was. We had paid for a full year of his time, and Stephen was talking to him on average every other week, plus emails in between if they were needed. By Thanksgiving, Stephen was taking daily walks, then that turned into running a mile a couple days a week. When we went to visit his family over Thanksgiving, he was actually able to play street hockey with his siblings without any issues other than some hives popping up, but they were manageable, plus staying up past our normal bed time. He pushed it just a little bit, but since he had been doing so good, we weren't worried about it. Once we got home, he just didn't seem to be able to get past overdoing it at Thanksgiving. Nothing too bad, but he just wasn't able to get his energy back and the brain fog returned with a vengeance. Since he had been unable to go back to working full-time since February of 2019, he was working part-time as a virtual assistant and had started studying to become a bookkeeper, since this was something that he could easily do from home.

It was at this time, January 2020, that we made an ER visit for me, due to the worst migraine of my life, combined with the inability to walk, trouble breathing, and talking out of my head. (You can read the whole story here) Long story short, we found out I have an abnomality in my brain. Specifically, an AVM, and one that is big enough that it could cause problems if we don't remove it.

Right around the time that the weather started to warm back up after the winter cold, all of his bigger symptoms began returning. Night sweats, inability to sleep, brain fog, skin issues, etc. He was still having to use the steroid cream after every shower, and sometimes in between. We were getting really discouraged again, because it seemed that we were hitting a plateau again, and we only had less than half a year before our time with Dr. Randy was up. We really were hoping not to have to pay for another full year with him...

We had always had a few thoughts about our house, and wondered if that could possibly be a contributor, but usually pushed them away or found reasons to think it wasn't the main concern. We knew that our front porch had some spots on the wooden slats, but we had sprayed it with Mold and Mildew Killer when we first bought the house. Our windows often had black spots on the metal frames, but we assumed that was because they were old, single pane windows that collected moisture easily. We figured it was just mildew collecting on the frames, so I cleaned them often. Finally, we mentioned mold to Dr. Randy and asked if he thought it could be an issue. He agreed that it definitely could be an issue, and also suggested that it could be outside more than inside our home. He was able to do some muscle testing, and mold came up twice during his test. We wondered if mold could be contaminating our house from the old abandoned mobile home not even one hundred yards from our front door. The roof on the mobile home was definitely compromised, and basically the rest of it was falling apart.

Dr. Randy recommended a home test kit, as well as a test for Stephen to see how many mycotoxins are in his body. We decided to do the home test first, because it would be quicker, and in the meantime we could get out of the house and see if anything improved while we waited on the test for Stephen to arrive. We also decided to get out of the house before the home test was delivered, just to see if anything got any better. So we went and bought just enough new clothes (plus some cheap pillows, toiletries, etc.) to get us over the next few days until I had time to wash our clothes properly. The opportunity to borrow a friends travel trailer came up almost immediately, and we decided that was the best option. Since there was a chance that there was mold out in the yard, we thought it would be smarter to park it at my parent's house for a little while, at least until we got the test results back. We started trying to think about what options we had for somewhere to live if our house did have mold. We thought about possibly just buying a pre-made tiny home to put on our property, but if there was a lot of mold outside, then that wouldn't really solve the problem.

The home test came with petri dishes that we were supposed to leave out on the floor for an hour. We would then close the dishes, put them in a dark room, and leave them alone for 5-7 days. Then we would send three of the seven dishes back to the lab, along with a swab that we used on front porch and a windowsill inside the house, to see what molds, if any, were in our house. We had to send the dishes back within ten days, or they wouldn't be able to test it. In order to meet the ten day deadline, we had to put them in the mail on day five. We actually checked the dishes on day 3, so that we could decide which ones to send in.

I actually wanted to see mold in the dishes, because it would give us a direction to go. Stephen wasn't really sure what he wanted to see, because if there was mold, there were a lot of big hard decisions that had to be made.

He started pulling out the dishes, and this is what we found:

According to the company that does this mold test, 0-4 mold colonies per room is within normal range, 5-8 is cause for concern with illness being possible for individuals who are susceptible, 9 or greater mold colonies per room is hazardous, with illness being likely in individuals who are susceptible.

We already knew that we had more than what is definitely healthy, but we were now waiting for the official report from the company. Now we began thinking a little more about what our options were for housing, since we definitely had mold problems. We looked at steel buildings, barndominiums, steel home kits, tiny house kits, quonset huts, etc.

Five days after sending in the petri dishes, we got our results. We decided to pay extra to get one more dish analyzed, because we just couldn't decide on only three.

They sent us a picture of what the petri dishes looked like upon arrival.

Our average count per dish was 13 mold colonies. Our dining and living room plate had 18. Our car was also above the normal range of acceptable mold colonies, and there was one certain kind of mold in every single room of our house, and in our car. Altogether, we had 12 separate kinds of mold detected. We researched the names of the mold ourselves, and found out that one or two of these are not allergenic and don't cause problems, and are more bacteria than mold (but we could hardly find anything on the internet about them) a few are allergenic, a couple are dangerous, and two or three are hazardous to your health.

We received a consultation with a mold expert with our test kit, and when we talked to the subcontractor who does mold remediation on houses, it was disappointing. He basically said that the molds we had in our house were not that big of a deal. Yes, we had about 4x times the amount that is considered safe, but he told us that if we simply fixed our crawl space by putting down some thick plastic and installed some vent fans, and then fogged our house, it should completely take care of it.

It just didn't make sense to us, but it did give us some hope that we could remediate the house and then be able to sell it, as we didn't feel comfortable moving back in after dealing with all of the issues to Stephen's health. All the research we did was telling us that these molds CAN and WILL cause problems. Not to mention that the mold that is in every room of our house was listed in several places as causing skin rashes and hives. The exact quote was "skin rashes and hives are unavoidable". Stephen also had over 1/3 of the list of symptoms caused by mold toxicity. I found out later that our house was not the only house that he had shown mold toxicity symptoms in. He had been in houses growing up that were found to have mold a couple of times.

We had decided that the cheapest option for a home would be to build our own tiny house on wheels, and to place it on my parent's property for the time being, until we could save up enough to buy our own land. Then we could just relocate the tiny home until we are able to build our own house. My dad already had a camper trailer frame that would just need to be cleaned up and reinforced. My mom found a YouTuber that offered lots of great ideas for space saving in tiny homes, and even offered some free plans to build your own tiny home. After LOTS of planning and research, I think we have finally decided on which plan to use. We are planning on modifying it a little bit to meet our needs. The problem with a lot of the plans we looked at, is that they usually have the master bed in the loft and any other bed spaces on the main floor. Since Ruth is still waking up during the night half the time, and still breastfeeding, we knew that having both beds on the main floor would be a must. Because we did not need me falling down stairs or a ladder in the middle of the night!! A tiny home also gave us what we needed for whenever we are able to start treatment for my AVM. Since this is kind of a serious treatment plan, resulting in eventual brain surgery, we know that we will be needing help as I recover. There is also a possibility that I could come out with either short term or long term paralysis on the right side, or the loss of speech, so already being at my parents would be a huge help. Because Stephen seems to be so sensitive to mold, we believe that building is our only reasonable option. That way we can make sure everything is done right, kept dry, and new.

So now we are working on getting estimates on how much all the supplies will be, getting the trailer ready, and starting the process of remediating our house.

The best news? Stephen is already showing improvement from just being out of the house for a few weeks. Just the first few days after we moved out of the house and into the camper, he was already sleeping better (not as itchy during the night, not getting overheated, and sleeping more without waking up). He is now having just a few bad nights a week instead of just one good night a week. He has still gotten hives a couple times whenever he exerts himself outside, but they aren't lasting as long and also are not wiping him out like they usually do. We've also decided on a new tactic every time he gets hives. As soon as they pop up, Stephen goes to take a shower and get clean clothes on. (Thanks to Ana Harris for this tip) Because he tends to only get hives when he gets warm, and our skin is our biggest detox organ, it is very probable that he gets hives because of the toxins coming out of his skin when he sweats/gets warm. So far, this method seems to be helping!

The somewhat bad news is that just a few days after being in the camper, we noticed that we began to get stuffy noses every night while sleeping. I could barely notice mine, but Stephen was stopped up to the point that he could not breathe through his nose at all. This was also something that had been bothering him at the house about a month ago, but it had started to clear up. It only seems to go away if he spends time out of the camper. If he stays in the camper all day, it is better during the day, but never completely goes away. So now we're thinking that there must be something in the camper that we are reacting to. We took out the mattress and foam topper that was in the master bed and replaced it with an airbed, hoping that might help, and it did cut down on his inability to breathe well at night. So now it's not as bad, but it's still an every night occurrence, and we hate thinking that we are still in an environment that is causing us some small issues. Thankfully, my brother has some great friends in Tennessee that offered to let us borrow their newer camper that they won't be using this year, due to COVID-19. Now we're just waiting on the weather and work schedules to cooperate for it to be delivered here!