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Lessons Learned From Purging My Life’s Stuff. 

~ mykidshealthjourney ~ Leave a comment

Looking back almost 5 years, what would I have done differently, knowing now I am much healthier and may not have needed to get rid of my whole house of stuff. Our family suffered from CIRS, a mold illness and started treatment for it nearly 5 years ago. I have written several articles concerning how we cleaned our household items, cars, clothes etc. As time has passed and have met others who regret giving away everything due to a CIRS diagnosis, I decided I’d write an article, hoping to remind others, there’s hope in healing and remind others they may not need to so ambitiously purge their life of precious memories.

Ultimately, most of what I got rid of, I don’t regret: lots of house decorations, kids toys and books and ultimately my furniture. I will note, we kept much of our wood furniture for several years and just cleaned it, post CIRS diagnosis. It’s sort of impractical and expensive getting all new furniture when you might end up moving into another moldy house. It happened to us.

I kept sentimental stuff like scrap books and baby stuff and just put them in plastic bins to save away. Most of our art I donated because it was too overwhelming at the time and too dusty. We downsized a lot to just make it easier to clean and manage everything including half our Christmas stuff and lots of the boys toys and book. The boys recall now, missing their “stuff”. I miss memories of Christmas stuff I now realize I could have cleaned. I miss our every day hand made furniture my husband and I made pre kids which we ultimately gave away. 

On a positive note, less stuff has allowed us to live more simply with less clutter. In the last year and a half our family decided to become a full time rv family. We live in a Livin Lite CampLite 21 ft and love the change in mindset and freedom it has given us. More to come on this…

My recommendations:
1) Save what is meaningful, just put it away in plastic bins till you heal. Keep photos, scrapbooks, baby memories etc which you would regret throwing away. 

2) Don’t think being sick is the end of life and you will never be able to enjoy your stuff again. I remember feeling that way. It’s only a period in time. You will get through your illness and you will be able to take out those bins you saved and look through them again.

3) Furniture, linens and clothes, appliances and kitchenware etc are often cleanable. Check out my other posts on these topics.

4) Scan books which you want to preserve using a scanning service. We have used https://1dollarscan.com/about.php

Ultimately, living more simply to focus on healing with less distractions really did help us heal. God’s blessings to you in your journey to healing…

Giving up Fear, for Life, in CIRS

~ mykidshealthjourney ~ Leave a comment

Fear of mold grips all those who have suffered so miserably at the hands of mold and CIRS at some point in their journey. The fear can be debilitating and keep us from enjoying life and venturing out into the “unsafe” world. How did our family get beyond fear of mold on our journey to healing and thrive? I won’t lie. It’s been a process with continual reboots.

1) Part of it just requires healing, and finding joy in the little things, the outdoors, the kids, friends, etc along the way. When our family started feeling good enough to rv camp again (around 5 months after CIRS diagnosis), the outdoors brought new exuberance into our lives. It brought wholeness. We have loved the outdoors during this healing process because it’s been a place of healing, hope, and safety for us. There was no bad mold and the fresh air brought us outside our circumstances and into a state of happiness. How joy and happiness reprogram the body to have hope and healing.

2) For us, giving up fear has required learning to trust God with our health and know he will take care of us. God brought us healing, so he will continue to protect and give us wisdom on our journey of life.

3) Part of giving up fear has been taking a step out in faith and realizing we may be able to go more places than previously thought. When we moved almost 1 year ago, we moved from a dry high desert environment to a maritime environment with moisture ridden and mainly old infrastructure. The maritime environment is ultimately the worst place for people with mold sensitivities. Everything is moldy, almost. Surprisingly, we have surprised ourselves. We continue to heal and can go more places than expected. We still avoid much of the old moisture ridden infrastructure, but we’ve been forced to venture out to find doctors, dentists, a hair stylist, church, stores, museums, etc and we’ve found good enough options. We can live life and enjoy it, and still stay healthy. It’s made me stronger being forced to go outside my comfort zone and realizing I stay stable.

4) Part of it has been utilizing tools to help keep us healthy in not the best environments, but also being wise to stay out of bad environments. When we visit unknown environments, I spray our clothes with Tea Tree hydrosol and we use Citridrops Nasal Spray by Microbalance prior to entering the building. If I need more assurance, we wear the Mini-Mate Ionic Air Purifier. The neat thing, as we’ve healed, we use these products less and less.

5)Part of it has been convincing our minds that we  will be fine even if we walk into a moldy environment. I remember how much mold had a grip on my life. I would just go into a store and if I saw something suspicious, my body would tense up and my nervous system would respond with fight or flight mode and tell me to run. DNRS training works to retrain the mind to not freak out about mold and to stay calm and reclaim one’s life. I have not yet done this training, but in principle it’s similar to talking your brain into staying calm so your body will not ramp up it’s immune system chain reaction with suspected exposure to mold. Now, two years post CIRS diagnosis, I can often shop now, without even thinking of looking at the ceiling panels. If we visit an unknown place which turns out moldy, then spraying tree tree hydrosol on my clothes  and Citridrops Nasal Spray in my nose can help stop any exposure before it starts. Staying calm and putting off the thoughts of fear about mold, will help your body recover and heal. It’s a process, one of giving up fear and trusting we will stay healthy.

 

Giving up fear and living life to its fullest post CIRS is a process. Give yourself time. Remember that healing takes time. We are still on the journey. As I’ve healed from Lyme disease, for example, my brain has became more clear and focused and it has become easier to trust and know I will survive and thrive, with tools for success.

I pray that your family can endure through this hardship and have hope and a future….

 

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Environmental Impacts on Healing from CIRS and Lyme Disease

~ mykidshealthjourney ~ 2 Comments

Among the CIRS community, there’s much talk about mold avoidance, but not much discussion on how the environment beyond mold can affect people with CIRS and Lyme disease.

My kids, my husband and and I were diagnosed with CIRS 1 ½ years ago and the kids and I started treatment for Lyme disease a little over a year ago. At the time, I didn’t realize how much our environment beyond mold, affected our health. I wrote the blog Do You Need a Perfect House to Heal from CIRS, just about a year ago. I now realize, a perfect house and toxin free environment is not absolutely necessary, but it sure helps with healing. The toxins in our environment can stress our body’s ability to heal itself.

If you are a family suffering from CIRS and/or Lyme disease and you are contemplating moving houses and trying to figure out environmental impacts to your health, this is for you.

In the past year, I have learned how much the environment beyond a moldy house can affect the body’s ability to detox and affect healing from CIRS and Lyme Disease.

  1. We lived literally under an airport and in very close proximity to a fire retardant carrying plane facility, until about 6 months ago. At the time, we didn’t realize how much the airport exhausts affected our health, but we had an inkling of such. After we left the environment, living under the airport, our energy level increased substantially and fatigue diminished. The toxins from the environment did not burden our bodies anymore.
  2. Living in a brand new off gassing house can also cause a strain on the body’s ability to detox itself, even when it’s mold free. We have learned this very recently, as we just moved into a new construction house 2 1/2 months ago. I will discuss it in more detail below.
  3. Fertilizers sprayed by farmers when living near agricultural areas can increase the toxic burden on the body. We sense it, and close windows when it’s obvious something is off in the environment.
  4. Living near moldy non-cared for buildings in a damp moist cloudy climate can impact the surrounding environment of one’s house. This is mold driven but related to exterior environment, which can affect individuals sensitive to mold. We sense it, and close windows when it’s obvious something is off in the environment. Part of the challenge is humidity driven, I believe, because at higher humidity the mold count in the air is increased. Since we live in a damp, cloudy environment, the humidity is high, particularly at night.  Focusing on bringing the humidity down to below 60% with a dehumidifier has helped our environment be  more comfortable and less reactive for us.  The lower humidity makes a huge difference!

 

Since living in a brand new construction home about 2 1/2 months ago, we haven’t suffered from mold exposure from our house (We used an Ermi cloth test by Mycometrics), but we started having sleep problems again, more joint pain and increased fatigue. At first, we didn’t put 2 and 2 together. Our eldest son struggled more with brain related symptoms like not thinking as clearly and increased tick type movements. He also had increased random joint pain. Our youngest, suffered from not sleeping well and daily fatigue, which affected everything from mood to behavior. We tried everything to encourage good sleep, but nothing helped. We realized our youngest son’s sleep problems may be related to his inability to detox heavy metals (from our off gassing house) just like last year, which brought the same sleep problems to my youngest son. I wrote about it, in “It’s Not Just Personality”. We put all of us back on Chlorella and a cilantro tincture. It worked. He started sleeping better as did all of us start feeling better.

 

How did VOC’s from an off gassing house impact us differently than living in a moldy house?

We recently came out of living in a moldy house for about 1 ½ month (A BIG PROBLEM: MOLDY MILITARY HOUSING). We got out of it, thank God. We got extremely sick multiple times there and my youngest son’s breathing challenges returned. Our fatigue in the moldy house was extreme and we had constant colds. VOC’s brought less fatigue, noticeable sleep problems, and some thinking problems, but not the repetitive illnesses like living in a moldy house.

 

How did we realize VOC’s were a problem in our current house?

Several things helped us realize the VOC’s, from off gassing were a culprit. Our Molekule air purifiers were having off gassing problems, and we suspected we might be having problems too. Our youngest had struggled with sleep problems in the past due to his body’s inability to detox heavy metals at night and he was exhibiting sleep problems again. My skin was also trying to detox itself with increased acne and I was struggling with some fatigue and sleep problems also from our new off gassing house. My oldest son was struggling with not thinking as clearly as normal.

 

How did we off gas our new construction house?

Besides taking heavy metal binders to help support the body’s ability to detox itself, we started to actively speed up off gassing of our house. We chose to use fans in the most problematic rooms. The closets, which have little air circulation, have taken the most work to off gas. My Chemical Free House blog has great tips on off gassing with fans, using heat to “bake out” the chemicals, etc. Actively off gassing our house has significantly decreased our fatigue. The boys and I feel better by the day.

 

Often a perfect environment and ideal house is just not possible. We often are forced to do the best we can with what’s available to us. For us, heavy metal binders like Chlorella and Cilantro tincture have helped support our body’s ability to detoxify itself even in a less than ideal environment with VOCs. A whole house air purification system is ideal, but for now we buy a combined carbon and Merv 13 filters from Nordic Pure, made in the USA. This filter placed in the air return vents or hvac unit helps reduce particulates and also collects VOCs. An off gassing house can also be actively off gassed to decrease the VOC burden on our body. If high humidity is a challenge, add a dehumidifier to your house. Focusing on bringing the humidity down to below 60% with a dehumidifier has helped our environment be  more comfortable and less reactive for us.  We’ve learned our health and the environment is often much more complicated than meets the eye. We are always learning.

There is hope and a future. Knowledge is power. Hope is fuel that keeps you going. We hope this helps you on your journey towards recovery.

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Do I Like the Molekule Air Purifier?

~ mykidshealthjourney ~ 3 Comments

I have mixed feelings about my Molekule Air Purifiers. I used to love the Molekule, but with my recent experience living in a moldy military house and now an off gassing new house, my opinion is wavering. After all is said and done though, their customer service has been superb and my Molekule’s are again working well after actively off gassing our new house.

Positives:

They work well in a relatively stable healthy environment with at most only minor mold challenges and minor off gassing.

My kids and I can be in the same room as the Molekule and we have no sensitivities because there’s no ozone.

We can have guests with unique smells in our house to visit and our house can stay neutral smelling with clean fresh air.

It’s portable so the Molekule works perfect for taking with for stays in hotels.

The warranty and customer service are excellent! I have never had such good customer service. There’s a 60 day satisfaction guarantee policy and a 2 year limited warranty. All our Molekule’s got moldy in our recent 1 1/2 months living in a moldy military house and Molekule replaced all of them since they were under warranty still.

Negative:

Molekule’s can get moldy if you live in a moldy environment. All our Molekule’s got moldy in our recent 1 1/2 months living in a moldy military house but Molekule replaced all of them since they were under warranty still.

Our Molekule’s did not do well in our new off gassing house until we actively off gassed the house. What happened? Our Molekule’s started making the environment more metalic and uncomfortable for us within 2 weeks of use in our off gassing house. I discuss ways we off gassed our house in this blog: Environmental Impacts on Healing from CIRS and Lyme Disease. Once our house was mostly off gassed and the air mostly neutral, we resumed use of our Molekule’s after replacing the Peco and pre filter. If the Molekule’s are under warranty still, talk to Molekule about replacing the filters under warranty, if you notice your Molekule’s causing an unusual metalic odor due to your off gassing house. Now that our house is off gassed, my Molekule’s are working well again and it’s giving off clean fresh air.

They are expensive upfront but have a smaller filter expense per year compared to some filter based air purifiers.

They are room air purifiers only. If you own and can buy a whole house system, that is the best option. If you rent, 1) think about installing carbon and merv 13 filters in your air return vents. We buy our combined carbon and Merv 13 filters from Nordic Pure, made in the USA. 2) Also, think about what room air purifiers are best for you.

How to Clean Your Clothes of Mold After Living in a Moldy House

~ mykidshealthjourney ~ 2 Comments

Why is it important to clear your clothes of mold? Clothes are a source of contamination that you need to address in order to fully heal from CIRS. Even after you move from a moldy environment to a healthy environment, if you do not clean your clothes properly, you bring mold and thus reactivity with you. I was ignorant of how to clean my families clothes properly until I met a good friend who’d been down the journey before me. I hope you can learn from this post to help your family heal.

Cleaning clothes, bedding, etc of mold spores is not as simple as washing them in the laundry machine.  Cleaning your clothes with both EC3 laundry additive and an ozone water producing machine, like PureWash is important because it kills off all mold spores and mycotoxins and keeps them from following you everywhere.

The PureWash is quite easy to set up attached to the laundry machine; the ozone water is important to kill off the mold spores. Make sure to wash clothes with both EC3 laundry additive and ozone water for at least the first few cycles to totally rid your clothes of mold spores. In the long run, you can use the ozone water alone to keep your clothes clean, unless it’s a particularly dirty load. Ozone water is definitely most cost effective.

The EC3 laundry additive is most beneficial to rid clothes of mycotoxins, although it helps with mold spores, so that’s why EC3 laundry additive and ozone water work so well together. The EC3 laundry additive alone does not clean clothes enough to purify moldy clothes after living in a moldy house. EC3 laundry additive is useful when you are on trips and don’t have access to ozone water though.

Things we learned while experimenting with our PureWash:

1) The first 2 months, the PureWash caused a large release of mycotoxins into the air during laundry loads. At first I thought it was the PureWash off gassing ozone, but I soon learned that the ozone water was actually breaking down the mold spores in the clothes (and also breaking down the mold in my moldy laundry drain pipe) and causing this release of mycotoxins. I’d walk into the laundry room and it was the mycotoxins which repulsed me. I started lighting an EC3 Air Purification Candle while doing laundry and it made a huge difference. I could walk in the room with no problems then.

2) If your laundry machine is a single washer and dryer like many European models and collects lint in the wash basin, make sure to clean the lint out regularly. That lint was collecting in ours and causing mytotoxin problems for us while doing laundry. Now that we clean it out regularly, I do not have an aversion to the laundry room.

3) The PureWash has a minor off gassing smell, although it’s tolerable as long as the above 2 considerations are met. I just close the laundry room door and it’s no problem. I can go in and out of the laundry room and the off gassing doesn’t cause problems.

On a side note, we set up our Purewash with a water hose also to make buckets of ozone water to put down drains and keep them mold free. You can also soak toys etc in ozone water, which works well. A side note: if you haven’t cleaned out all the sink traps including kitchen sink, garbage disposal, even laundry machine drain pipe, do this first.

For more info related to cleaning pipes with ozone water, check out my previous blog Do you need a perfect house to heal from CIRS?

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How to Clean Your Car of Mold After Living in a Moldy House

~ mykidshealthjourney ~ 4 Comments

Why is it important to clear your cars of mold? Cars are a source of contamination that you need to address in order to fully heal from CIRS.

Thankfully, we were able to clear our cars after recently living in a moldy home, which contaminated both our cars with mold. There were times I wasn’t sure we could clean them enough, but it was successful. We did not have to sell either car. It was a lot of work and shear endurance, but it worked!

How did we do it?

1) We purchased an ozone machine to 1st ozone the cars. We closed up the car and let the ozone machine run for 2 hours. Then, we let the car sit, closed up, for about 1 day. Car and ventilation system was turned off while ozoning the car.

2) We removed filters from the car’s ventilation system. You can do this before or after ozoning it. From what I understand, ozone passes through the filters and permeates everything.

3) Next, we fogged with EC3 by Micro Balance the entire car and ventilation system. We fogged at the inlet of the car vent system on the exterior, often found near front windshield; the car ventilation system was turned on, set on exterior air mode. Then, we set the air control on recirculation mode and fogged the interior of the car. We fogged the ventilation system and the inside of our car several times. Then, we turned our car on high fan mode and high heat in order to circulate and dry out the car.

4) Then, we replaced the car ventilation filters with a dual hepa and carbon filter. I believe they are made for most car models.

Tips: Fogging with EC3 or ozone treatment alone did not clean our cars fully. The reason, ozone destroys the mold spores but leaves the mycotoxins. EC3 destroys the mycotoxins as well as mold spores. EC3 alone did not permeate the car enough to clean out the ventilation system without the ozone treatment. A friend of mine pre the existence of EC3 had to sell both cars because ozone alone would not clear her cars of mold. Thankfully, there is EC3 now. When we ozoned our car and then fogged it with EC3, our car became happy for us.

ACTION NEEDED: Protect Compounded Medications

~ mykidshealthjourney ~ Leave a comment

Compounded medicines are under attack by the FDA. These medicines are an asset worth keeping in the USA! Of the 300+ nominated natural ingredients used for physician-prescribed compounded medications, the FDA is ready to reject fully 95% of the 300+ natural ingredients. For my family, my son’s journey towards healing his lungs would not be possible if the FDA bars Glutathione, one of these natural ingredients, from use in the USA.

To read the Citizen’s Petition written to the FDA, Click Here

To show your support of Citizen’s Petition to the FDA, you can support them financially and voice your support at Citizen’s Petition @ Naturopathic.org

We need your voice to urge the FDA to stop its process of denying ingredients in the compounded medications that are lifesaving for so many including my son.

Here’s my youngest son’s story and his journey to healing his lungs. Approximately 1 year ago, my youngest son, who was almost 3 at that time, was first prescribed nebulized glutathione and nebulized NAC to help heal his lungs by our new Naturopathic MD. My son, at the time, was on Atrovent and Albuterol almost daily. His breathing was first compromised due to Mycoplasma Pneumonia as a baby, and then with each cold, he only recovered with Atrovent and Albuterol administration. Over the next 2 1/2 years and living in a moldy house, his breathing substantially worsened, to the point, he was on Atrovent and Albuterol almost daily. His pulmonologist, wanted him on Flovent long-term, and our family was not comfortable with giving our son long-tern steroid, inhaled or not. We knew there had to be a better way than just treating symptoms with Albuterol, Atrovent and Flovent. After our initial visit with our Naturopathic MD, we had hope of a better healing path for our son. Since beginning Glutathione and NAC nebulizers, my son has barely used Atrovent and Albuterol and not used Flovent at all. He used Glutathione and NAC nebulizers 2-3 times a day in the beginning. Over several months, the need diminished to once a day or less. Now, we use the neb treatment only as needed, typically only with colds . It is a miracle. He breaths well and has no trouble running and playing like a normal kid.

If you are wondering if glutathione can help you or your family, look on PubMed Central® (PMC) which is a free full-text archive of biomedical and life sciences journal literature at the U.S. National Institutes of Health’s National Library of Medicine (NIH/NLM). Search inhaled or nebulized Glutathione. Below is on article, I referred to when I investigated nebulized Glutathione for my son.

The Treatment of Pulmonary Diseases and Respiratory-Related Conditions with Inhaled (Nebulized or Aerosolized) Glutathione

We need your voice to urge the FDA to stop its process of denying ingredients in the compounded medications that are lifesaving for so many, including my son.

 

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A BIG PROBLEM: MOLDY MILITARY HOUSING

~ mykidshealthjourney ~ 3 Comments

The story of sinus and respiratory problems, fatigue, headaches, constant cold etc is all too common for those living in privatized military housing these days. We just experienced this fact after moving for my husband’s job and within 1 ½ months, we were displaced from our home due to high levels of mold in our on base privatized home. The company itself has denied any problems with our home. They stated it had no history of water damage, although, while we lived there, it was obvious that they were incorrect in their assessment. An ERMI test confirmed our suspected mold problem as did our symptoms of increased fatigue, sinus problems, headaches, constant colds, and increased respiratory problems for example. We informed the privatized housing office ahead of time that we were black mold sensitive and we still received a moldy home. There is a big problem.

Mid February the Senate Armed Services Committee convened to hear military families discussing black mold, rats, faulty wiring and other substandard living conditions in their on base housing. The Federal News Network reported on the Senate Armed Services committee meetings with an article Lawmakers Find Systemic Issues as Military Families Suffer in On-Base Housing.  Also, military.com recently wrote an article Mold, Lead, and Vermin: Survey Finds Toxic Conditions in Military Housing.

If families are not supported with healthy housing, then it jeopardizes the military member’s readiness. Families cannot support themselves, with a deployed spouse when families are suffering from toxic mold related health problems. My family is not the only one suffering from mold exposure. There are others ….

We need to 1st educate people concerning what initial mold exposure symptoms looks like: constant cold, respiratory problems, fatigue, headaches, sinus problems etc are initial signs that a problem may exist with your house. The keys questions are 1) when you leave your house for extended trips, do those symptoms go away? 2) Have you tried, getting to the root of your problems by visiting the doctor at no avail? Typical conventional MDs have no idea that mold exposure can cause so many problems. With my eldest son, his cough continually evolved and we took him over and over to the pediatrician to figure out why he had this cough. Eventually we took him to the allergist. The allergist did allergy testing and concluded he had no allergy problems and his cough was “in his head”. My son is not the only one with this story…

We also need to educate people concerning the serious long-term health problems resulting from with living in a moldy house. Mold exposure can in the long term cause countless physical ailments like Chronic fatigue, MS, Rheumatoid Arthritis, Autism, Hyperactivity, chronic respiratory problems, etc… Typical conventional MDs have no idea that mold is the cause of SO many health problems and they typically give little to no support for families going through mold exposure and it’s aftermath.

What can we do now? For those in potentially moldy homes, 1) do an ERMI AccuCloth  test, which tests the mold dust levels of your home. It is the most reliable way to test average mold levels in your house. 2) Speak to your Garrison leadership about the issue. Due to the recent Senate hearings, the military leadership has increased awareness about potential issues. In our region, the military is offering free house inspections to anyone in on base housing concerned there may be a problem with their house.

We can also continue to speak out to our Senators and Congress people on behalf of those suffering from mold exposure from living at on base privatized housing. With a voice, people will be heard. There can be change. Senator Thom Tillis recently spoke to military command at the SASC hearing on Safe Military Housing. The government is realizing the problem is bigger than initially thought. People need to speak out about their suffering in order to be heard. We need to stop the cycle of mold exposure, which happens over and over again when new families move into the same moldy homes. This is the time…

How we do it: What helps keep our house healthy here and now?

~ mykidshealthjourney ~ 1 Comment

The biggest thing – We work together as a family to clean our house and it makes a huge difference. It’s not all Mom’s job, especially when we are all suffering from chronic illness. It has to be a team effort!

Saturday morning my husband and I vacuum and mop the floors and change the sheets biweekly. We do dusting, clean drapes, toilets etc on a rotating schedule. We put money aside to have a cleaner 1 time a month to clean whatever we don’t get to and it alleviates some of our stress so we can spend more time with the kids.

We use EC3 mold solution concentrate as our go to cleaner to clean our house. It simplifies cleaning and it’s nontoxic for kids and animals and there is no strong odor to it.

Cleaning our clothes with both EC3 laundry additive and an ozone water producing machine, like PureWash is important because it kills off all mold spores and mycotoxins on clothes and keeps them from following you everywhere. The PureWash is quite easy to set up attached to the laundry machine. In the longterm, you can use the PureWash by itself, but just starting off, you will need to use both EC3 laundry additive and ozone water together to clear your clothes of spores and mycotoxins. Check out my blog specific to How to Clean Your Clothes of Mold After Living in a Moldy House

We set up our Purewash with a water hose also to make buckets of ozone water to put down drains and keep them mold free. A side note: if you haven’t cleaned out all the sink traps including kitchen sink, garbage disposal, even laundry machine drain pipe and used a brush to scrub out top down of each drain, do this first. Ozone water can also be used to soak and clean toys for example. It’s useful and inexpensive.

Since we bought a Molekule air purifier, our air stays much cleaner and healthier for us. My kids and I can be in the same room as the Molekule and we have no sensitivities. Prior to the Molekule, we tried the Air Oasis, but I returned it because it could only be running while I was out of the room. I was sensitive to the ozone I believe. What we like about the Molekule, we can have guests with unique smells in our house to visit and our house can stay neutral smelling with clean fresh air. Here’s my latest review of our Molekules after 11 months of use and multiple environments. Do I Like the Molekule Air Purifier?

We have friends to thank for cleaning help along our healing journey. When my husband and I had no more energy to clean and still quite sick with CIRS, we had friends come to help clean and organize. It made all the difference. It’s important to ask for help.

For more info related to cleaning and CIRS check out my previous blog Do you need a perfect house to heal from CIRS?

Do you need a perfect house to heal from CIRS?

~ mykidshealthjourney ~ 5 Comments

We did not need the perfect house after all in order to heal from CIRS. Here’s our journey and what helped us clean our home. The moldy pipes were the biggest problem.

By the time we got diagnosed with CIRS we had moved out of the CIRS inducing moldy house. We live in a 10-year old rental house though, not ideal but in good condition. From onset of diagnosis with CIRS, my husband and I continually asked ourselves whether we could stay in our current house. The house itself had 10 years of dust and grime, no major water damage but lots of small stuff like moldy pipes and a slightly moldy bathroom shower.

Here are a few big things we learned in the process of cleaning and healing from CIRS.

We started feeling healthier in our house after beginning to use EC3 mold solution concentrate to clean our house. What’s awesome is you can wipe down surfaces using one cloth and kill mold spores, mycotoxins, and bacteria along the way. It simplifies cleaning and it’s nontoxic for kids and animals and there is no strong odor to it. We clean our house and cars using it. EC3 is a game changer when it comes to cleaning and getting healthy from CIRS. You can fog rooms with it also and minimize your work.

PIPES!!! Our pipes were moldy! 10 years of use covered the pipes with loads of gunk and mold. How did we figure out the pipes were a HUGE problem? As we started recovering from CIRS for example, I noticed funky smells and felt weird after washing dishes. I couldn’t figure out why until we realized the kitchen pipes and garbage disposal were VERY moldy. We cleaned out all the sink traps including kitchen sink, garbage disposal, even laundry machine drain pipe and used a brush to scrub out top down of each drain. Boy, our house smelled so much better after doing that. It was at that point I started to become biotoxin negative on my VCS score. Our house had become healthy for us!

It’s important to get rid of old couches, rugs, chairs, etc. As we started down the journey towards cleaning and healing we realized our stuff was super dusty. Our couch for example was 15 years old and looked beautiful but held loads of dust. When we removed it from our house, it started smelling more neutral. The same happened when we got rid of upholstered reading chairs, rugs, etc. My new favorite sofa is the Knopparp from Ikea. It has a washable cover and it’s made of all metal and doesn’t off gas.

De-cluttering our house and sorting through old dusty stuff is important for recovery too. We originally had photos everywhere as I love photography and pictures of our kids. Those photos though held years of dust and also made it very tough to keep things clean when I had so little energy. We took down all the photos and it was one thing which led our house to be more neutral smelling. For now, we laminated photo collages and placed them on our kitchen table so we can enjoy photos and have them be washable and healing for us.

We love books but we realized we must get rid of old books, which store loads of dust. Our plan is to scan those books with a book scanner so we can eventually read them. For now, our kids have a new selection of their favorite books but we just keep them in plastic bins to cut down on dust and they have made a new routine of it.

We made our rooms a healing respite. We took out our pictures and clutter which needs to be cleaned and dusted regularly. We still have wood dressers but not much else besides a few books held in plastic bins. Our closet holds stuff in plastic bins to keep dust down and help decrease the need to clean as regularly.

A few other suggestions I will follow up with in additional posts like How we do it: What helps keep our house healthy here and now?.

Cleaning our clothes with EC3 laundry additive and  PureWash by Greentech, an ozone water producing machine is important because it kills off all mold spores and mycotoxins on clothes and keeps spores from following you everywhere. We set up our Purewash with a water hose also to make buckets of ozone water to put down drains and keep them mold free. Read my post How to Clean Your Clothes of Mold After Living in a Moldy House for more information on using EC3 laundry additive and the Purewash.

A Molekule air purifier has helped us keep our air clean and healthy too. My kids and I can be in the same room as the Molekule and we have no sensitivities. Prior to the Molekule, we tried the Air Oasis, but I returned it because it could only be running while I was out of the room. I was sensitive to the ozone I believe. What we like about the Molekule, we can have guests with unique smells in our house to visit and our house can stay neutral smelling with clean fresh air. Here’s my latest review of our Molekules after 11 months of use and in multiple environments. Do I Like the Molekule Air Purifier?

I wrote this blog about 6 months into our journey after diagnosis with CIRS. At the time, I didn’t realize how much our environment beyond mold, affected our health.  I now realize, 1 1/2 years into CIRS treatment that a perfect house and toxin free environment is not absolutely necessary, but it sure helps with healing. I wrote Environmental Impacts on Healing from CIRS and Lyme Disease.