Not dead yet!

Well-Known Member
I have a lab tested case of Stachybotrys in my home. It grew on the outside of windows because:

1. It's been humid for months, and it takes 93% of higher humidity to allow it to grow.

2. The AC makes the windows 'stream' on the outside with water.

3. The windows are old, single pane, and the glazing was breaking down, allowing even more air to enter, bringing spores.

4. The paint was old enough to have cracks opening the wood to the fungus.

5. There was flashing instead of weather stripping on the windows and underneath, it was bare wood, never been painted there. There are three places for flashing, top, bottom and middle. If you have flashing, remove it, paint it, put weather stripping there.

6. Some fool of a construction engineer decided it was clever to put HVAC forced air registers right underneath windows which just added to the streaming effect of water on the outside. We bought air redirectors so the cold air doesn't go straight up.

7. My husband insisted we do NOT put curtains up (blocks the view), and it was a huge mistake because it added to the cold air/hot air effect that caused the water on the outside. Use curtains if you have old windows!

The cost for replacing windows never came down below $9000 for about 20 windows in a medium size home, not even if we chose picture windows in places.

The cost for painting was around $2500. So we chose that.

It took 3 days and 5 people, but we got it all cleaned up. We're going to need to do more painting, especially the porch, or we could demolish the porch and just put stairs down from there. Metal ones.

We learned that 'remediation' companies have a built in flaw: they ONLY do the inside of the home. So if your outer layer of drywall is covered in Stachybotrys, they will not even look for it. The guy tested the INSIDE layer of driwall and found nothing. We kept saying, yeah but the house is BRICK and it needs tuckpointing, and there have been cases where the brick in other homes leaked into the OUTSIDE wall. They refused to even look for something like that.

My opinion: they're a scam, steer clear of remediators, and instead, get a mason to tuckpoint.

We're considering getting some thing like this from England, and wonder who might install the Nuaire Drimaster in the US:


Or even if they are 'code.'

The past few days after the cleanup all I did was sleep. I was conscious about 20% of the days. I'm still feeling exhausted, but not as bad as before. Through the sleep haze I could feel my kidneys and liver burning and painful.

Funny thing happened: I used anti-allergy eye drops, and my vision cleared!! I mean, I had blurriness which I thought was just age related, but it was allergies. It's been there for months, now gone.

Note that Stachybotrys eats cellulose but NOT sugar! Sugar was making me feel better. Science sources say it's hard to grow it on media that contains sugar.

It looks gray to me, not so much black. Circular splotches, darker in the center. Like flowery black lace.

I still think I need a vacation in the desert.

I will probably want to sell my house anyway.

All I can think of atm. Need another nap.
 
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Forebearance

Well-Known Member
I'm so sad that this happened, Not Dead Yet. But I'm so glad that you have found it and fixed it.
I hope that you keep feeling better and better.

Yeah, I agree with you about the risks of wood windows and lots of other building materials.

I hope you do get a vacation in the desert! I would want to sell my house, too, if I were you.

I have seen mold like you describe! Gray circular splotches, lacy and delicate looking. It's good to know that it was probably also Stachybotrys.
 

waiting

Member
I'm so glad you were able to tackle the problem!

A thought -- do you plan to have the house's air ducts cleaned? If you do, please consider staying away from the house before work begins and for at least a week afterward. Good luck!
 

Birdie

New Member
I'm so glad you were able to tackle the problem!

A thought -- do you plan to have the house's air ducts cleaned? If you do, please consider staying away from the house before work begins and for at least a week afterward. Good luck!

Hi Waiting-
Sounds like you've had some experience with getting ducts cleaned. I get extreme cognitive symptoms (thinking shuts down and I become almost non verbal) whenever our central heat/AC comes on. We're planning on having the ducts cleaned- can you elaborate on your experience?
All advice welcome!
 

Not dead yet!

Well-Known Member
I'm so glad you were able to tackle the problem!

A thought -- do you plan to have the house's air ducts cleaned? If you do, please consider staying away from the house before work begins and for at least a week afterward. Good luck!

Yeah we had the ducts cleaned. I got stubborn and stayed home for the cleanup. I just feel like this illness is taking so much from me. And I'm not exactly 'well' anywhere else, so my personal decision was why pay the cost of a not-scary hotel? I might need that money for more cleanup. Well that's what I was thinking anyway. Others may decide otherwise. I survived. Starting to feel better.

The duct cleaners were awesome, they showed us what they were using and it was made of Thymol! You know, from thyme, the herb. So we bought some and are using it in places we're suspicious of, like the pocket door.
 

Not dead yet!

Well-Known Member
Update: we're using a thymol black mold killer to clear the mold from the window tracks! I kept walking into one room in particular and saying "I smell mold" and it turned out to be the bare wood pressed up against the window frame along the track. I nearly puked when I put my nose close to it to be sure. It changed the smell of the room from moldy to herbal so at least that's a plus. Supposedly it will kill it, though I haven't been well enough to look up much.
 

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