A Year of Resilience, Part 4
After several months of struggling with our 4yo son Theo’s chronic illness (Part 1), discovering he had food sensitivities and converting to a fully holistic healing path (Part 2), we had finally found the answers that had eluded us for so long (Part 3).
Theo was allergic to mold — mold that was hiding somewhere in our house, poisoning our family and keeping us stuck in a chronic cycle of sickness for almost a year.
Leaving Home & the Nightmare of Mold
As soon as we figured out that mold in our home was making our family chronically ill, the kids and I moved out the same day — May 20, 2023. Fortunately, my parents welcomed us with open arms (and a pool), just 10 minutes down the road. We were exhausted but thankful, and we dared to hope that this was the start of our new chapter.
Meanwhile, my husband Sam stayed home with our pup and was determined to find wherever this toxic mold was hiding. He bought a moisture meter and, after testing around our entire house, found a spot that read particularly high in our living room ceiling. Directly under our bathroom. Which is right next to Theo’s room. With a shower access panel in his bedroom wall. Right next to where Theo’s bed had always been.
Sam figured out that the spot was right under where the toilet was, and marked it off on the living room ceiling with blue painter’s tape.
Now Sam isn’t into all things mystical or woo woo like me, but as fate would have it, he had just listened to a podcast episode where the guest was a mold remediation expert. So when we found out there was mold in our home, he knew exactly where to find a certified mold inspector. And he knew that we needed to hire separate companies for mold inspection versus remediation to make sure the testing was reliable and the problem was handled well.
Coincidence? I think not.
Even here, we weren’t alone. Something greater was guiding us.
Sam and I each waded through our own research on the nightmare of mold in our home and found the advice fell on two polar opposite sides of the spectrum. One side downplayed the issue of mold, basically saying, “fog it with chemicals and you’re fine,” while the other side cautioned of the invisible horrors of mold spores and that we’d never be safe unless we essentially burned all our possessions and moved.
We didn’t know what was true or how to reconcile the two camps, but we figured one step forward was enough for now and we scheduled a mold inspector to come out that Monday.
Meanwhile, 10 minutes down the road and only a day after leaving home, Theo is getting worse again — constant coughing, ears draining, and night terrors persisted (when the cough allowed him to sleep that is). Now we’re afraid that there’s mold at my parents’ house too. And my sisters’. And again we start to spiral, trying to escape this invisible monster that has been chasing us for almost a year. Nowhere feels safe.
Thankfully, it was just Covid.
I know that’s an odd thing to say, and it was still awful and really difficult to navigate for our whole family. Especially when Theo wasn’t sleeping, and then Iris. My mom and I all got it too, navigating sick kids amidst our own exhaustion, fever, and chills. Sam was still home trying to get things figured out, but was driving over to help out in the middle of the night when Iris was too sick to sleep. And then he caught it too.
Yes, Covid was no picnic. But in the face of pervasive world-shattering, home-stealing, nowhere-is-safe terror that was our reality at the time, finding out that it was a viral infection came with a sigh of relief.
We could come back from this. We could heal from this. And we did.
We found the right homeopathic remedies, and the kids got better. And with a bit of time and distance, they started to detox from the mold and actually got better. For real this time. For the first time in too long.
A Summer of Detox & Duality
Being blessed even in this challenging season, Sam’s parents have a beach house in Delaware. They offered to take care of our pup and for us to stay there for however long we needed. So at the beginning of June, that’s where we went.
On June 8th we got the results of Theo’s mycotoxin testing, showing super high levels of 2 different mycotoxins produced by Aspergillus mold. We were horrified at the amount of toxins our little boy had been carrying around all this time. Yet somehow we were also relieved, because — finally — we could say with certainty that mold was the real problem.
We started a whole new protocol of homeopathic remedies and holistic supplements for mold detox and desensitization, recommended by our homeopath. After Theo’s 1st dose of his mycotoxin remedy, he improved drastically. And he just kept getting better from there.
Within 2 weeks of moving out of our house and starting the new remedies, Theo’s ears stopped draining. His cough and congestion went away, and eventually the night terrors did too. The dark circles under his eyes disappeared and his energy returned. His face didn’t look puffy anymore.
He just looked healthy. For the first time in almost a year.
We had our suspicions that the mold was holding our daughter Iris back too. Even though she was 14 months old now and showing all the signs that she could start walking and talking, she just hadn’t seemed up for it.
Again, within 2 weeks of moving out of our house, Iris started walking. She took her first steps on the beach, on a beautiful day in June. And for the first time in so long, things were starting to go right. Good things felt possible again. Iris started talking, she and Theo both had rapid growth spurts, and they just seemed so happy and healthy.
For the first time in almost a year, our kids were thriving.
All summer, we alternately lived with my parents and then Sam’s. We spent most of June at the beach, then back to West Chester for appointments and for Sam to make progress at the house, then back and forth again and again.
We moved 10 times during those 4 months, each time having flashbacks to leaving our own home (and a bit of a mental breakdown), while lugging our suitcases (full of the only clothes and possessions we knew to be safe), medicine bin (which sat open on the kitchen counter of both houses for easy access to our multitude of remedies), and huge cooler (full of vitamins and gluten, dairy, and egg-free foods).
Avoiding gluten, dairy, and eggs (amidst everything we were navigating) continued to be hard. With the kids starting to feel better, family would constantly ask us when we’d start bringing everything back. Trust me, at this point all we wanted to do is to let our kids be normal and take them out for a fun night of pizza and ice cream.
Oh, for the food in our life to be so easy and carefree again.
We did try gluten again, but Theo complained about his ear hurting that night in the tub. It could have been a coincidence, but with the kids still detoxing and everything we were navigating at our house, we didn’t need more variables to worry about at the time. So we decided to stay the course and kept our limited menu for now. Our families got on board, and we found our own ways to make food fun even with the restrictions.
Meanwhile, it was incredibly humbling trying not to impose on our parents when, with 2 active kiddos and super restrictive diets, we really had no other option. Being two people who take a lot of pride in being independent, it was hard for Sam and I to admit just how much help we needed in this season. Thankfully, our parents were there for us in a way we can never express enough gratitude for.
Still, we missed our home.
We longed for our own space and rhythm, but we couldn’t go back, and that was the hardest part. Especially at my parents’ house, just 10 minutes down the road from our own — knowing we couldn’t go home and might never be able to again.
The kids missed their rooms, their toys, their books, and so many other things — since we could only bring so much back and forth with us and we weren’t sure what was safe with the threat of mold spores and toxins always in our minds.
We had found a laundry additive to help wash any mold spores from all of our clothes and belongings. But when we tried to bring back a quilt from Theo’s room at home that his great-grandma made, he had a night terror that night and we realized we couldn’t be too careful. So we had to take it away again, wash everything, and explain to our son why his blanket wasn’t safe.
I wanted to escape the nightmare of mold and what it had done to our children, and yet it consumed Theo’s reality. He made drawings of our house with mold in it and every person we passed at the food store or saw on the beach, Theo would say, “Can you tell them that our house has mold?” I can’t tell you how many times over the summer he would say to me, “Mommy? I miss the good old times at our house…” And every time, my heart would break all over again. I wished he didn’t understand so much of what was happening, and yet I was amazed at how resilient and brave my son was through all of this.
I did my best to hold it together, but let’s just say our kids got very used to seeing me cry over the last year.
After being off the grid for the better part of a year, there weren’t many people besides our parents who truly knew the extent of what we’d been going through, but my friend Bre of Rowan Made was one of them. While bonding over the struggles of healing and motherhood one day, she shared that in this season she was allowing for herself to hold two truths — that life could be really really difficult and wonderful at the same time.
That duality couldn’t ring more true for us in the summer of 2023.
We had been forced to leave our home — a home that had been poisoning our family for months or maybe even years. And yet, we had not one but two homes we could run to. Our parents welcomed us with open arms for whatever time we needed, and offered more support than we could have ever asked for.
We were technically homeless and heartbroken after everything (with more challenges still unfolding day by day). And yet, our children were finally healthy and thriving for the first time in a year.
We couldn’t go home, but the kids and I spent a beautiful summer with their grandparents by the pool and at the beach, full of priceless moments and memories we wouldn’t have otherwise.
Even through all of the trials and trauma of this season, there was light.
There is always light.
Join me for Part 5 as we do our best to put the pieces back together and make our home safe again.
