Last Friday was my now-weekly midwife appointment. It was and has been quite hot out. Once we got to the part where they listen to her heartbeat, the midwife thought it was a little high (160 when 'normal' is 130). They sent me to the hospital, across the street, for a non-stress test, where they put two monitors on my belly to get a baseline and make sure she calmed down. She did, but they kept us there two hours. Not that I'm complaining--it was cool in there and they brought me juice and crackers.
Saturday we did very little, because Andy was concerned about Jane's well-being. But then came Sunday.
Our carpeting downstairs is dark brown, and Brisco's hair shows up very well on it. It'd been a while since we'd vacuumed, and one of us mentioned it should be done that day. Somehow I noticed a white patch (not unlike his hair) but I determined it was mold. Once we noticed that, we started noticing more of it on the carpeting, as well as a few patches on the linoleum that had shown up with the extended period of humidity we're having. The linoleum just needs a Clorox wipe, but what do you do about carpet?
I called our landlord who lives in New York, and asked what he'd have us do. He said he'd "probably" be in town the weekend of the 14th because his daughter was expecting a baby that day. I said I was too, and we were not going to wait for him to possibly be in town to take some kind of action on the mold. (Remember Andy's what-turned-out-to-be-yeast ordeal?) He suggested a dehumidifier and I, in turn, suggested that it be deducted from our rent. I also said Andy'd be willing to rent a steam cleaner but that the rental would also come off the rent. Our landlord agreed, so Sunday was spent moving furniture, mopping (and drying) the kitchen floor, moving the couch to the kitchen, steam cleaning the couch, steam cleaning the carpets...
I helped out as much as I safely thought I could. We both wore those surgical masks. Brisco and I retreated to the air-conditioned bedroom several times. The dehumidifier filled a few times (it's just a small one, as Home Depot only had TWO left, and it's an LG, which I knew my in-laws would not approve of) so it's doing its job. We mentioned the mold to our neighbor and she said she'd found the same thing, though she doesn't have carpeting. Her apartment is mirror-image of ours, so she mentioned a particular closet that had mold, so we knew we had to tackle that too.
Yesterday I found more mold in one of the kitchen cabinets. Luckily it was just the one, and not all of them, but it needed cleaning out which meant Andy had more to do. Everything in the cabinet went through the sanitize cycle on the dishwasher. Then today we emptied out the utility closet and mopped it out, though we didn't find mold in there. Andy found a bit behind the dryer but was able to clean it up too.
Basically it's not a safe place for either of us, but it's much, much better that we've found and dealt with it now than when Jane was here. We thought she was coming last Saturday, so it's good that she didn't!
Now that's what I call a lucky timing indeed. It's a good thing you got that mold growth removed immediately before the baby arrived. There are recent studies that show there's a link between early mold exposure to the development of asthma in some children, particularly if they're genetically susceptible to asthma development. Admittedly, further studies are still needed in this regard, but when it comes to your family's health, it's better to be safe than sorry. And additional studies also show that improved housing conditions can reduce the rate of incidence for asthma and aspiratory allergies among children. Congratulations for your new baby, by the way!
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