The Toolkit

There is a toolkit of products and strategies that we use to remove spores and toxins from our belongings. Before getting started, let’s remember some basics.

 

Colonies make spores. Spores make toxins. Toxins suck. Spores are willing to move along peacably, but if you attack them, they will make toxins that are a thousand times harder to remove than the spore itself. They are like skunks. Don’t piss them off.

 

Also remember that spores release toxins within their own natural cycles, not just when you piss them off. They release them when barometric pressure drops, when a storm rolls in and generally more in and around the month of November. I don’t know why.

 

There is a vast variety of spores and toxins. Some are completely benign and some will devastate you. Toxins vary in stickiness, toxicity, cross-contamination-ability and speed of denaturing.

 

Stickiness--Some toxins are so sticky, they just won’t come off your stuff. You may have to wash 5 times to remove one exposure, for example. Moldies often give up and get new stuff.

 

Toxicity–Some molds are non-toxic. But Stachybotrys is insanely toxic, for example. It’s like weaponized mold-toxin. People have varying reactions to it ranging from malaise to weeks of bleeding lungs, nausea, vertigo, psychosis. One woman I know will literally pass out in the presence of a single Stachy spore. The toxin it makes is called Trichothecenes. It is not to be trifled with.

 

Cross-contamination-ability– Cross-contamination refers to the ability of a toxin to jump from item to item. If an item touches a second item and that touches a third item and so on.  Old fashioned molds, even the 5 HERTSMI molds, are relatively easy to contain. The newer super toxins are crazy-dangerous. The primary item can contaminate something with 10 degrees of separation, (a guesstimate.) They have somehow mutated to gain the ability to jump the space-time continuum. It is said that they travel like radiation. One item can contaminate a whole house in minutes and take years to denature.

 

Speed of denaturing– All toxins will denature eventually. Some take hours, some take years. I think there are some that may take decades, but only Erik Johnson would know. If something is exposed to the air and heat (think metal storage shed in the desert) and/or direct sunlight, it will denature more quickly. Conversely, if it is wrapped tightly in plastic and kept in a damp basement, it won’t. Toxins also denature from driving over mountains! I don’t understand why, exactly, but driving your car up and down in altitude helps to clean the car! I can feel it on the downhill, my body feels the toxins and then the car feels better.

 

The Toolkit- For removing spores and toxins from the environment (not from the body)

 

An old-fashioned lint roller– One of my mentors, Karen Dean, gave me this ingenious and simple solution to keeping spores down in my Scamp. The Scamp is a mini trailer that has cushions and fuzzy walls and I was living without electricity in a wilderness area. I didn’t want to get a Hepa Vacuum because it required electricity and seemed too ineffective anyway. A lint roller was perfect! I roll all the walls and ceilings and cushions when it feels like it needs it. You can use it on your car seats in between vacuuming.

 

Quats– quarternary ammonium compounds– These are cleaners that have a molecular structure that attaches to spores. Some, like Windex and Fantastic, can be harsh and stinky. The two I use are Simple Green and Downy Free and Gentle. You can clean almost anything with these two. They get rid of spores, but not toxins.

 

Hepa vacuums and air filters— These should only be used to keep a clean space cleaner. They will not make a contaminated space clean. They will just make the hepa contaminated. They round up spores, but not toxins. But they always distribute some spores in the exhaust. Never use an old or contaminated vaccuum in a new, clean space. (Done that.) If possible, have your remediators buy long hoses and keep the machines outside when vaccuuming. If using industrial car vaccuums at car washes, become aware of where the exhaust shoots out and stay away from it.

 

Ozone– Not everyone can use ozone. There are some people who react to it so badly, that it becomes another problem, not a solution. But for those of us who can tolerate it, it is a godsend. You do not want to trifle with a small machine, however. Karen Dean cautions against using small machines for short periods of time. Your process will piss off the spores and they will create intense toxins. The ozone needs to be left on in high enough concentration for a long enough time to completely denature the toxins before you call it finished. Otherwise you can make a space worse and possibly unlivable. As an example, I would do my car overnight for 8 hours with a 20,000 cfm ozone unit. A 200 square foot room might require two ozone units for four days.  Caveat: Ozone is dangerous. It will annihilate any living thing. Insects, house plants, the entire microbiome of a place. It will annihilate you too, if you breathe it. So don’t. You stay away and let a space air out for a good long while before you reinhabit it. (Several hours for a car, a couple days for a room.) Also; ozone degrades rubber and messes with electronics. You can ozone a car about a half a dozen times before you start having electrical weirdness. Learn how to clean your grids. Each machine has ozone-producing grid-like plates inside them. They turn black and stop functioning optimally. You can extend their lives by wiping them off regularly with cotton balls soaked with white vinegar or isopropyl alcohol.

 

Altitude– Traveling up and down hills changes the barometric pressure and can make toxins “pop,” which means they release and denature all at once. Just driving for a while can make a vehicle feel better, but driving up to a clean location will make it feel MUCH better. Altitude also has an impact on Erythropoietin, which can lower your C4A (an inflammatory marker.) Erik talks more about this in his book Erik On Avoidance. Definitely read it.

 

EM-1– This is sold as a “soil conditioner” but it appears to be an aggressive soil-based bacteria that has it out for molds. It attacks mold and the mold flips out. It is incredibly important that you basically sterilize anything you use it on before you use it, because it can backfire if you don’t. You boil any fabric before you apply EM-1 and you ozone any space before you spray it indoors. Many have gotten lucky (I did) and sprayed it indoors with no adverse consequences. But it is very risky. It is unknown what is exactly happening when it “goes bad” but the war of the microbiome can make a space uninhabitable if this bacteria is applied in the presence of the wrong spores. But used correctly, this product will clean up both spores and toxins, even the worst ones.

 

A fine mist on a computer that is then left out in the sun can decontaminate a mild contamination.Visit Sara Tamames website to learn more about all the ways this product can be useful. Sara Tamames Boiling Water Protocol

 

Vulpex— This is an expensive, non-toxic, alkaline soap made in Britain that is used by museum and archival restorers. It is what is used to wash America’s Star Spangled Banner. It is non-toxic enough that it doesn’t harm vegetation, but it stinks and it is also difficult to obtain. It is not appropriate for people struggling with MCS– multiple chemical sensitivity. It is above 11 on the acid-alkaline scale, meaning very alkaline/base. It works by breaking the acidic bond that mycotoxins use to adhere to any material. (Bleach, ph 12 and Ammonia, ph 11, also have this potential, but these two cleaning agents really piss off spores, often causing them to release more toxins, which Vulpex doesn’t do.)  It is so alkaline that Vulpex is categorized as a “caustic degreaser.” That means it can NOT touch raw steel or other metals. If it does, gasses that can kill you will get released. It can not be put down the drain, therefore. Or into your septic tank. But if you soak a contaminated item of clothing in it overnight and then wash the item the next day, it can feel clean. It works to remove most, but not all, toxins. It seems to work to remove regular mycotoxins, but not supertoxins. You can make a tub full of the solution with about a ½ cup to 10 gallons of water. You can reuse it over and over because the solution doesn’t “contain” mycotoxins, it denatures them (which essentially means it dismantles them into their molecular components.) It also has the bonus of being both water soluable and alcohol soluable, so you can use the alcohol mixture to clean toxins off (painted) metal and glass (like your iphone or TV.)

 

Sunlight– The sun won’t kill spores, but it will denature toxins. Spores can withstand up to 500F and are viable in space. Only the torch annihilates spores. But the sun will denature toxins. Rig up a southern facing clothes line and leave items on it til they are clean. That sometimes can take weeks or months and multiple washes. You can also leave your car baking on a hot day in the sun to denature toxins and allow chemicals to outgas. It might degrade fabrics, but who gives a shit if you can’t use it anyway?

 

The Torch– The torch was invented by Karen Dean. It is basically a flame thrower attached to a 5 gallon LPG canister. Karen cleans her house with this. 🙂 If spores are torched, they don’t have time to produce toxins. She built a metal and concrete house that can be torched. It is, of course, not possible to torch something clean that will catch fire or melt. So use your common sense. After extensive research, Karen relies on the torch to kill spores, but uses ozone to decontaminate toxins. The torch is not effective enough at denaturing toxins because it needs to be held in place for too long in order to work.

 

Karen sometimes torches the ground outside if washing something covers the ground in her outdoor living area with spores. Spraying EM-1 can also help this, but will result in a toxic cloud for a while afterwards, while the torch just annhilates the spores before they can emit toxins.

 

Washer and Dryer– If you are lucky enough to have your own washer and dryer that are not contaminated and are not shared with others, you can use these for removing spores and toxins from your clothes and bedding. Guard them fiercely. Do NOT share them, not even with your family. Make sure your clothes washer is an upright version, not a front-loader, as those get moldy. Clean your washer regularly with Smelly Washer Cleaner and make sure it is well-ventilated and stays well below 50% humidity levels. If your washer drains to a grey water system, be aware that that area will contain spores and toxins. Make sure it is away from your living/sleeping space and gets plenty of sunshine.

 

Using a dryer is an effective way to get spores to release themselves from your clothes. That is IF the dryer is clean. It can also be an effective way to inoculate your clothes and bedding with spores and toxins if it is not clean. Avoid laundromats.