For the moldie life, camping, bedridden, in the car, times with no refrigeration, etc.
1. Baby food (I’m serious!) tiny jars/good serving size to use up and pitch the jar. I’ve had toddler meat sticks for emergency protein. I LOVE the fruits, especially strawberry-beet applesauce! Sometimes you can even get organic. Most baby foods do not have preservatives.
2. Meats (besides the toddler meat sticks), tinned kippers are my favorite. Clams–mixed with cream cheese and put on cracker is pretty amazing, mayo if you want, a dash of Worcestershire if you tolerate. Smoked oysters are yummy. I wouldn’t touch Spam, 😀 but maybe some would. Tuna–keep some mayo packets from restaurants, a stack of celery or a sweet pepper…
3. Trail mix and granola bars: nuts, dried fruits, dry cereal, and of course M & Ms LOL
4. Peanut butter and fruit
5. Cheese and crackers or bread and butter. Triscuits are hearty and whole grain (which is a binder). Cheese can be kept out of the fridge a while, especially if the environment is good.
6. Candy ( I always think of Pa Ingalls eating the Christmas candy when he was lost in the snow). Both Mounds and bars with nuts have the advantage of including binders (coconut meat is a binder), even chocolate is a mild binder, and we found that some of Welch’s fruit gummies are all natural and delicious. Swiss Miss packets, even hot tap water would work in a pinch (I don’t usually drink tap water, but one cup isn’t going to kill you). The Swiss Miss I used to get had coconut oil, which has health benefits.
(complex ptsd) Many of us in the mold community get c-ptsd. Our traumas are not war-related, but many little traumas, burn-out, etc. can result in a form of ptsd. But it is complex because often our battles for our health go on for years. Things may continue to go wrong, especially with housing.
One thing I found to happen really surprised me.
I began to see faces wrongly. My being on the autism spectrum has made faces a bit inscrutable since I was young, but I took it on as a challenge (while not even realizing I was on the spectrum) and began “studying” people’s faces and trying to read them. Over time I honed the skill until I could fairly accurately read faces, especially my children’s faces.
Well, with ptsd now, this is what I found and finally researched it, and sure enough, it’s true:
I see a happy face as a cringing face. I see a sad face as they “lost their best friend.” I see an angry face as “serial killer”!
I am exaggerating for effect, but the truth is, we with c-ptsd need a little grace. We tend to misread many things.
I learned it is related to our hypervigilance. And most moldies can tell you it doesn’t take much to trigger hypervigilance: “Is that sound dripping water?! Where is it?! Is it going to drip on something and cause mold by tomorrow?!”
It’s truly hard, because doing mold avoidance DOES require vigilance and diligence. But it can become overwhelming. Just like the faces, we need some help finding if the “face really is happy or cringing.” Evaluating situation with water is similar. But first let me tell you what does NOT work.
“Calm down.”
“You’re paranoid.”
“You’re scared of everything” (or everything water).
What DOES help:
“Ok, that’s an icicle melting off the roof, you can hear the drips hitting the snow, but it is running off down and away from the house foundation.” (or something like that)
What have you found to help when you are going through mold PTSD or water PTSD etc?
When I was about 7 years old, I read a very famous children’s book. I came to a part where it said “There was a dead bluebottle on the window sill.” I’d never heard of such a thing, so I wondered what that was. I went on wondering for another 45 years. Finally last year, I googled it. Turns out, “bluebottle” is the name of a type of house fly (I am not telling you what I thought it was for 45 years, LOL). I’ll give you a clue as to the book with this: the only other thing in the room in the book was a wardrobe.
Slice unwaxed cucumbers lengthwise, but no all the way through the end, like so:
KODAK Digital Still Camera
Place in sterilized jars.
Add 3-4 juniper berries, lots of fresh dill, 1 t. whole peppercorns, and several whole garlic cloves
KODAK Digital Still Camera
Cover with brine–3 c. warm bottled water 2 heaping tablespoons of natural salt (let salt dissolve.) Place a crusty hunk of bread in the top of each jar and loosely screw on sterilized lid.
Set jars in the sun for two days to ferment.
KODAK Digital Still Camera
Discard if you ever see mold, or if it smells “off.”
Yeah, I freaked out and caused one of our kids to freak out. But 10 minutes later, all was well!!!!!! WHEW.
A little bit of snow had blown up the roof and under the ridge cap and into the attic. On a VERY sunny day (high-altitude sun), so it melted and dripped though a gap in the ceiling metal.
Honestly even if my husband had not gone up there to see what had happened, we probably would have been fine, although it is true that our semi-arid climate, high-altitude sun, and most importantly wool insulation helps our attic stay nearly perfect (wool dries out fast).
If there were just 2 things you could do for a mold-resistant house, I would recommend wool insulation, and plaster walls. 🙂
Of course there are many other aspects to our house that have helped our house stay mold-free for 7 years, but I think these 2 materials are among the best strengths of our house design for resisting mold growth.
Great subject, eh? lol Many of my chronic illness friends use coffee enemas to help with detox. I can’t because of my hypotonia, so I came up with alternative steps.
Eat enough (yeah, that sounds weird, but for 18 months, my appetite was wayyy down (liver damage I think, as well as gut biome was bad, and tooth pain from too much acid (fruits not drugs LOL )
eat enough fiber (whole grains, nuts, coconut meat, beans, even coffee and chocolate!
drink your coffee (I think the caffeine may help as well as the fiber) (I always joked with my friends I like my coffee better in the other end) lol
Take magnesium in the morning, particularly a powder or gummy that is easy to get into your system (not a pill your body has to break down.)
My dad passed 5.5 years ago. Just a bit silly I am only just now realizing how much we had in common: Bach, Vivaldi, love of gardening, holding on to truth like a bulldog, reading non fiction, gardening, art with a special spot for mom’s artwork, ND, humor (especially in the midst of stress), love of Hungarian things, love of Hungarian food, LOL extroverts, did i mention love of gardening? lol
my heart broke when he died, but on the other hand I am 100% sure I will see him again (if you want, ask me how I can be 100% SURE)
He designed the cover for this book, and it is hands down my favorite book cover of all my books.
Christa Upton Black Hills Picture Books Edgemont SD 57735
So, I’ve been thinking about this a LOT because at least 10 people with MCAS (or similar) have argued with me how they “can’t” do this. (Try to cure/help their MCAS with probiotic foods.) Well, here are my thoughts, which of course you can take them or leave them.Â
1. When someone feels “awful all of a sudden,” the instinct says, ok, don’t do that again! However, the thing with MCAS is sometimes totally the opposite of mold. With MCAS, the body is reacting to HELPFUL things with “erroneous” reactions vs. with mold the body is reacting to harmful things (mold or chemicals) with helpful reactions (warning the person to get away.)
2. Moldies need to completely re-think the difference between a mold or chemical reaction (and get away from the thing) and an MCAS reaction (evaluate whether it’s worth skipping/escaping the thing or not).
3. Probiotic foods are the prime example of this. Ironically, this is because probiotic foods (not necessarily probiotic pills) LITERALLY help cure MCAS. They help turn off mast cells. The histamine in probiotic foods is kind of like a “side effect of a medication.” Probiotic foods can also detox the body, rebuild the body, reduce heartburn and reflux, balance body biome, reduce episodes of constant burping, digest properly, increase digestive enzymes, reduce indigestion, and increase energy. They can also lead to tolerance of whole wheat and other foods which are foods that can bind toxins with very little risk once you tolerate wheat (after all, “daily bread” is in the Bible, and God made bread for humans). This is why I often recommend probiotic foods, even to people who have MCAS.
4. Of course, gaining all those foods back helps in other areas too (usually finances, LOL)
5. To me, all this is worth the “side effects” of probiotic foods, IF mild. But of course, everyone can make their own choice.Â
6. Probiotic foods may be (in my mind) the ONLY exception to try with MCAS despite histamines because I absolutely do understand the bucket full aspect of MAST cell (try them first during non allergy season.) But I also understand the power of probiotic foods to help empty the bucket (detox) even while the body STILL has trouble with the histamines from probiotic foods. There apparently is, though, a lo-histamine yogurt out there.
IOW, because of the direct correlation from probiotic foods to MCAS healing (rather than continuing to have to fight MCAS avoidance), it seems to me that probiotic foods, particularly yogurt, I should say, are worth putting at the top of the histamine bucket list in order to gain the benefits while minimizing the histamine. What appears to work best, especially if MCAS is severe (like affecting breathing like my friend who can now eat wheat), do a tiny bit on a spoon as often as possible rather than a whole bowl at once.
It’s true that doing this probiotic food method to help MCAS takes both courage and patience (sometimes even years, literally), but the science is there and I have seen it work for at least four people. I realize that’s not a big sample LOL but I believe in addition that my daughters and I did NOT get MCAS (or kept it below “syndrome” level) because we were eating probiotic foods almost every day in the mold house. She and I can both eat anything we want except chemicals in food. I also think that some people’s bodies are able to correct biome “by themselves” (maybe that person had hardly any antibiotics in their life, etc.) and that this is a big reason why some people move out of mold and their anaphylaxis episodes stop. But those whose episodes do not stop likely need the outside help. Well, my son also got MCAS this January post-viral, and that is worse than having it myself! So NO, it’s not because “I haven’t experienced it myself.” In fact, I have struggled with fairly extreme fear of my son having anaphylaxis starting when he was 2 and struggled with food reactions, hives, etc. That was even before the mold house. I also thought I was having anaphylaxis once, and when the EMTs got there, my heart rate and blood pressure had skyrocketed because I was so scared. Yogurt is making my son’s and husband’s MCAS less and less even now.
for my MCS peeps diamond painting has no paint. Only a very mild adhesive on the “canvas.” a tiny bit of unscented wax on the “pens.”
I have not reacted at all.
To be able to pull out and work on periodically (like while watching TV at night) get one of these
Put each color of dots into one circle tin and label the tops with masking tape and a pen
KODAK Digital Still Camera
if you spill a container and run out of dots of a color, ad lib by putting like color near like and/or same. but of course I have no idea how the loch ness monster (blue) appeared near the bottom of this one! ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
Do important colors first (like in the example below, that would be the tree, and the dark and light “outlines” of the mountains. Save leftover dots to use on the next one for substitutions, spills, or creativity (my daughter’s idea).
KODAK Digital Still Camera
I am addicted to diamond painting now (except it’s summer now and I want to be outside. 😀 )
From 2007 to 2010, I suffered accidental Toxic Injury (also called Multiple Chemical Sensitivity or Environmental Illness). But, the forced time in bed has given me time to write. It has been such a blessing to work on my children's books and stories!
I love: God, family & friends, outdoors, gardening, animals, writing, reading, photography, cooking, music, dance, bare feet, long skirts, lavender & yellow, and chocolate.
If you would like to support further blog posts and writing from me, you can become a patron by signing up on my Patreon creator page.
Patreon does not have an option for a one-time gift, but you can sign up and then cancel later. I would be happy for you to have the listed rewards even for support for only one month. :)
