But really, I feel the meat and potatoes of what we're doing is looking at emotional contributors to illness. And I think there is still sometimes this sense [00:01:00] of, yeah, that's a good thought and it resonates, but is there really any science behind it? And so I really wanted to create a comprehensive webinar showing you guys all the latest research on how past trauma and chronic stress can contribute to illness.

So this is going to be science heavy, but I think I'm pretty good at presenting that science to you guys in a way that's really palatable and digestible so that we can start to understand. How emotions aren't just this kind of thing in our head. They are actually affecting the physiology of our body.

And I'm gonna highlight how that is happening in this webinar. So again, it's a free webinar on Wednesday, August 27th. You can click the link in the show notes to register, and if you're not able to attend live still register because you'll, you'll get access to the replay, but only if you register that way.

To talk to us about mold prevention and what are some of the things we should be doing for those of us who don't have mold in our home? What can we be doing to be super, super preventative and proactive with mold in terms of lifestyle, habits, any products, tools, techniques, any kind of quarterly or annually checks we should be doing in our home?

I did my best to link all the things that she referenced, and I think this was a really comprehensive conversation. Again, for those of us who don't have a mold issue, but you're a homeowner, you never want to have a mold issue. This is absolutely a must listen conversation. So with that, please enjoy this conversation with PJ Harlow.

Yeah. Our last conversation a few months ago was all about. You really like holistic integrative remediation. So for individuals who do have mold in their home or wherever it might be, their office, and we were taking this deep dive into how might a holistic integrative remediation be so much more nuanced than maybe what's happening conventionally.

So if that's where you're at, definitely go back. I'll make sure it's linked in the show notes to listen to that conversation. But I really wanted to have you back on because I'd like to think that there's a good number of us who don't currently have a mold problem, but also wanna be really preventative and proactive in, in making sure there won't be a mold problem.

I mean, it just can be such a massive project. And so if there are things in our power to do, to be able to prevent ourselves from getting to that place, I think we wanna be doing them. Yeah, absolutely. No, I think, um, you know, we don't wanna be, you know, remediation is expensive and I think one of the bigger things that I see is there's just a lack of education and understanding.

Mm-hmm. How, how can we make our homes look good, right? Everything is heavily focused around that and not really how do we make our homes actually work to improve our immunity and our overall health, which is possible. Mm-hmm. Right? And what I'm excited to get into is I think the starting point has to be the difference between, maybe there's some things and I don't know, you'll be able to tell us maybe there are some preventative things we can do that are kind of like a one and done, but I would imagine [00:07:00] it's more about.

Lifestyle, it's more about habits, it's more about things we're doing consistently or on some semi-regular basis to maintain that healthy environment. And I think that's a little bit of a mindset shift there where I do think it's easier to wanna be able to be like, you know, whatever. Great. I, um, I got a, a home air filter now.

I never have to think about that again. And to some extent, when you get some of these initial things, I do think you, you know, there's certain things you can check off the list, but the, just the reality of it is anything we want to be good and healthy long-term must be maintained. Whether it's a plant, whether it's our kids, whether it's our own health or our physical home, we have to be engaging with them regularly.

Which is the opposite. Um, we have to kind of look at our home like a system. Mm-hmm. And if you're just applying one thing into that system, you know, there's so many other things that you kind of have to look at. And so it's kind of a collective. And the more layers you add into that system, the more protected you're gonna be and the higher performing your home will be as well.

And then I imagine there's also some products and things that we might want to work in. So I don't exactly know what the best flow for us to go in is. Maybe you can kind of start us out of like, where do we start with all this? What might be where? Yeah, where do we start? So I think one of the most important things.

But we wanna kind of get away from the scary part and remember that mold is a byproduct of moisture. Mm-hmm. So we don't really wanna prevent mold as much as we do prevent moisture. Mm-hmm. Because when you get into preventing mold, this is when you get into products and things that aren't really gonna serve the actual health of your home.

You know, even, oh, let's paint this wood with a special antimicrobial paint and then you won't grow mold. But that is just not true. Yeah. I've seen mold grow on it. I've seen that actual paint backfire and will, you know, cause the, the mo the water, or I'm sorry, cause the wood not to be able to dry if it does get wet.

So you're almost increasing the opportunity for mold to grow in those situations. So that would be, yeah, it's almost like you're treating the symptom, not the root cause. Yes, exactly. The mold is a symptom. Yes. So we wanna first get that out of the gate. Mm-hmm. Um, and so when it comes to moisture, you know, we need to be checking.

Mm-hmm. We're trying to keep a nice, balanced, diverse microbiome. We are microbial beings. We're supposed to be exposed to bacteria and also mold, believe it or not. Okay. There's a difference though. We have to remember that there's a very wide spectrum of exposure types. Mm-hmm. So oftentimes we get caught in this black or white where it's like it's either nothing or.

And, you know, unless you live in an area where you don't have heating or cooling, um, you know, but most people do in the United States, I would say, you know, the majority of homes have, um, some type of heating and cooling, whether it's mm-hmm. Window units to cool. Whether it's mini splits, which a mini split is kind of like a, um.

It's kind of like a, a rectangular unit that hangs on the wall. Uhhuh. Yeah. Yeah. And you don't have ventilation. The the cool and the heat, uh, are the air is coming out of the actual machine. Mm-hmm. Um, they're pretty popular. Um, we actually have one in our house, but they're very high maintenance.

I think even understanding. What the different parts are, because most people, when I ask where their air handler is, they'll say, oh, it's outside, and that's your condenser. And, but I'm not shaming anybody. I used to think the same thing. I'm like, oh, it's a big thing. The square thing outside. But that is your condenser.

They're very needy. Mm-hmm. So you wanna make sure that the exterior is nice and clean and, and recognize. Where yours is, because if your air handler is in an environment that is not heated and cooled you, it can create more problems. Mm-hmm. Like if it's in an attic or a vented crawl space, very easy to have a mold problem when they're located in these spaces.

Like, you know, and um, but I tried to kind of like think of it, you know, I'm always trying to think of like creative ways of like how we can make this information more accessible. More easy to take in. You know, I think we're overloaded with information and, you know, oftentimes if things are too heavy and educational for me, like I get like this kind of analysis paralysis, like a DHD where I just can't absorb the information.

Mm-hmm. And, um, so I created a guide. It's a real easy read, but it has everything you'd need, you know, because there's. A lot of context that goes into this as well, right? Like I could sit here for an hour and go through scenarios of like, well, if this happened, this is what you do, and this happens and this is, but Right.

Having mold, you know? Yeah. Which is, can be in the hundreds of thousands for some homes. You know, some homes have four HVAC systems. Yeah. Oh wow. And you know, to replace each of them, it's about 20 grand to a place replace one HVAC system. Mm-hmm. But, you know, it has, there's also different types of servicing that you should be doing depending on where you're at in your homeowner journey.

Right. Everybody's in a different stage. Some people maybe just bought a house, some people maybe just have been there for 10 years. Some somebody is maybe a renter. And so there's a lot of different aspects on how you should be navigating that. And, and I wanna touch on renters as well. You know, gone are the days where we can depend on our landlords to take care of all of the things, you know, in our homes.

I mean, a, a a technician visit's about 150 bucks, you know? Mm-hmm. It's not that it's not gonna break the bank. We're not saying redesign all the duct work in the, in the whole home. Yes, of course. That's, that's extreme. But, you know, as renters, I think we need to just kind of know that, that we can't just say, well, the landlord didn't do it.

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And it's something that I recommend to clients all the time because it's so gentle. Non-invasive is backed by science and is so, so accessible. Click the link in the show notes below and you'll get $60 off your Apollo or use discount code the Accrescent for $60 off. Well, it sounds like we could do a whole podcast just on the HVAC so we could Yeah, I think it's for the listener, it's, this is a key, a big area of concern when it comes to mold.

At a starting point, getting that HVAC guide that can really walk you through what maintaining your HVAC to be preventative actually looks like. Yeah. But broad brush strokes are, hey, if you're wanting to be preventative with mold in your home, HVAC is one of those areas we need maybe a little bit more particular emphasis on.

And I know we have like everything in our phone right now, but it's good to have that on your fridge still, just in case. Um, and your HVAC tech should be on there because, you know, we don't just wanna wait again, this is, this is what we're talking about. We don't just wanna wait until something breaks.

Mm. There is a really affordable one on Amazon called the General, and there's two types of moisture meters. There's pinned moisture meters, which kind of have these little pins on the end of 'em. We don't want those because they're very, you know, they'll destroy your drywall and leave holes everywhere. Um, but there's one that lays flat and you can just pick it up and move it.

So. Um, we actually have, um. I'll be putting out another one, but we have like an old post where I go over like how to kind of use 'em on my Instagram. But that is a really amazing tool. You wanna look like a flashlight and a moisture meter and look under your sinks. Believe it or not, using your flashlight is something that needs a little bit of love too.

And we, we wanna try to. Kind of redesign under our sinks a little bit. I have like little Tupperware bins that I put my stuff in so you can easily take things out. Or if something gets wet, you can kind of have some visual back there. I like to put water alarms back there as well. There are these little tiny water alarms by the company Govi, and they just ring locally.

So they absolutely work. And I've had many clients who are like, thank goodness we had the alarms back there. Mm-hmm. So I would put them like, ev we have them under our dishwasher, behind our refrigerator, under every sink, behind every toilet, um, you know, any, even by under our HVAC where your drip pan is, um, anywhere where there's water because mm-hmm.

That's potentially where you, you'd want to look. Um, yeah. I love that as a prevention mechanism. And to that end, just for the audience, that's one of those things that, you know, there's an, an initial energy and time and probably small financial investment, but that's one of those things that once you set that up.

Absolutely. I think, um, another thing I would recommend is just randomly doing perimeter walks. If you have a basement, you should be doing a perimeter walk inside your basement, just kind of walking around the perimeter of where it kind of, um, you know, the outside. If you have a finished basement, pay real good attention because you must know that, you know.

Check all of that. Mm-hmm. Uh, but I would also do an exterior perimeter walk and just look at your foundation. Um, oftentimes another big thing I see is sprinkler systems that damage the exterior of your home because, you know, sprinklers are going off at like three in the morning. We're not out there and they're beating up against the, the home.

Mm-hmm. Um, because they can cause a, a significant, very costly amount of water damage. Um, I would also say, you know, to have just even the exterior checked, like your roof, you know, look at your roof and, you know, every penetration that's in your roof is an opportunity for water to go in. Mm-hmm. So if you have a chimney.

If you have a skylight, you know, if you have an exhaust pipe coming out, you know, all of those things, um, need to be flashed and waterproof properly. And that's one of the weak points in a lot of construction that we're seeing is that things are not being waterproof and flash properly. And so moisture wakes it makes its way in.

Especially we've had some bad storms Mm. Uh, this past summer, especially here on the East coast, um, you know, all the way down to the southern states. We've had an abnormal amount of rain and just a lot of, you know, really strange gusts of winds that have, you know, kind of moved things around. And so really important to get into those spaces that we don't spend time in the attics.

You know, especially if it's vented down there. And, um, so that's another key area that we see a lot of mold problems, crawl spaces and attics are big. I know it's probably hard to answer this, but what would be like a minimum regularity? We'd wanna be doing those perimeter checks? The checks of like our skylights, our roof, you know?

'cause I think I, I hear the audience being like, oh my, I can't, I can't do that every single week. Walk my whole home. Sure. No, that's too much. What is like a minimum regularity? So I would always do it after a, a, a big storm. Not just like a sprinkle, but if you're like, wow, that was like. That was a really bad one.

Uh, but especially if you can't even do that, then at least do it. Try to just remember when we change over to heat and when we change over to ac, those are two, two times that you can kind of like, Hmm, I really need to do a check. Right. Um, preferably I would like a little bit, at least quarterly to get up there and look around.

Totally. Yeah. So I, I do feel like there's two things I'm hearing in this. One is all the things we can do to prevent moisture. And I wanna get into that a little bit more, but a little bit of what I think we've spent some time on is also prevention in the terms of detecting a leak as fast as possible so that it can't become a bigger problem.

And I think that's a lot of what you've just spoken to. And that's huge because if you're, you know, if you install these little water detectors and you do find that your sink is linking you, great, you've detected that day one, you have someone come in and fix it, it can't become a bigger issue. That I, I love that you said that because you know, when we're talking about this topic of water damage and mold.

And, and to kind of preface for a second, even when we're talking about the I-I-C-R-C, um, which is one of the institutions, um, that has a lot of certifications for remediators and um, water restoration. They have two books. One is for water restoration, the other is for mold remediation. They're two totally different things.

It should be somebody local. They usually have like 24 hour, but they should be able to get out there immediately. If you walk in your basement and you find mold, but not water, as much as that feels urgent. It, it's not an urgent situation. We have time to kind of evaluate, you know, try to, you know, really kind of ground ourself a little bit.

Um, but it doesn't require that same, like, we need somebody in 24 hours because the longer that water sits there, the more opportunity we have for mold to actually start growing. And once it does, the whole operation changes and we need to have containment and suits and all this stuff like that. Mm-hmm.

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Maybe adequate moisture. What does that even look like? You mentioned the moisture meter. Mm-hmm. And I wanted to get a sense of, is there a particular number or maybe like spectrum we want our home to be in and how, how do we keep it there or do that if it's maybe consistently out of that spectrum? Sure.

So a moisture meter is to measure the amount of moisture in surfaces. Now when we're talking about moisture as in humidity in your home, uhhuh, that is something that we wanna to make sure that we're monitoring as well. And there's a different kind of little, um, monitor you can get called a high urometer.

So, just remember, if you're in a really super hot climate, you know, Houston, you know Fort Lauderdale, you know Orlando, even Georgia, the Carolinas, you know, really hot places that are very humid too. Just, just try to stay realistic. You're not gonna get it down to 40, it's just, it's too much. Mm-hmm. But we can get it to healthy levels.

Oh wow. Yeah. And is this like maybe when you're first getting started, you won't have to empty it with that regularity all the time or, no, that's pretty standard mean. We empty ours about once a day and Okay. We have multiples in our house. I have one in the living room, they're in our bedrooms. We have it in our garage.

Mm-hmm. In our basement now. If you own your home and you want to kind of do something a little bit more less, um, re re not requiring you to do so much, you can get what's called a whole home dehumidifier. Okay? And this would have to be hooked up by a professional, but this can work to. Dehumidify a larger space, uhhuh.

Mm-hmm. If you ever notice, sometimes if you live where it's hot, it can just feel like, man, I just took a shower and I already feel like I'm sticky. Uh, yeah. Or just that kind of heaviness in the air sometimes with the humidity. Yes. Yes. So, um, you will need to clean out the bucket of the dehumidifier though, because it will grow biofilm.

Mm-hmm. Like we have all of these gadgets all over our house, so I never really have to clean mine. Um, but for somebody who doesn't have those things, you know, just, I was saying earlier, you can start out by getting all of these things, you don't have to get everything at once. Mm-hmm. A lot of these things are not cheap.

You know, a dehumidifier can be $300, uh, an air purifier, these can run anywhere from 400 to a thousand dollars, depending on what size and what type. So just take your time. You know, even when we talk about health, you know, I remember when I first was sick, it was like I would see all these biohacking devices and I would be like, oh, I, I need that and I need that and I need that.

Dehumidification Yeah. I find does a lot because sometimes mold just grows from humidity in homes. Yeah. And we, and Right. Not that there was a particular big leak or something, but just like a chronically humid environment over time. Yeah. Can be a very hospitable environment. Yes. Are, are there, um. I'm, I don't have, I don't know anything about de dehumidifiers.

Are there per, you know, is there a brand you really like? Are they all pretty standard? Is there anything we should be looking for just so the audience has a general idea? Sure. This is something I'll probably wanna get for my home 'cause I live right on the coast. Yeah. We get pretty humid summers. Yeah. I like, but what do I look for?

It's not too crazy loud. Um, you can get 'em on Amazon and they're, the only thing you wanna look at is how big of a space that you're planning to use it in. So Uhhuh, usually there's like a 3000 square foot one. There's a 4,500. I just have the bigger one in my living room just because it's more powerful.

I have one in my bedroom. All of our bedrooms have them garage. Uh, and don't have them in the bathrooms just because we have a fan that works really well in our bathroom. And I would suggest if you're not using, I was surprised. I was talking to somebody the other day and they were like, I never use my fan.

I thought that was for like, you know. Smells in the bathroom. And I was like, no, no. You're supposed to like, turn it on when you take a shower and then leave it on for about 30 minutes and shut the door and let it take all the humid air and expel it, you know, out of the house. Um. Mm-hmm. So, but if you don't have, uh, a fan, you could get a, a very small one for mm-hmm.

So I would start there if you, if you want a starting space and, yeah. Yeah. I love that. It's funny, I live in an, a pretty new apartment complex, but all the fans in the bathrooms go on automatically Mm. All throughout the day. Which at first I thought was kind of annoying, but they, you know, they'll turn on at like a random time in the day and I'm like, oh, it's sensing moisture.

Like, it's, so, it's turning that fan on and that's been kind of interesting for me. I, I live right by the coast. I love airflow, so I have most of my windows open all day long, but that's, that is also humidity that's coming in, so it is just interesting to see that. These, these apartment buildings now are so concerned about mold and I'm sure there's things that they should be doing that they're not.

That's another, you know, I know it's loud and like, you know, but that's another important part that, you know, not necessarily mold, but I would say be cautious though. Some kind of, um, uh, exhaust fans that are over top of, uh, an oven or stove are the microwave. And just be careful because. They aren't necessarily exhausting out like a regular exhaust.

Over top of Yeah. Your, your burners. Um, and if that's the case, I mean, what, how do you check that? Is that something like you're putting your moisture meter against the wall there? Are you having someone come in and check things? You'd put your moisture meter against the wall to kind of just check it, but depends if you own it.

Um, I would more keep an eye on it. There's also, um, there's a little kind of fan that you can get from, oh, what's the company? I'll have to think of it. I can't think of it. Right. Air, air Ethereal is the company. Okay. Uh, and there's like a little side exhaust fan that you can purchase that you can put ripe on your counter and it will kind of mm-hmm.

Pull it into the fan. Um, and so it's kind of like a, like a individual unit that you could get. So that could be maybe something that you could offset if you felt like the risk was really big there. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And then I do wanna understand a little bit deeper. So there's dehumidifiers and then there's air purifiers and, you know, our air purifiers and important part of mold prevention.

Right? Got it. It's, it also kind of a taxi for mold to kind of ride around on travel around. So we wanna try to keep our dust levels down and when we look at even like, what, what makes us sick in a home, right? It's, it's a, um, you know, uh, fragments and little particulates from mold colonies. So this kind of moves into air purification and cleaning, right?

And when we start talking about. The different types of air purifiers, because there's either, to put it very simply, um, for, for, for anyone new, there's two types of purifiers out there. There's ones that are removing contaminants and particle pollution from the air. Mm-hmm. And then there are ones that are actually changing those particulates and they're, they're adding something into the air to change those particulates or bacteria or fungi.

Yeah. Because you know how misguiding that can be. Yes, exactly. So, you know, when it comes to that, I think that a lot of people think that I either, I, I like hate certain brands, but that's not true. It's just in general, when people are talking to me on social media, you know, the answers I have to give are, are just very general in that sense.

Air doctor has ionization. Um, and molecule has ionization as well. They ha they have a different type of PCO, I'm sorry. Molecule is not ionization, but those are two types of technologies and those are adding either ions or oxidation. And so, but they can also, um. You know, create other byproducts, formaldehydes, aldehydes.

But, you know, again, you could use these in a targeted way, but personally I prefer to use straight filtration, which is HEPA filtration or even carbon, which is an AB absorption. Mm-hmm. So, um, but if I were in a hospital or something. I might want to use some of those higher tech, you know, technologies because we have to kind of sterilize all the time.

Yes. 'cause then we're getting small exposures and our immune system's able to tag those things and go, great. I know how to respond to this now. Exactly. Versus a sterile environment actually creates a weaker micro microbiome long term. Correct. You got it. We all know we need to stay hydrated, and yet it's still something that most of us struggle with.

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Click the link below to learn more and receive 20% off your first order. Are there any, and it's, I know you're, are there any, uh, air filters that you do recommend? And if you don't want to label one, that is totally okay. Oh, yeah. But I just know the audience is gonna wanna know. Oh, absolutely. My, uh, I guess the premium model that I love would be Jasper, uh, and.

I also really love, um, a company called Mila, M-I-L-A-A. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I've seen them. Uhhuh. Yeah. Mila Air three is a really affordable, um, and they have different filters that you can use. Um, so I, I really like their brand as well. Um, I actually have a best in air, uh, list that I do every year. Oh, awesome.

Mm-hmm. And I've done this for the past two years and it's been very popular. And this one's gonna have even It's free too. Yeah. So you don't have to buy it. So, um, definitely if, um, you're, you're not a follower, just even for that, that's gonna be coming out as well. So. Yeah. And is that just something where, you know, if they follow you on Instagram, you'll be announcing that and telling people how to get access?

And then also coming back to what are, you know, the free or almost free things I can do. And so even just talking about dust, dust feeds, mold, great. A free or almost free thing you can do is making sure you're cleaning your home regularly. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Even just those dust on surfaces, you know, I, I keep so many windows in my home open all day, and I do, like, I will see the dust on my surface.

I, um, I pick and choose the things that I do myself and that I. Contract out to have people do. So I have cleaners who come in every other week and do like a deep clean of the entire home. But, um, that's just, I just wanted to say that like, yes, we can get the air filters. Is that something we wanna work towards eventually?

So our big announcement will be coming on October 1st. So I've worked very hard on that. You know, it's kind of an offshoot of my decontamination guides that we have, um mm-hmm. For our members that they get access to in our library. And, you know, it's really health focused, you know, because there's a difference between what I would consider to be traditional cleaning and then Right.

And sometimes we get caught up in thinking like, well, but it's non-toxic. Right? Uhhuh and I can just kill mold with it. It's natural. Yes. Yes. And that's not really what we want to be doing, you know? Um, I think that they even did, um, you know, a study, uh, you know, most people also look at probiotics, you know, too, as well.

Mm-hmm. And they're usually very secretive about it. It's like proprie, you know, the proprietary blend. But there was a study done in 2020 where they looked at cleaning. I think it was like soap, water and a disinfectant and like probiotics. And the probiotics ended up kind of creating a monoculture type situation.

And, and I get it. Like I love cleaning. It's very cathartic for me. You know, I try out all different types of products. I kind of look at it like market research, but, you know, I feel like for some people, you know, I mean, look at, look at TikTok. There's like literal as m is it as SMR or ASMR cleaning videos or something.

There's like so many cleaning videos that are, you know, just, I think it's even turned into like a culture, uh, to some degree. Um, but I just have always felt like it there, there's. What I'm looking for is missing. Mm-hmm. And I've always been a proponent of, well, if I, if I can't find it, then I need to create it, you know?

Yeah. And yeah, the attention to detail. Yeah, for sure. Completely. Okay. I have one more question that I think is really, really important. Do you have a second? Yeah. Okay. Um. One question then one maybe like thing like big takeaway, but a question I really wanted to get to is what do factors like having pets, you know, using essential oils, having indoor plants, how does that affect that home microbiome?

And there were, um, uh, a better diversity but reduced levels of, uh, autoimmune illness. I think it was asthma and allergies in the home. Um, so, you know, dogs are really amazing. I've seen a lot of studies on dogs that really do amazing for the home. What was the other one that you asked? Um, essential oils, indoor plants.

However, I am a proponent of plants, but you have to take care of them properly. Because they can cause mold, you know? Mm-hmm. And it's usually the soil of where the problem is, or underneath the bottom of your pot. This is where we usually find even some stacky borus, uh, if we do a little sample underneath the pot.

So if you have a whole huge area of plants and you've got surs or mold toxicity, it might not be the greatest idea for you for to have that exposure right now at this point in your life. But it doesn't mean you can never have plants in your home. Mm-hmm. But you need to be careful of how you're watering them.

So I try to have a lot of indigenous plants in my garden. I love gardening. Um, as far as essential oils go, I am an absolute advocate for using essential oils topically or, you know, in, in health for the body. But I am not a fan of using them, um, in kind of those diffusers. Because mm-hmm. They have done studies that have shown that it actually, uh, is very poor for air quality and Yeah, essential, essential oils are VOCs, you know, when you really break them down, that's what they are.

And I try to just try to be realistic and balanced with it. Um, you know, certainly I know that there's cleaning products out there that's kind of like the go-to in the holistic kind of crunchy community is, you know, products that have essential oils 'cause they want a little bit of scent. Um, but just be careful because some of those essential oils can have antimicrobial and antibacterial properties and we don't want to be constantly.

Like for me, the two biggest takeaways from this are one. I gotta keep moisture low in my home. And we gave people a few really specific ways to do that. But then like they also now I think, have enough of an information that they can go do their own additional research too, which I'm all about here. It's use your critical thinking.

Get involved, take ownership of this. And then the second big takeaway for me was also implementing some things that help you detect water leaks as soon as possible. Yes. Those for me, I think were the two big takeaways. Yeah. And it's good too, you know, if you are able to, I think that I often get the question of like, well, what if I have mold, what can I do?

And we're trying to get that, that air change to change over all the air in the house to kind of provide a little bit more, um, of, you know, to kind of. Pull down that risk level a little bit. Mm-hmm. Um, but I'd also say, you know, declutter, that's another thing that mm-hmm. Can really kind of, cause I mean, people wouldn't think of it, but when you think about dust, you know, um, some homes that have a, a high level of mold often have a lot of clutter, uh, everywhere.

She's made this super comprehensive guide. I can go get that immediately. Yeah. If I want. It is actually such a gift you provide, so that's awesome. Yeah. I would say, you know, I think every woman should own the pretty little guide to hvac. It is that essential. I see mold in HVACs every day that, you know, it's almost a given.

Mm-hmm. Um, and you know, especially since we're building our homes tighter and more energy efficient, you know, just remember HVAC professionals are not mold professionals. So it's important to make that distinction because you can't depend on what they say as like, oh, but my HVAC guy said it was no problem.

They don't understand what this actually does. And just, I would say to everybody, keep that in mind. Mm-hmm. And, you know, not that I'm trying to sell myself or anything, but you know, this is what I wrote this guide for was because it's so, I see it so much and you don't want to, as this whole, this whole episode has been about being proactive and you know, if I, if, if, if I, I had mold and I am in my hvac, had I known what I known now, like I would've bought that in a second because it would've prevented my family from getting very deathly sick.