Yesterday I had to have part of my finished basement torn out because it turns out we’ve had water seeping in from the foundation probably since we moved in and we found out when the carpet got soggy and the mold got so bad that we all started getting sick. (My beautiful carpet. I splurged on that when we moved in. It’s so soft and lovely–what there is left of it.)

Now I am out quite a lot of money and 1/3 of my family room is stripped down to the concrete foundation, and I need to be out MORE money to fix the immediate exterior issues that are causing this. (And then more money yet to fix the long-term exterior issues that will eventually damage the foundation if I let it go.)

In the meantime, mold spores have gotten into everything, especially downstairs. After they tore out the basement, I vacuumed every floor in the house and had to prop open every door and window in the house in the middle of winter and let the heat run for two hours to clear it out of the heating vents. Every bit of fabric substance downstairs makes the backs of my hands break out when I touch it. Tonight I’m washing all the blankets with bleach, and at some point when I feel up to it I’ll need to scrub all the upholstery and cushions, and do an intensive dusting. Could probably stand to scrub down the walls too.

And yet, it could have been so much worse. Ah, home ownership.