From Mystery Illness to a Mission: Hidden Mold, Genetics, and Recovery

Podcast Intro and Guest Introduction 0:00

I had a one patient gain 90 pounds in one year and that mold was the biggest piece, right? She was extremely sensitive. And so again, on average, it's more like 30 pounds, but if someone moves into any new place and they don't feel well and start to gain weight and all these things, we have to look at what's in that home could be potentially causing issues. You've tried everything. You changed your diet, you've detoxed, and you even moved homes. And yet you still feel sick. Headaches, brain fog, fatigue that no one can explain.

What if it's not you? What is your environment? Welcome to Mold Microtoxins and More. I'm John Borden. Each week I sit down with experts uncovering how mold, micro toxins, environmental exposures affect your health and what real recovery looks like. Let's get into today's conversation. The information provided on the Mold Pros Podcast is for educational and informational purposes only and is not intended as medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Listening to the podcast does not create a doctor-patient or professional-client relationship between you and the Podcast host, guest, and Mould Pros.

The content shared should not be used as a substitute for professional medical advise, diagnoses, treatment, And always seek the medical advice of your physician or qualified healthcare provider with any questions you may have regarding the medial condition, potential mold exposure, or health concerns. Never disregard professional medical advise or delay in seeking it because of something you heard on this podcast. And while we strive to provide accurate and up-to-date information, we make no representations or warranties of any kind, expressed or implied, about the completeness, accuracy, reliability, and suitability of all the information discussed.

A guest's experience and outcomes discussed on this podcast are individual cases and should not be considered typical results. Your situation may differ significantly. As always, if you think you have a medical emergency, call your doctor or 911 immediately. By listening to the Mold Pros podcast, you acknowledge that you understood this disclosure. Welcome to another episode of Mold Microtoxins and More, where we explore how our homes, our workplaces, and other environmental exposures may influence our health.

I'm your host, John Bode, co-founder of The Mould Pros. On this podcast, we're bringing together physicians, researchers, environmental professionals, and individuals who've lived experiences to examine the sciences behind healthier people and healthier indoor environments. Today's guest is Dr. Ashley Beckman. Dr Ashley is a doctor of Chinese medicine and acupuncture and a functional medicine practitioner. She's also an epigenetics and cellular detox expert. Her work combines the principles of traditional Chinese medicine with functional testing, nutrition, lifestyle interventions, and personalized root cause strategies.

Dr. Ashley also understands complex illness personally. Her experiences navigating mold exposure, Lyme related disease, autoimmune imbalance, migraines, brain fogs, fatigue, And other chronic symptoms helped shape the practice that she has today. Doctor Ashley, welcome to mold mycotoxins and more. Thank you. I'm so excited to be chatting about one of my favorite subjects. Well, we're glad to have you and are really interested in your perspective. The journey that you have is kind of a unique one.

So before we tear into today's program, can you share a little bit about how your health began to change and what did your personal life and clinical career look like prior to these issues? If you talk a How did you know that maybe something wasn't right? Sure. So I would say even when I was a little bit younger, I started to notice in high school that I very sensitive to fragrance. That would be the products that we were using at the time when we young, like bath and body works and just all the traditional perfumes.

I starting to get more and more headaches that turned into migraines as I got a bit older.

Ashley Beckmanu2019s Early Symptoms and Mold Exposure 3:59

Uh, but I didn't really put it together. I just thought maybe I'm sensitive, nobody else seemed to be around me. Right. And then fast forward, I went to grad school and one day I, it hurt when I woke up and hurt to walk. My ankles hurt were excruciating pain and it was my cell phone was too heavy to hold. So my wrists and ankles were impacted and I had been getting more and more headaches. Even though I wasn't from a family that went to the doctor frequently, we kind of grew up pretty healthy and I asked her if there was anything I could do and she said, well, you probably have some sort of undiagnosable autoimmune issue and if you're lucky, it'll show up in 10 to 15 years on blood work, if ever.

And I said, well, could this be from diet? You know, maybe I'm sensitive to gluten. I've been hearing about this. She said no, but we'll run a celiac test, which was negative, of course, because I didn't have celia. But then I started just fine tuning a lot. I think I'd been vegan. I started eating meat again, which most of us do in acupuncture school. And I had stopped eating a lot of all of the vegan foods that were all gluten and soy. So I found that if I removed gluten in dairy, most my joint pain and headaches went away.

So I felt much better for many years and then I lived in a home where we got a call from the water company because we had an excessive amount of water use, right? Turns out we have a leak in our foundation. And so it was a big problem and this was the rental so i had recently been running microtoxin testing on all my clients because i've always been obsessed with toxins and getting them out of people's bodies as a preventative measure. And so I came back, I ran myself, my mom, and my daughter. I think at the time we only had maybe six or eight elevated ones, which again was significant at that time.

Only six, right? Well, now my patients I run some and they have 10 to 18, but again, it's the nature of your clientele, Anyway, we looked into that. I had a mold inspector come out and I just said, you know, there might be an issue, but I think it's just in the foundation, which is pretty problematic anyway. But at the same time, they started testing. And I. Think after room six, when they kept seeing things, I said OK, think we have enough information to stop testing like it looks like this is going to be a issue.

And it was in our HVAC. So it had pretty much spread into most of our rooms, right? So, it, was a big problem and that really got me extra invested in mold and looking at that because I had felt much worse. You know, all the joint pain and migraines and brain fog and fatigue was back significantly and I hadn't felt like that in about 15 years. warranted me just diving deep into the mold and what it could do. And as I had started running all of these tests on my clients, I was just finding it over and over again.

So I always take a look at what's going on and want to see, again, these patterns we see in the health industry and mold just kept coming up. Naturally I very intrigued. Of course. Wow. It was the water leak in The Foundation. Did you actually, if you don't mind me asking, did you see visible signs of microbial growth or did just know that you had a water problem? Because a lot of times what we hear is that people say, no, I don' think I have a mold problem because I can't see it. But you mentioned the HVAC system and we know certain molds like penicillium and aspergillus that are xerophilic or dry-loving molds, the hVac is a great place for those molds to grow and thrive, right?

And you always see that. So I was curious if actually saw stuff or just kind of felt the symptoms. So no, and I was kind of new to this, right? I wasn't used to looking around a home and trying to look for visible signs. Our home looked perfect, I think that's what a lot of times happens. The only thing is because I'm so interested in this I've been following the mold inspector around everywhere. You know, I wanted to buy the moisture meter and he was showing me the signs that one could see. The only thing I would say is outside there was, you know like wet soil in an area where there shouldn't have been.

And then we also lived. There was a big hill behind us, which, there were just some things I learned later that for runoff were problematic of where your home actually was placed. We did see, I could see old water signs in the garage and the ceiling. And the first week I moved into the house, actually, and this happened to us twice, the sealing fell through because there had been a slow leak. So I knew that there was potentially a little water thing, but this was about a year and a half later. Again, it was fixed, right?

Some of these homes right when they're sitting for three or six months vacant there can often be a water issue and then when new tenants move in and the water starts running then we like i said we have that twice where the bathroom the drywall came out so. Yeah, but I was not aware of how to look for these signs. Now I try to talk to my clients about that, especially before you move in somewhere. But know that our home looks beautiful, perfect, no musty smells, none of the typical things that people think of for mold.

I couldn't see anything. Yeah. And that's not uncommon. Right. A couple thoughts to that. We use infrared thermal cameras during our inspections because, you know, moisture heats and cools at a little bit different rate than what air does. And so we do have those slow pinhole leaks that create this damage over time. They're a great tool to help diagnose some of that.

Finding Mold in the Home and Hidden Water Damage 10:20

So I don't know if you actually got your moisture meter, but if I'll recommend a few models for you, but an IR camera will be the next toy that you want. They're a lot of fun and really helpful in diagnosing. It helps you kind of see behind the walls and then allows you to kind further investigate with that moisture meter. But very good. One of the main things that we hear is like, yeah, I don't see anything. There's no way, no, way that I'm a good housekeeper. Or my house is new construction. So I, don' have a mold problem.

It's not an old, old damp home. Do you find that a lot of homes are the, do you see a correlation between the age of home and the moldiness in Europe with your patients? No, not necessarily since a lot of the homes and my friend and I educate practitioners on mold and we show, you know, examples of some people, of our clients that have had a brand new build and you just go, break open the dry or the outer wall and behind it's just filled with mold, right? Because the materials arrived with water or it is just hidden.

Um, everyone, that's the first thing they say, Oh, I have a new build. But first of all, for them, a knew build could still be like within five years, right? So it's, it, not always like a brand new home, but they, say it is. And, and so, yeah, we, again, as just something that we talk about because even the brand-new ones are not safe from molds. and then the way, which you probably talk, about all the time is just the, way everything is so sealed. Now, some of it it actually can be worse in certain ways.

Right. Most of our business, and we've been at this now for going on close to 20 years, but it's actually newer construction. In fact, we have done a lot of work on multi-million dollar model homes that have never been lived in. The way we build, you're right. We wrap them all in Tyvek or plastic. They're energy efficient and they're airtight from that standpoint, also they don't breathe. And we do have a larger issue. There's really nowhere for it to go. We usually recommend a lot of intra-cavity samples if we suspect we've got a hole behind, really inexpensive, less than a hundred bucks, should be able to get you a sample behind a wall as well.

And I find a lot of my clients decline them, right, because they don't want to drill into the wall and things like that. So some of the inspections, you know, again, it's all about making sure it is as complete, but sometimes the clients start to say no to certain things. Like the walls happening. It's an easy, we make a hole a little bit larger than a pencil. So you can actually repair it pretty easy with spackling, so you don't have to demo the wall unnecessarily. And so if you have patients that are concerned with that, it really is a simple thing to do, yeah.

It won't result in unnecessarely tearing up the house. Now, another thing that we hear frequently, some people in the home, Fine. Usually, usually a lot of husbands because we, you know, myself, we definitely don't listen or to our bodies or kind of go out. And so we're not as sensitive sometimes in a lotta ways. But anyway, but anyway. Do you come across where a lot of people in the home are non-symptomatic and then you have others that are experiencing severe symptoms? And maybe some of the non symptomatic people are testing high.

Yes. Do see that? Yeah, so we see, I see it a lot. The typical story or client that comes to me is either a mom coming for herself or a sick child. And usually again, there's a few children in the home or more, and then a couple. Often the male doesn't have symptoms, right? But he still might have some things that the wife could determine might be contributing, their digestive issues, skin issues like rashes, irritability, things like that. Then the mom though is usually quite sick and depending on the age of the kids, the kid are usually pretty sick or at least a few of them.

I would say it can just depend on so many factors. Because most people have been working from home more lately, we've had more people be sick that I think it wasn't always the case. If the home has a mold issue, whoever spends the most time at home is often one of most sick. Also, men tend to have a higher and a more robust constitution, so they might just have, they have very different systems than females, right? Overall, women, 80% of autoimmune issues are with women. So we just more complex systems, and lot of these molds can impact the hormonal system and estrogen and thyroid and things like that.

That along with the little kids who their immune system isn't fully formed, they're often the most sick. And I would say the kids where the mom was either pregnant or the child was born in that home are some of the sick in the family. So we see a lot of anaphylactic allergies, eczema. a lot of attention issues as they get older. And so it's, again, we see this a lots and when the kids are born in that home, those are some of the more sick clients that I have. But generally, the mom is pretty sick, a lotta chronic fatigue or autoimmune issues that we would pull back to mold being a root cause.

And that's, that that truly interesting there. There was a study that was done, uh, years ago, Dr. Thrasher. Um, I don't know if you're familiar with his work, but it was the Thresher family of five out Maui and how the mother was actually passing. Uh, there was, a heavy aspergillus load in the family. That study is actually on our website, the, Uh, the family pup had lesions, aspergillosis, legions. Um, but the mother, they actually tested the breast milk and she was actually passing mycotoxins, uh, through the, to the infant.

Yeah. Yeah and again as a mom it's a tough one right because you're trying to do something you think is the healthiest for your child with nursing and we pass so many things down. So like for example I did all this preconception detox because I just was always interested in toxins because i seem to be more sensitive to all these chemicals we have and Again, this was a long time ago, so this in about 2010 or 11 and was kind of before I had done any of this testing and so I thought

Symptoms, Family Differences, and Passing Toxins to Children 17:28

what I did was probably pretty good. It was all kind herbal based and of that nature, but then when I ran my total toxin test, when my daughter was about six, it had, so let's just, this was at the time I run a mosaic lab and this ran the toxins, I think there were maybe 18 or so markers or 25 markers. I had 75 to 95% toxicity level in 80% of the markers that I checked. So this is where it came down to the genetics, right? I was thinking that I had done all these things, I already was living super clean, done these herbal detoxes before pregnancy, and I ended up passing down some things to my daughter that thought I'd cleared.

I wasn't even going to take this test because I thought there's no way I don't really need it. You know, don t use plastic. I eat all organic. But it was very interesting because we're all so unique and handle toxins in a specific way. And then some of that we pass down to our kids. It's just nice that that have great testing available now. I love that families come and I get to work with kids, maybe starting at two years old and older because they can really change their whole health trajectory.

We've had a couple of practitioners on our podcast so far this year that talked about how in working with children, one, it's a little bit different from the treatment standpoint, but also how quickly they can rebound and recover. They're so resilient, right? And do you see the same thing in your practice as well? Yes, I do see that a lot. I also see some of the kids that are pretty sick, right? So some other things just take time, especially with mold. We want to be just gentle, not overwhelm their system.

But some kids, yeah, it's great. They can get through things much easier and faster and with less side effects than the adults. It's a lot overwhelming their little body, but at the same time, they don't have all the you know, trauma or in life and all the other toxins. Yeah, the wear and tear. Yes. And they don't have the same mental thought process, right? Like, oh, I know this is bad and now, you, mold fear, all those things, Oh, i've been diagnosed with this. I have this disease or issue. So they just have, it's almost like when you treat pets, they get better much faster too.

Right? We always treat the pets in a house with mold because the the pets can be impacted too. There's a lab you're familiar with, real-time, that they actually have a pet microtoxin panel. I don't know if you've used that? I haven't used it, no. Yeah, we'll have to connect and I'll get them to sponsor for Pete's sakes. But yeah, and I don't know how you collect that. That's I, I dunno how that process works, but you actually have, uh, you know, these animals, um, metabolically or a lot, a, lot quicker than what we are.

Well, except if I think it was bulldogs, i don' think, ah, don''t think they're metabolic. They're that bad at all. Uh, yeah. You can actually touch your pets. for microtoxins, which I think is a great thing. You touched on some of these other things like mold and hormones and, of course, lime and this autoimmune imbalance. Can you share a little bit more how all that interacts? You've cleaned, repainted, and replaced filters. And still, you're not getting better. Headache? Fatigue? Brain fog? The doctors can't explain it, but your environment can.

At The Mold Pros, we specialize in uncovering what's hidden in plain sight. Our environmental testing looks beyond surface mold, identifying bacteria, volatile organic compounds, and even microtoxins in the air that you breathe. Then we correlate those results with your clinical data, showing how your space may be affecting your health. Next, we use our patented remediation process to safely remove toxins, restore balance, and prevent them from returning. It's more than just a cleanup. it's a science-based system designed to help your body heal by healing the environment first.

If you're ready to breathe freely again, visit TheMoldPros.com and schedule your free consultation. Because wellness doesn't start in the doctor's office, it starts where you live. For example, Hashimoto's clients, so autoimmune issues with the thyroid. I always run these full toxin panels. With auto immune thyroid issues, 100 percent of the cases I've seen microtoxin exposure. So I'm yet to see a case of mine without significant mold. Heavy metals, of course, can impact the thyroids. Thyroid is a very sensitive gland, but most of I mean, because I've seen mold so common in the practice, I only know two clients that I'd run a mold test on and nothing came back.

It like flagged as an issue. So this is thousands of labs. So for me, that's why this is so important to get information out there and have practitioners be very well aware of this so that we're not chasing other symptoms or viruses for many years when we have to focus a good amount of effort on getting the mold out of the body. But yeah, also certain mycotoxins can impact your liver or your kidney or they can mimic estrogen. And so these can all impact people in different ways. Another big one is weight loss resistance, right?

So a lot of people, especially women, will move into a home and then within a year they've gained 30 to I had a one patient gain 90 pounds in one year and that mold was the biggest piece. She was extremely sensitive and so again on average it's more like 30 pounds but if someone moves into any new place and they don't feel well and start to gain weight and all these things we have to look at. What's in that home, you know, that could be potentially causing issues. And that's what's great about that.

You test for all these other factors. Cause it's not always just mold. Mold is one piece, but, um, But we, it was something that was much easier to test. For it wasn't in the past. So I'm grateful for the testing now.

Mold, Autoimmunity, Weight Gain, and Environmental Testing 24:18

It is amazing how how things have accelerated in the industry, both on the clinical side and the environmental side. Everyone's familiar with standardized mold testing, which has some value, but really going in, we always recommend if someone has health concerns. do a PCR test, which gets down to the species. So it's one thing to have mold, but now do we have toxigenic or pathogenic fungal species? And just because we do doesn't mean they're necessarily producing those toxins. They may not have the right environmental stimulation to produce.

And so doing environmental micro toxin testing, I think is really critical for those with chronic health concerns. Yeah. Things are getting better and better in the last year. We decided, uh, because of demand from the practitioners that we work with environmental heavy metal testing. Oh, yeah. It's not always molded. You know, we can, w we, can test for over 500 different chemicals, whether it's formaldehydes or benzene. That's getting back to new construction. Some of those, those homes are just, you don't think about it, but the amount of chemicals that's in varnishes and, and.

Manufactured wood sometimes and all that good stuff. Yeah, it's a heavy burden. Yeah, I've had to get rid of things or if I was in somebody else's space where I quite a bit, if it was varnished or new, you know what I mean? Just the amount of chemicals that you're exposed to. And again, migraines will just show you that this is creating some sort of neurological inflammation, right? It's not just a headache, our body is responding to these chemicals and it's usually impacting our brain. And so when we moved, I was not in the camp of throwing everything away, right?

I did obviously get new mattresses and certain things, but I didn't clean a lot. And one of the things is we had all of this raw wood products, unfortunately. And so one of the solutions, right, was clean it and then varnish it. But there's no, for all the people who are very sensitive, you just can't really do that because the varnish alone will then create other toxins and issues. So it was very interesting. And I think too, and you would probably know this more, but a lot of people are under the assumption too that when you get furniture Like a lot of it even comes with mold, right?

Like the sofas and things like that of where they've been stored. We bought all of this old antique furniture off, I'm in Los Angeles, off the street in Venice, which is outside by the beach, So when I tested my headboard, all these cool things, it had so much mold. And again, I realized it's probably had mold since I bought it 20 years ago, right? This is not just from home, because it has been outside by the beach. in the moisture, but it's very interesting, right? Because of the whole, what do you throw away?

What do get rid of? Conversation is very unique, to the individual and the family. But at the same time, it doesn't always mean everything we're getting is clean. Or if you're using products that have particle board and all that, they're outgassing for so long that a lot of clients, myself included, that are sensitive. It's just another piece to look at. And just to build upon that, you're absolutely right. On the inspection side and the remediation side, so we're so building focused, a lot of inspectors are, and they don't look behind the nightstands, behind their headboards, et cetera.

They just miss it. And that's where those colonies are. Molds are agnostic to growing on drywall or by an antique piece of furniture. It's a food source. We're going to grow if they have enough moisture. So absolutely correct. You're an expert on epigenetics. So for those that don't understand what that is, probably familiar with what it means, but doesn't be familiar what is. Can you break that down for us a little bit? Sure. So when I was in school, again, I just was very interested kind of in I love new technology, right?

And things we have that we can customize to the individual. But I'm still very rooted in a lot of the ancient ways and theories that We've had for thousands of years, especially through Chinese medicine principles. But when I was looking at again, when i got that toxin test back and I thought there is something I'm missing here, you know, I've lived so clean. I don't know how this could be my test. So it was when was I looking into diet based on your genetics and then I came across this whole section that was how we detox different chemicals based our genetics.

Again, so basically the genetics is the blueprint that you're born with. And then epigenetics is how every single thing you do every day can alter that genetic expression of that blueprint you are given. So eating healthy, exercise, toxin avoidance. Our thoughts are a big one, right? Meditation. All these things can either turn a gene on or off for favorable or unfavorable expression. Some of these can lean towards certain disease patterns. But again, we have so much control of our inputs every day.

And again from, you know, what you choose every single meal is a help or I don't want to say harm, turn on some unfavorable expressions. So I always like to give people their power back. And so you have a lot of control. Just because you were born potentially with something, it's often only about a 10% risk of something manifesting. 90% is under our control of what we do and how we live. The toxins, right, are so strong. So they are a big impact on this. And that's why I love some of the testing because you can see if even the different types of metals or if mold might be potentially problematic or again, like benzines versus certain pesticides.

It's very interesting to me because I'll take that information and see what the kind of priority is for that client. And you could just tailor your information and your protocol a little bit to that. But we hear about the, you know, this dreaded mold gene, but I have plenty of clients who don't have the gene and are very sick. So it's not, again, people think of this as like these terrible things that they find out in their genes. To me, it is just usable data that I can support your protocols with.

It's good information. it just doesn't mean that you're necessarily always going to get that issue. I think that's a really kind of an important message of hope, right? Just because sometimes we feel like, Hey, this is, these are the cards I'm dealt. So I, I want to have to just deal with it, but you're, that, it's not the case. It's, uh, you have more control actually sounds like than not. Yes, definitely. Right. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So to me, that's very important. And then again, like I said, I love though, because I'm so invested in the toxin piece.

You know, if someone potentially has a bigger issues with metals versus mold versus pesticides, then I am cognizant of that in when we're doing our protocol

Epigenetics, Genetics, and Personalized Detox 31:58

and you just might need to work on that longer or have a better avoidance when possible. Very good. the impact of like, um, mycotoxins on like the liver, right? We know that aflatoxin is, is a big one for the, uh, the lever. And we know, that, you know aspergillus, which aflotoxin has come from as pergilla species. So it's not just a liver though. Right. How do these micro toxins impact other organs? Uh, Sure. So lungs are big one that we see just because of the route of entry into the body, right?

So very close to the brain in the sinus cavity. Sinuses are a really lovely place for mycotoxins to live and replicate in there. And then the same, just breathing it down into of impact on brain and neurotransmitters, especially dopamine and sometimes serotonin. So you'll get kids with OCD type tendencies, you get a lot of anxiety and depression and I mean, that's the thing about mold is it pretty much can impact any organ system. So that kind of one thing we talk about is, it doesn't really discriminate or have one particular affinity to an organ group.

But that is another reason why this can show up so differently even within one household. And it's rare that you get members of the same household with the problems, right? Because I think most people also realize a lot of us have more weak system so some people's digestive sometimes it's neurological. Yeah sometimes is more joints like so for me i had mostly joint pain and migraines and brain fog so those are more on the neurological side. I have a lot of kids where it impacts. They get asthma, they have anaphylactic allergies, They have eczema.

So that's impacting their gut and skin and lungs for Chinese medicine. And so the liver one is big too because we get a lots of irritability. they talk about mold rage, right? There's people who just, it's almost like they're a different person after they've been living in molds for a while. And then there's also all the mold fear, right? So you get the people who are afraid to go on a trip or afraid, go to a new Airbnb or go somewhere tropical because they might get recontaminated or they're very hyper aware of their home and.

anything potentially that could go wrong in there. And so it's, you know, a lot of times you will get caught in these loops and then especially when they're just reading a lots of information online, um, lots conflicting and most is very fear based, right? Like you get all the throw every single thing away, Right? You can't say that thing. You just have to like walk out the door. So there's there's just a lot in this world surrounding mold that's very difficult. And again, it's hard for people to understand why one child has this issue, the dad has nothing, and then the mom can't get out of bed.

So it is tricky where this education comes in. A hundred percent. We had a group that handled our marketing and they came back with this nice video and television. And it was all, you know, like, don't talk to them. Oh, that's not, no, we're not gonna, We're gonna take that approach. You know? Yeah. It's, it's going to be about education. We encourage kind of getting back to what you talked about the testing. Good data, try to make good data driven decisions. Not, um, and I get the fear side of things.

It's a real concern, but let's take comfort in the labs, good, bad, or indifferent. Let the science kind of help you with some of that. Yes. Yeah. Your, your website has a lot of great information on mold. I think some the best information I've seen on some, on the practitioner websites, you've done a really good job with that, A lot of folks get confused between molds and mycotoxins at some of our listeners. I think have some that, um, figured out by now, but you want to share a little bit. What's the difference between moles and Michael toxins.

Yeah, so the molds, I mean, and you can go even greater detail than I can, but the mold is all around and there's lots of different types, lots different families and species. And then the mycotoxins are the toxins that are produced from those different species and generally they're of a more pathogenic nature. So some of the people, again, there are some people with very robust immune systems and we were talking about this where Maybe everyone in the home has quite a bit of mold, but some people, just their system, it's not necessarily clearing it out very well, they're not as symptomatic.

But again, depending on the area that you are in, like some people it's in a child's bedroom, sometimes it is in the kitchen, some times it in living room or a garage. So there's so many factors of how people get, you know, an overabundance of this. But if it isn't a particular bedroom because you're spending so much time there every night, that's usually one of the most important rooms, right, to make sure that that is clean for all of those family members. And then the spaces where people frequent, right?

Because a lot of the times, anywhere where there's water potentially, then, you know, that room can be impacted. But a lotta people's bedrooms, it is common because they leave the bathroom door open. So things from the migrate in. But yeah, the mycotoxins themselves are what we're checking, and we are checking with urine mycotoxin, so we see what the system is excreting on its own. And again, that thing that's a little tricky is we never really know exactly this is from a childhood issue, a child home, or if this your current home unless we start to have a pattern of testing regularly.

And then that's why the home inspection is critical. And that's the reason why we oftentimes get asked what's best test, and there isn't one that is the best. They each tell us different data points, right? But I think for those with environmental illness or chronic illness concerns, that environmental mycotoxin testing is, if you had to pick one, because that helps understand. And we talk about functional medicine and getting back to the root cause. That test really helps you get back the roots of some of those issues.

So I think it's a great one. The comment that you made about genetics being only 10%, I Can you talk a little bit, kind of along those lines about, when someone has these conditions,

Mycotoxins, Organ Impact, and Recovery Foundations 39:28

these chronic health conditions about going through a supportive recovery process, helping them get to wellness without being so overwhelming? Because it's a lot sometimes. It's supplements, protocols, all this. A lot on somebody's plate. Can we share a bit about that? Yeah, and it's especially a lot on a plate. I'll just give an example for a mom who's already struggling, right? And then thinking of implementing this for their kids and the husband. But yeah, it is definitely overwhelming, because it a lots.

So part of the foundations that I talk about with my clients to get dialed in first, Clean air right is always in there because that that would be the health of the home clean clean food clean water and But the other big things would sleep you have to have your sleep dialed in and then how you process stress So we hear a lot about nervous system regulation that can look differently for a of different people but for someone that might just be getting out in nature and walking and can be meditations, it could be there's nervous system devices to try to help you regulate better.

But we're generally pulled in so many directions and people are overwhelmed all the time. So kind of looking at where their energy goes, and how quickly they can regulate, I think is important. Because if you're in the middle of needing to remediate or just thinking about it, right? You're about to go into so many decisions, like the decision fatigue during remediation, of what to keep, throw away, clean, however it ends up happening for you. That alone is a tough one to to through. So I think having, again, those foundations in place is always really critical.

And then you can start adding in the supplement protocol of. You know, preparing your system for the detox. But what's nice is now there are, you know my whole thing is having it be gentle but effective because a lot of the way we used to detox many years ago is like, Oh, I know it's working because I feel awful. Right. And yeah, it. So now we don't want that. To me, if I've hurt somebody, it was too aggressive and I didn't read the clues right, you know, or didn t know them well enough yet to for it to be more gentle, right?

So it's now, you know, again, like the last thing we want is to Be more overwhelming. And that's going to look very different for some people, because, with mold, there's also kind of like a good diet to do, we don't want to eat a lot of sugar and refine things, which There's still a lot of people who there's room to clean up their diet and especially when it's related to fungal issues that are in your body. So all of this could be very overwhelming depending on what you're implementing. But if they don't have their sleep dialed in, some sort of ability to handle stress well or regulate, and then again, the clean air and food and water, those are just where I focus at least first.

But the overwhelm was crazy, at least because we opted to clean a lot of things. You know, we threw out certain things too, but mostly not on the first round, right? I did all of the testing on furniture after because were in that camp where it was a rental, so the landlord was told that the fogging would fix everything and we could keep everything, which I knew was not true. But when someone else is doing that and you don't have a choice, I was like, okay, I'll show you the testing after and see what's still here.

I said, this is why we're going to get rid of the mattresses and things which clearly were not going be cleaned by some fogging spray. We, uh, you know, prior, our chat prior to a recording, we, um, would jokingly refer to there. There's a lot of folks that come out and we call them the spray and pray people and they just spray everything. It's okay. You're good to go. We'll charge thousands for that. And it's couple thousand. That's not, it sounds like a mirror. Yeah. Yeah, um, most don't grow in the air.

They grow on surfaces and they may spore late through the year, put the spores out there, but it's, if you're not effectively treating the surfaces. Right. We have not found, we're 17 years in doing this. we haven't found this pray and pray approach, uh, to be effective long-term. It may weigh down the particulate and you may get a clear air test afterwards. Once all that dries up, it'll re aerosolize oftentimes. So yeah. I want to put you on the spot for a second. I know with the amount of detail that you have, I notice that something you're truly passionate about.

And I'll know your passion about helping out your patients. Obviously. Is there a particular type of patient or group that your especially passion. About helping. Oh, sure. I'd say twofold. So because when I lived in that house with with mold, it triggered so many symptoms that it helped me. Now with better testing, I checked for lime. so mold and lime go together quite a bit. And so I, really like working with clients that have lime that has especially if they've not looked into the mold piece, right, because the mole can often Trigger the immune system to allow maybe even a latent lime to kind of resurface.

I love working with clients that have lime in their history or just have mystery symptoms and then I loved the kids right i love kids and families because a lot of the times like I said we can just really change things that sometimes the parents thought were part of their personality, right? Like a very anxious child, or again, when they have eczema, you know, all over or anaphylactic allergies. You know again it doesn't mean we can fully get rid of all the anafylactic allergies, but you can usually dial down the sensitivity of things quite a bit.

And again just that can help them so much in their future so the The same, they don't have kids with OCD, right? Or high, high anxiety. So we see that a lot. Fantastic. I'll put you on the spot. Do you go to I-Lands at all? I haven't. Yeah. I love traveling and going to conferences, but I have a, so I'm a 14 year old daughter. And so it's, she always already feels that, you know, I work quite a bit. So if I loved learning, if it was me, would be at all the conferences all of the time and just enjoying it.

And, um, but yeah, and it's always interesting too, cause I don't do, you know, the traditional lime testing and the same, I use different methods. So, uh, But I always love seeing what's out there and what new and helping people and haven't been.

Working with Sensitive Patients and Closing Remarks 46:58

We'll be there again this year. I think we've, we sponsored that shoot. Well over a decade and we have line bites and border coming up another good group. But the work you do is, it sounds just fantastic. Uh, I'm sure there's going to be some listeners that want to, uh, reach out to you, get ahold of you. Um, would you mind sharing what's the best way of doing that? Uh getting a hold of any socials that we should be aware of. So I'm on Instagram as drashleybeckman, and there's a link on there or on my website, but I offer a 20 minute consultation.

So you can just hear a little bit about someone's case and see if I can help, if it's good fit. And again, I have, you know, mold guide. I try to educate on Instagram quite a bit or on different various podcasts and things, but it's, um, yeah, most information is. On Instagram or my website's drashley.com. Perfect. We'll appreciate you, uh, carving out time today. Uh, great, a great conversation. For listeners, we appreciate you joining our podcast. If you found some help, give us a good review on this, or even better yet, if you know someone who's struggling with mold illness or Lyme disease or some of these chronic issues, sorts of things, for this episode, link over to them.

It's great to help other folks out. We appreciate it. I'm your host, John Bodie, co-founder of The Mold Pros. We'll see you next time on Mold Microtoxins and More. Thank you.