In the last month, maybe years, i started to have some neurological problems. Main symptom is general weakness, slight paralysis especially in the spine. There are better days and worse days.
But lately i started to make a link between the temperature, the vibrations and my symptoms. And i think i found the problem i suspected before. It's the pad under the carpet.
I believe in the summer of 2011 i tried to replace it. I wrote about here. I gave up because the new one was smelling the same.
Yesterday at times i was feeling like could not stand or walk easily. Lately there's been a lot of stomping around here. Apparently i have a new heavy weight neighbor down stairs who likes to cook and move around. So he's shaking the building really bad, sometimes for hours.
Vibrations also come from planes, helicopters (every time i leave the building at least one plane making big noise showes up, i just came back when i started to write this from a short walk (a different story), when i left there was a heavy helicopter at maybe 300 ft above, probably the OHSU helicopter), or from heavy diesel powered trucks, like the garbage truck this morning. Garbage truck comes always when i eat or immediately after. Always.
When the building shakes or vibrates, whatever is being released by the padding mixes with the air in the room faster and the concentration is bigger. Dust also falls from the walls. At times i feel high. At times like i cannot breathe easily. Lately i feel some sort of weird pain and paralysis on my spine.
The smell of the padding is a combination of sweet smell, diesel fuel smell and 10 year old worn-out perspired snickers.
So i decided to do something about. And i was thinking. 2 years ago, under the padding, on the floor i put some self adhesive shelf liner when i tried to replace the padding, to seal the floor. About 10 rolls in total. Above the padding there is some sort of thin plastic foil i thin that has holes at places. But actually the pad is sandwiched between two foils of plastic. So i injected 6% chlorine for home use between these two foils, in many places, using a syringe needle with a small polyethylene bottle (flux dispenser for soldering) one foot apart for the whole area except under the furniture. That sweet smell is gone but now it smells like chlorine and i think the chlorine is trapped between those two foils and will stay there for a while.
For those who don't understand what's going on, the small pad in the picture from the link above has been in the closet in the balcony for almost a year and it smells so bad i cannot describe. The smell didn't go away.
But i believe the pad itself is not enough to explain what's happening. Probably whatever substance is coming from it is combining with something, maybe sulfur from the walls, i don't know (Sheetrock is made of gypsum, which is calcium sulfate, that in certain conditions can decompose).
11 comments:
OHSU or another helicopter made another pass right now after i finished writing this. Different pitch, different noise, i could barely fell anything vibrating.
I looked again. The upper foil on the pad is gone. Maybe since when i used that enzyme for the smell.
So i put baking soda on the whole surface, twice. But it's not making it through the carpet and onto the pad. It stays at the bottom of the carpet that has some sort of sealing polymer-like material on the fabric that still has holes everywhere.
I just figured. In 99 i guess i saw a commercial on TV about some imitation of Tempurpedic mats somewhere in Seattle, for half the price. So we climbed in my truck in a weekend and went up there and bought them. Because the old "donated" mats that have been used in Romanian adult foster home stank like urine and we didn't really have a bed back then and sleeping on two mats in top of the other, i just put some polyethylene cover in top of the old mats and put the new foam ones in top.
It was ok for a while. Until one day, a few years later, i discovered they were wet. Literally soaked in perspiration. Because they didn't have ventilation on the other side, i don't know. And i took them to a recycle center and payed 25 bucks for them to get the mats.
Now i'm wondering. What if... they used the old mats (milled and glued) to build the new pads they put in here when we moved so it is our own smell, so nobody can say they're recycled and this is the way our apartment stink because of not cleaning it? The glue smell covers the perspiration one i think...
It was Tacoma, not Seattle.
There is something in the pet store that eliminates ammonia from fish tanks (some proprietary salts) turning it into something less toxis (and less stinky). I know for a fact that stink is made of ammonia.
Unfortunately that something from the pet store also contains a synthetic protein that is the same protein that coats fish. So i spread a bottle of that stuff on the carpet (among so many other things) and now i think i'm turning into a slippery fish because when i step on the carpet i gather some of that stuff on my legs and it gets everywhere. Let's hope it's not going to coat our lungs on the inside.
Trial and error, driven by desperation.
Everything almost dried out after i ran fans parallel to the floor, it smells a bit like fish protein and/or ammonia by-products in the living area, pad smells almost like new pads except about ten times stronger. Wondering if it has any deodorant in the rebond cushion (pad). One component of the smell is definitely polyurethane rubber. But polyurethane smell goes away after a while.
Downstairs neighbors' fan's been running for hours. It is unbalanced and makes the floor vibrate and walls vibrate and exchange stuff with the air i breath. Gotta move the computer from near the bathroom's door.
Came from a trip and the smells have changed. So i just bought some bacteria supplement for fish tanks (nitrifying bacteria) and sprayed it on the carpet wile still not dry. I think it started smelling again like a fish pond. I think the pad under the carpet have been soaked in ammonia before it was installed.
Just figured this out. Japanese live more because they eat raw fish that contains nitrifying bacteria that helps lower blood ammonia levels.
Just figured out. The persistent smell in the carpet is similar to old shoe wax. I looked and shoe wax is made with naphtha. Then i found the recipe for the carpet pad glue; it is naphtha.
http://www.chemcas.com/msds112/cas/2628/64742-89-8.asp
However, after 3 years the smell of the pad is way stronger then the one i checked in the store; The glue could not have had that many residual naphtha. Certainly, it has been added some between manufacturing and installation process.
This smell covers anything else including the strong dog shit smell coming from under the main door, because they installed siding under the deck in front of the door and dog feces and urine falling between the boards of the deck is trapped in there.
Can't remember where i saw it written, you can cast out demons easier if you know their name... In my case, although nothing has changed, it makes feel better i found out what are the spirits that haunt me...
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