Episode #8: Mold
Summary
In this episode, Kyle Hulbert and Dr. K discuss the topic of mold and its impact on health. They cover the symptoms of mold exposure, the role of mold toxins and mycotoxins, and the testing methods for mold. They also delve into the treatment options, including the use of Itraconazole and binders. The conversation then shifts to mold in the home, specifically in new construction homes, and the common sources of mold growth. The episode concludes with tips on how to identify mold in the home. In this episode, Kyle and Ben discuss various aspects of mold, including testing for mold in your home, what to do if you find mold, common misconceptions about mold removal, effective methods for mold removal, purifying the air after mold removal, using ozone generators for mold removal, and hiring mold removal professionals. They also wrap up the episode by inviting listeners to send in their questions about mold.
Takeaways
- Mold exposure can lead to a range of symptoms, including uncontrollable hunger, weight gain, thyroid issues, brain fog, and gut issues.
- Mold toxins, known as mycotoxins, are responsible for the damage caused by mold.
- Testing for mold can be done through measuring antibodies to mold toxins in the blood.
- Itraconazole is an effective prescription medication for treating mold, and binders can be used as a support system in mold detoxification.
- Mold can be found in various areas of the home, including the HVAC system, kitchens, bathrooms, and wet areas.
- Identifying mold in the home requires careful inspection and maintenance to prevent mold growth. Testing for mold in your home involves more than just air testing; using swiffer pads to test settled areas and dust can provide a more accurate reading of mold levels.
- Bleach is not an effective solution for killing mold; removing the surface that the mold is growing on is the best way to get rid of it.
- Air purification units and ozone generators can help improve indoor air quality and remove mold spores.
- When hiring mold removal professionals, it’s important to find reputable and experienced individuals or companies.
- Listeners are encouraged to send in their questions about mold for a future Q&A episode.
Chapters
00:00 Introduction and Background
02:15 Symptoms of Mold Exposure
06:05 Mold Toxins and Mycotoxins
07:38 Testing for Mold
15:42 Treating Mold with Itraconazole
19:11 The Use of Binders in Mold Detoxification
21:24 The Benefits and Protocol of Itraconazole
25:22 The Importance of Treating Heavy Metals Before Mold
27:00 Mold in the Home
34:47 Mold in New Construction Homes
37:28 Common Sources of Mold in the Home
39:22 Identifying Mold in the Home
39:25 Testing for Mold in Your Home
41:26 What to Do If You Find Mold
42:27 Common Misconceptions About Mold Removal
43:36 Effective Methods for Mold Removal
44:15 Purifying the Air After Mold Removal
46:12 Using Ozone Generators for Mold Removal
46:55 Hiring Mold Removal Professionals
47:55 Wrap-Up and Call for Listener Questions
Sponsors
This episode is sponsored by Toxic Roots. The optimal resource for online health coaching for optimizing performance and removing toxins. Click on the link below to get started on finding your toxic roots.
Website: https://www.toxicrootswellness.com/
Instagram: @toxicrootswellness
X @toxicroots
Sources
Kyle Sister, Katie’s, Lab Results
People
Peak Performance
- Website: https://peakperformancepodcast.online/
- On Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thepeakperformancepod/
- On X https://twitter.com/PeakPerformPod
Dr. K
- On Instagram https://www.instagram.com/theosteodoc/
Coach Kyle
- On Instagram https://www.instagram.com/toxinfreekyle/
Transcript
Kyle Hulbert (00:00)
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Peak Performance Podcast. My name is Coach Kyle.
Ben Kosubevsky (00:04)
And this is Dr. K. Thanks everybody for joining today as we’ll be talking about mold. We’re gonna talk about how to diagnose it, how to test for it, symptoms it could cause, how to kill it in your body, and where we get exposed, chiefly our houses. Let’s get into it.
Kyle Hulbert (00:22)
You’re nice, enjoy the show.
Welcome to the Peak Performance Podcast. Once again, we are back. I’m Coach Kyle.
Ben Kosubevsky (00:29)
And I’m Dr. K. Thanks everybody for joining us today as we discuss mold.
Kyle Hulbert (00:33)
Mold? I don’t like mold. I don’t like it on my food. You like what? Oh, that’s true. You know, there’s like a, there’s a special type of blue cheese in Spain that they make in caves and it gets like super moldy and it’s so powerful. It’s like, the taste is like, whoa.
Ben Kosubevsky (00:36)
I like blue cheese.
That doesn’t sound appealing. That sounds like torture. Uh, unless you’re my prisoner in this.
Kyle Hulbert (00:56)
Yeah, they had it. I had it when I lived there and it was, uh, it’s called Cabrales and it is, it is potent, very potent, but yeah. But before we dive in on mold, um, I just want to address this bike in the background because I’ve heard some complaints. We have about nine listeners at this point. Uh, all of nine, I’m hoping to get to 10, but, uh, yeah, they’re saying that the bike is weird. And, and what you guys got to remember is I’m not a doctor.
Ben Kosubevsky (01:06)
Interesting.
friends.
Kyle Hulbert (01:26)
Dr. K is a doctor and we’re not giving medical advice. Please talk to your practitioner, but I’m a biohacker. So that means I’m into all kinds of weird stuff like supplements, suppositories and fitness. So this bike is an AI driven bike that lets you get a workout, a very high quality workout in about seven or eight minutes. And it’s proven through studies to about, to increase your VO2 max around 12% within eight weeks. So it’s not an unprofessional setting. It’s a biohacker setting. I’m not a…
clinical medical person. I, uh, live and work a lot in the fitness world. So that’s why that’s there for all you haters out there. If you have issues, DM me, we’ll fight. We will fight, but regardless, I’m trying to get a backdrop so I can be more professional. So I actually did cave and listen to you guys. It did. I got, I got pressured. Dr. K had an intervention. He was like, the bikes gotta go.
Ben Kosubevsky (02:14)
Well, yeah. Your pressure worked.
It either needs to come all the way in or all the way out, but like where we can just see one handlebar just isn’t working.
Kyle Hulbert (02:27)
Yeah, it’s just kind of like a lopsided workout at this point.
Ben Kosubevsky (02:29)
Right? OK, let’s stop torturing them. Let’s get into mode.
Kyle Hulbert (02:34)
Let’s do it. So where do you want to start with mold?
Ben Kosubevsky (02:39)
So we all know mold is kind of everywhere, right? So let’s get into symptoms first. Why are you even listening? Why do you care whether or not there’s mold around you? So Kai, you want to start with your personal experience with mold?
Kyle Hulbert (02:51)
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, I actually had kind of the standardized list of mold symptoms. Usually, I guess, and specifically for me, it manifested in uncontrollable hunger, weight gain, thyroid issues, brain fog, and gut issues. That’s really kind of how it hit me. And this actually led me on a path to working with a mold-specific doctor who incorrectly diagnosed me.
looking back at her data now, with SIRS, which is Chronic Inflammatory Response Syndrome, I believe. And it’s basically where you’re reactive to all kinds of chemicals and just about everything in your environment. I didn’t actually have that, but I did have the symptoms of mold poisoning, which I think we later mitigated by removing heavy metals, but we’ll get to that down the road. So it was, for me, the biggest thing was the gut.
and weight gain issues. So it was just like, my stomach was off and I was like uncontrollably hungry gaining weight. And on top of that, my thyroid was going off. So it was just a double whammy. Is that kind of how you see it manifest in your patients?
Ben Kosubevsky (04:08)
Yeah, I mean the simplest way to put it is basically mold. It’s a… Technically it’s a parasite in the sense that it’s just trying to feed off of you and grow itself. So basically, molds… So I use the words molds and fungus interchangeably. Kind of like all rectangles are squares, but not all squares are rectangles. All molds are a type of fungus. And so what it is, it’s basically trying to turn you into a fungus. It’s just trying to make you like sit there and consume food to feed it so it can live.
Um, and so the symptoms tend to go along with that, just a lot of depression, and brain fog, and lethargy, and just overall bleh.
Kyle Hulbert (04:48)
So when I absolutely needed a pizza and I like blacked out and all of a sudden I was eating a pizza, that was the mold in my body saying, feed me.
Ben Kosubevsky (04:56)
Basically, yeah, you know, people with really severe mold. We had this one really interesting guy come to the office just years ago. He came in and said, you know, I forget the exact words he used, but something along the lines of, I know that the mold is controlling me every day. Please help me. He only came in once, never came back. But that’s basically what’s happening.
Kyle Hulbert (05:17)
Wonder if he’s still controlled.
Ben Kosubevsky (05:20)
I don’t know.
Kyle Hulbert (05:21)
Yeah. So I had like a lot of instances like that. It was wild. I would literally like be sitting down, like I’m tracking my food. I’m trying to eat healthy. And all of a sudden I would literally black out, like have no recognition of doing this. And I looked down, I ate an entire pint of ice cream. And I was like, what just happened? It’s like, how? Like I had like, willpower was not a thing. It was like not a choice that I could make. So.
Ben Kosubevsky (05:48)
Yeah, the mold very easily invades your brain and then from there, it just short circuits your brain.
Kyle Hulbert (05:54)
Jeez. Okay, so I mean, that’s kind of the symptoms. I mean, are there any other symptoms that pop up with mold, like on a broad scale? Because I think it manifests differently in different people.
Ben Kosubevsky (06:03)
Yeah, so I mean there’s a few different aspects to it. One, there’s a few different molds that are common. There’s about 12 that are really common. Those are usually the ones we test for. So they cause different things. Some cause a lot of mental, some cause a lot of GI, some can cause peripheral nerve issues, some can cause bone issues, some can cause cancers. So it kind of just depends what you have. Similar to having metals, different ones cause different things.
Kyle Hulbert (06:29)
Gotcha. So I’ve, you know, we’ve been talking about mold, but is it the mold that’s actually doing the damage or is it the toxins that come from the mold? Or is it both?
Ben Kosubevsky (06:39)
Well, it’s the toxins. So molds in our bodies, they create toxins. And we call those mycotoxins. They’re basically, the mold is trying to survive and is trying to spread by spreading spores. And those spores are toxic. And that’s really what’s causing the damage is that explosion of them.
Kyle Hulbert (06:58)
So the mycotoxins, so mycotoxins are essentially like molds defense system.
Ben Kosubevsky (07:04)
Basically, yeah, that’s part of it. The other part of it is biofilms.
Kyle Hulbert (07:09)
We’ve talked about biofilms before. I think we had a heavy metal episode talking about biofilms.
Ben Kosubevsky (07:13)
Yeah, because in my experience, molds and heavy metals, they’re really closely linked, as in the molds, and I’m just gonna refresh what we talked about in the heavy metal episode. The molds, they create biofilms in the body, and biofilms is a protein shield around itself that your immune system can’t punch through it. Even antifungals have trouble getting through the biofilm. And the way that they make this biofilm so effectively is they actually anchor the heavy metals in the body.
Kyle Hulbert (07:38)
Mm-hmm. So it’s like a, basically a house for them. Yeah, goodness. So someone comes in with mold, they have mold, or they’ve been exposed to mold, they have a lot of symptoms that are like mold. How do you tell? I mean, besides being a doctor and having that intuition, like how do you diagnose someone with mold?
Ben Kosubevsky (07:45)
Basically, it’s like a fortress.
So there are two different big camps of mole testing. I’ll talk about one and then Kyle you talk about the other. So I will take Dr. Andrew Campbell, my Michael Labs, because this is the testing I use in my office. This is the other camp is the Dr. Richie Shoemaker and I believe we’ve touched on these in the past. We’re going to get a little more into it. So like I mentioned, molds create toxins.
our bodies create antibodies to fight those mycotoxins. So we can measure the amount of antibodies that your body’s producing. It’s basically measuring your inflammation level and response. We can measure two things with that. One is called an IgG, the other is called an IgE. An IgG is basically what you’re chronically infected with that your body’s fighting. The IgE is more of your histamine mediated response. So let’s get more into MCAS, mass cell activation syndrome.
get into allergic response, stuff like that. That MCAS will be its own episode. But those are two things to measure because the problem is the molds are hiding in your body and they’re not being excreted. So if you do like a urine test or a blood draw for mold and you can actually do a blood draw for mold through Quest, oftentimes it’s negative because you’re not looking for the right things because it’s not readily available in your bloodstream.
Kyle Hulbert (09:22)
So this is kind of like the heavy metals discussion where we advise people to not do just like a urine or blood test without some kind of way of bringing them out because you can’t actually measure the levels that are there because your body’s not excruiting it. Okay. So this test, I mean, say someone gets this test, they run it through you.
What is like, what is a good result, bad result? How’s it measured? I mean, how do you kind of interpret that when you get it back? And we can put my results, we’ll put my results in the show notes for you guys to look at.
Ben Kosubevsky (09:53)
Perfect. For a matter of call, yours was not one of the worst I’ve seen, your average I would call it. And you guys, when you see this, go ahead.
Kyle Hulbert (09:59)
Actually, I’ll get consent from my sister. We’ll put my sister’s results in the show notes because hers were a bit more dramatic.
Ben Kosubevsky (10:08)
Okay, so we’ll get hers. She’s still not the worst I’ve seen. You know who the worst I’ve seen. We won’t mention it. Basically, there’s four categories. And they color code it, so I’ll just talk about the color codes. There’s yellow, light orange, dark orange, and then red. And honestly, most people have yellow. I pretty much view yellow, even though the test says it’s positive. I view it as everyone has it. It’s not really a big deal. You don’t have symptoms when you’re yellow. You start to get symptoms when you’re creeping into the light orange,
dark orange and red is really symptomatic. And so like I said, there’s 12 we test for with the two different antibodies. 12 groups of IgG, 12 groups of IgE. So bad is, obviously the more red you have, the worse it is.
Kyle Hulbert (10:52)
So usually when I’ve worked with clients and they get these results back, they send them over to me. And a lot of times I see the specific mold is lining up with their symptoms. So if they have neurological symptoms, they have a block of those molds that affect them neurologically that are high. And maybe the GI and other things are real low. So it’s specifically the type of mold or mycotoxin they’ve been exposed to in their environment is what’s causing the symptoms.
Ben Kosubevsky (11:17)
Correct, yep. It’s just like bacteria or viruses. You know, if you have the common cold, you’re gonna have entirely different symptoms than the flu versus E. coli versus salmonella versus whatever.
Kyle Hulbert (11:29)
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. So basically you get the test and it comes back and it’s anywhere from yellow to red. And I think what you said about yellow is really important. So mold, like we said earlier, is everywhere. So if you walk outside, there is mold floating in the air. It’s just, it is literally everywhere. So what happens is when it gets out of balance is the issue. So, and a lot of building techniques and construction nowadays has changed our natural environment, leading.
mold to grow in an alibalance way as opposed to nature. So that’s why we see the red as an issue where the yellow is maybe not that big of a deal.
Ben Kosubevsky (12:10)
Yup, that’s exactly it. Because I get patients, you know, I think I mentioned this during the heavy metal talk as well, but I’ll say it again. I get patients all the time that come in and they say, oh, I’m so sick from the mold in my house. My first question is always, you know, is anyone else in the house sick? And oftentimes they’ll say no. So it really has to do with their ability to fight the mold along with the burden.
Kyle Hulbert (12:37)
Yeah, to my understanding, there’s some genetic testing you can do. Um, sometimes around like 25% give or take, um, of the population has these combination of genes that make them not able to actively excrete mold from the body very well. Um, so I’ve seen some, some of that stuff. Um, do you, do you see about like 25% of your patients that come in? I know you have confirmation bias, but a lot of people come in for heavy metals. Do you see like.
Ben Kosubevsky (13:01)
Thank you.
Kyle Hulbert (13:04)
Some of them have legit mold symptoms or is it mostly heavy metals and then mold is kind of the carry on.
Ben Kosubevsky (13:09)
The problem is it’s so hard to tell because the symptoms are so similar. Because most of the people I see are high in mercury and a lot of molds cause neurological issues. So who knows which one it really is. So we just treat for both.
Kyle Hulbert (13:22)
That makes sense. That makes a lot of sense. I would.
Ben Kosubevsky (13:24)
So before we tangent, you want to talk about the other, the Richie Shumacher.
Kyle Hulbert (13:28)
Yeah, the Ritchie Shoemaker protocol. And it has been a while, so bear with me. But to the best of my remembrance, it’s a combination of seven lab tests that you have to fail four out of the seven to be diagnosed with mold toxicity. My issue with this protocol, and I won’t go into the specific lab test because that’s really getting in the nitty gritty, and I don’t really wanna promote this protocol, to be honest with you.
My issue with this protocol is that most of those tests are very nonspecific. So they’re mostly like generic tests for inflammation. And they’re kind of adding them up and kind of, in my opinion, hoping that it is mold after they get enough of these things positive. Is that your read on it?
Ben Kosubevsky (14:12)
Um, well you forgot about the VCS, the visual acuity test. Did you ever do that?
Kyle Hulbert (14:15)
Yeah, I did. Yeah. Um, which is, you know, another point that brings me back to that doctor that diagnosed me with mold illness. Um, I passed the VCS test. So VCS is a visual contrast sensitivity test. It’s basically like white and black lines and then shapes in it. And you have to like discern kind of what the shape or what the number is in the test.
And I believe the reason you do that is because molds interact with your brain in a certain way that make that contrast very difficult to perceive. Is that is that tracking right? Am I remembering this correctly?
Ben Kosubevsky (14:50)
From what I understand, yes, I’ve truly actually never really looked into this protocol enough to talk about in depth.
Kyle Hulbert (14:58)
Yeah, I, to be honest with you guys, I, I went through this protocol and I passed the VCS test, which usually you need to fail in order to be going to the next blood testing with the seven different tests and fail four of them. I went to that test. I only failed two of the seven and I was still diagnosed with mold, which was an incorrect diagnosis looking back on it. Um, but again, we don’t really want to, we haven’t researched this protocol thoroughly and we don’t know too much about it because, um, quite frankly, I’m not a believer in.
how it goes about diagnosing mold, especially when we have something like the Andrew Campbell, it’s Andrew Campbell. Yeah, the Andrew Campbell approach where it literally measures the antibodies to the toxins in your blood. I think that’s a very much more specific test and much more accurate in terms of what it’s looking for.
Ben Kosubevsky (15:46)
Yeah, I’m a huge fan of quantitative testing. I don’t like assuming that things are happening. I like to be able to at any point pull blood work and see what’s happening.
Kyle Hulbert (15:55)
Yep, totally agree. So we got testing. We got the two camps of testing. So, um, say I come back and I’m high in mold. What do you do?
Ben Kosubevsky (16:05)
So out of the, geez, I don’t know, hundreds, thousands of chelation and mold tests I’ve done now, I haven’t done as many mold tests as chelation tests, but hundreds of mold tests, thousands of chelations, I’ve only ever had a handful of people have high mold and not high heavy metals. And those few people that did, they told me that there is mold growing on the walls of their house. You know, they ripped open the walls, there’s just like black mold pouring down.
Those are the only people, and you know who I’m talking about for some of those, right? So most of the time, when I bring patients to the office, we do three tests off the get-go. The two heavy metal tests along with a mold blood draw. That’s my initial testing. That’s not the routine blood work that we draw. And so what happens is…
Kyle Hulbert (16:38)
Mm-hmm, yeah.
Ben Kosubevsky (17:02)
So I found this really cool study and I sent it to you a while ago and we’ll link it on the website. A lot of people haven’t seen this because it was a dental study, so most doctors just haven’t seen it. It was published in the Dental Journal. But they basically found that EDTA is actually better than 99% of antifungal agents to kill mold. And these studies can do this specifically because it’s a single celled hyphae, so X kind of is both a mold and a yeast, which makes it a little easier to study.
And so that’s when they found that the biofilms are bound to heavy metals. So the problem, let me take a couple steps backwards, the problem becomes if you start taking antifungals off the get-go and those molds are still bound to heavy metals in your body, antifungals don’t work. They’re resistant to it. So, correct. Yeah, those biofilms, they’re charged. They can repel antifungals. Modern medicine is running into this problem that…
Kyle Hulbert (17:50)
because they’re in the bathrooms, they’re protected, they’re in their house.
Ben Kosubevsky (17:59)
So the same resistance that we have with bacteria and antibiotics, the same thing is happening with funguses and anti-fumbos due to this reason. And so the way I initiate treatment, I have patients do between 5 and 10 chelations first before we introduce anything that’s anti-mold. Because I’ve learned that if you start the anti-mold stuff right away, it just doesn’t work. Their symptoms don’t change. Whereas when they get on the atrial convolvus, it’s usually noticeable effects.
You know this right away, right?
Kyle Hulbert (18:30)
Yeah, so let’s, I mean, let’s talk about itchoconazole. So you mentioned anti-molds and anti-fungals. So itchoconazole, I’m assuming is a prescription that you take to kill mold in your body.
Ben Kosubevsky (18:42)
Yeah, so there are two different prescriptions, itchoconazole and voriconazole. Voriconazole is slightly better at a couple molds, namely aspergillus. Itchoconazole is better at the rest of them. Those are the two prescriptions. And then of course there are natural supplements as well, such as caprylic acid and garlic mullion oil and all sorts of stuff like that. But typically if patients are seeing me, we’re gonna hit it hard, we’re gonna use prescription strength antifungals.
Kyle Hulbert (19:07)
Yeah. There’s quite a few, there’s quite a few ways to approach getting rid of mold in the body. This is like a hot topic on, on like social media and online now. And I’ve run across a lot of people doing just like terrible things that probably won’t work. Um, but there’s a lot of people doing like a more quote unquote natural approach, um, with the use of binders. Um, what do you, what do you think about binders? Cause I have my opinions, but I’d like to hear yours.
Ben Kosubevsky (19:34)
So my problem with binders is the same for binders of mold, binders of metals, binders of toxins, et cetera. They are binders and they are, your body doesn’t want to absorb these things. So when you take it orally, it’s gonna go through your GI tract, bind whatever is in your GI tract. And yeah, there’s a fair bit of mold in your GI tract, but it’s not all of it. And then it’s gonna get passed out. So all the mold that’s in your brain, in your heart, in your lung, wherever else it is, continues to be there.
And the bigger problem is if you’re doing some kind of testing, like a provocation testing with those binders, you’re going to see that yeah, your levels are dropping because the binder is binding what it’s able to and as there’s less available, it’s going to drop. But it doesn’t mean you’re done. That’s the extent of that binder.
Kyle Hulbert (20:22)
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. So there are specific ways to get around this and there are specific binders that are like liposomal and things like that. It’s a little bit more niche and you really have to know what you’re doing to use binders effectively past just the initial like GI tract clearing of mold toxins. I think binders are a good part of a detox protocol but I don’t think they should be your frontline.
Ben Kosubevsky (20:49)
Absolutely, I have no problem with my patients being on binders. Hey, if it saves them a couple treatments, absolutely go for it. It would just, unfortunately, it will never be their primary thing.
Kyle Hulbert (20:58)
Yeah, yeah. And I’ve seen that too. I’ve seen it’s a great, I’d almost call it a detoxification support. Like it helps your journey. Which is really why I like the combination of itchicondazole, the prescription to kill the mold and then binders. Because usually, and correct me if I’m wrong, but I understand that as itchicondazole kills these molds, the basically the trash makes itself to the liver. And then you can take binders to effectively clear out the dead trash.
So that’s how I like to use binders, almost as a support system for an actual protocol to systemically kill mold. But let’s go back and talk about Etrachronazole for a little bit. Prescriptions are scary. A lot of people don’t like prescriptions. So why is this one good? Or why should we be using this one?
Ben Kosubevsky (21:47)
So it’s not that it’s good and honestly, even though I’m the first one that’s not a big fan of prescription medications, I almost never do prescriptions. This and the Linear are really the only two things I prescribe on a regular basis. And the Linear is an anti-parasitic agent. Honestly, the reason I use it is because, unfortunately, most of my patients are high in multiple molds and most natural supplements only cover one or two molds. So the only way to get…
people’s mold array covered without them taking like 10 supplements a day is to use itchriconazole. That’s the first thing. Second thing is it’s really good at killing things. And the third thing is it really doesn’t have much side effects. The biggest thing with it is it can cause liver issues. We do modular liver function every six weeks. But honestly, I’ve never actually had anyone have their liver spike up on itchriconazole. It’s rare.
Kyle Hulbert (22:45)
Yeah. So what’s your protocol for it, Chaconazole? Cause I’ve heard a few different protocols. One of the most popular I’ve heard of is running it for six to nine months to basically clear, kill all the mold in your body.
Ben Kosubevsky (22:56)
Yep. So there’s just like you, you’ve experienced that, you know, if you still need the trichon’s on, you stop taking it, you’ll know this right away. So I have people go for six months straight, don’t take any breaks. And then that six months, take a week off and see how you feel. And if symptoms start to creep back, you’re gonna do another month and take another week off and keep tracking like that up to a year. A year is the longest I’ve had someone on it.
Kyle Hulbert (23:18)
Yeah, this is, I mean, do your patients, when they start taking this, do they see benefits? Do they immediately feel it? How’s that work for them?
Ben Kosubevsky (23:27)
That’s honestly a better question for you since you’ve experienced it. You wanna answer your?
Kyle Hulbert (23:31)
Well, let me, yeah, I mean, it worked, it worked slower for me systemically, but let me tell you about my wife. She had high mold, so she grew up in a house with mold in it. And she probably lived in some places with mold, you know, after she moved out. And so her test came back pretty high with molds. And so we treated her a little bit and then put her on intraconazole. And it was like miraculous.
It was ridiculous. Like she took itriconazole, like the day before she was like not happy, grumpy, stomach issues, snappy, angry. She took itriconazole and she was like, in her peace. It was crazy. It immediately affected her mood and her brain power for the positive. She called it her happy pill, which I think is fun. Why take antidepressants when you can take antifungals?
So it was huge for her and actually the same type of massive response, my sister saw too. My sister started taking it and she had a massive decrease in her OCD symptoms. All of a sudden she was tolerating her germaphobia a lot better because I guess it was the hijacking, the mold hijacking her brain to some degree. And so when it started to clear it out, she just was able to live her life a lot better.
Ben Kosubevsky (24:58)
Yeah, so people that react immediately like that, their mold levels are higher than their metal levels. So they get that instant mold killing effect. Whereas people whose metal levels are higher than their mold, it takes longer, it’s a slower effect. You wear a higher metal than mold, whereas they wear a higher mold than metal.
Kyle Hulbert (25:17)
Yeah, like my sister and Rhiannon had very low metal levels, but decent mold levels. There’s some of the few that you don’t see very often. And so the Atrocannazole had like an immediate effect because there were no scaffolding. There was no homes for the mold to hide in.
Ben Kosubevsky (25:33)
Correct. Yeah, they likely, your wife, you know for a fact, had just chronic extreme exposure. And that’s where their mold comes from. If you keep getting hit with it over and over, eventually it’s going to invade your body.
Kyle Hulbert (25:45)
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. So for mine, my symptoms actually, what’s interesting is I took a, I did an entire mold protocol for a year before I saw you. Like an intensive like binders multiple times a day and alternating different types of binders and all that stuff. And it did just about nothing. And then I came and saw you, we treated heavy metals and we did some other treatments and then the mold issues just disappeared.
just kind of as a side effect. And so that’s probably due to that biofilm effect.
Ben Kosubevsky (26:21)
Yeah, so my recommendation is always treat the metals first if you have them and then the mold. Because if you do the mold first, because that’s actually the worst part of all this. Let’s say you treat the mold first and you still are full of heavy metals. As soon as you get re-exposed to mold, which you absolutely will be, especially where I live in Florida, mold’s everywhere. If you get, as soon as you get re-exposed to mold, it’s gonna invade you again. It may not be the same ones, it may be entirely new ones, and then you’re stuck battling them again.
and it’s all that money you’ve spent battling the first time you’re gonna have to spend again, and it’s gonna keep happening over and over until you clear out the medals.
Kyle Hulbert (26:58)
Yep, and that’s exactly what happened to me. I basically was given a protocol that didn’t work because it wasn’t the root issue. Now it was causing symptoms related to mold, but it wasn’t the real cause of what I was dealing with. But that doesn’t mean it’s not the real cause for other people like my wife or my sister. So you said mold is everywhere. Like where do we run into this? Where do we, how do we avoid it?
Ben Kosubevsky (27:24)
Um, honestly, basically you can’t. It’s probably in your house. It’s probably in your grocery store. It’s probably in your office building. Might be in your car. I had one guy come in. He said he had his house checked, everything checked, couldn’t figure it out. Finally he peeled back the roof liner of his car and it was full of mold. So.
Kyle Hulbert (27:28)
Mm-hmm.
Dang, it’s like a roof leak in his car and it all just molded up there.
Ben Kosubevsky (27:45)
Yeah, I think it’s sudden roof leaked or something and that was it.
Kyle Hulbert (27:48)
Goodness. Yeah. Mold is insidious because it is everywhere. Which makes it one of those things that like, and this is terrible, but the health industry is one of those things that can, it can sell you things to detox mold and it’s like the customer keeps coming back because it’s everywhere. So along with tree and mold like itself, there is.
I mean, there’s a lot of other strategies that you should do to increase your resilience over all two mold so that when you come into contact with it, you can battle it and fight it a little bit better, clear it better. So what else do you do besides a joconazole? I assume you don’t just kind of give a prescription and say good luck.
Ben Kosubevsky (28:29)
So, no, so this comes down to how aggressive people want to be with the treatments. Chelation, as long as they’re high in metals as well, chelation is a primary treatment that they’re going to do. Atriconazole is the second. And then third, we add in things like methylene blue IVs and ozone IVs. Those episodes should be out by the time this episode releases. So if you guys want more information about those, just listen to those episodes. Yep.
Kyle Hulbert (28:54)
We’ll link those in the show notes too.
Ben Kosubevsky (28:59)
four things I use with chelation being number one. About half my patients, when I first started, I didn’t put a lot of my patients on atriconazole in the beginning because about half of them would clear the mold on their own. So the way I would do it, I would get their mold and metal levels in the beginning. I would chelate them all the way down, then I would retest their mold and metals. About half of them, the mold would just be gone because their body’s immune system was struggling to kill it once it was exposed. The other half then went on atriconazole. I’ve shifted things now to start atriconazole earlier just because I find…
because half the people need it right away. You know, more people feel better sooner.
Kyle Hulbert (29:33)
It’s not a terribly expensive medication either. It’s relatively affordable if you buy it in like a 90-day supply.
Ben Kosubevsky (29:39)
It keeps going up in price. It used to be $30 a month of Publix and it went to $50 and then $70 and now it’s like a hundred.
Kyle Hulbert (29:46)
Oh my goodness, when I was taking it was 30. Yeah, cause I got a 90 day supply for 90 bucks. Yeah, dollar a day. Well, so we’ve talked about basically the frontline protocol, which is the Campbell protocol for removing mold, which is itchicomazole. That’s the main frontline tactic used in that protocol. But you mentioned ozone, and I want to go into a little bit more depth than that.
Ben Kosubevsky (29:52)
Yeah.
Kyle Hulbert (30:15)
Um, cause I was actually just listening to a podcast interview, um, the mind pump guys, uh, interviewed Dave Asprey. Dave Asprey is probably like the most popular example of someone who was like terribly poisoned by toxic mold. Um, and you know, the biohacker social media presences. Um, and he said the number one biggest driver for having him feel better and clearing it was ozone. He said that was the thing.
Ben Kosubevsky (30:39)
Yeah.
Kyle Hulbert (30:41)
So, I know we talked about ozone, but could you go in a little bit more detail on specifically how ozone works to clear, fight, or whatever it does to mold?
Ben Kosubevsky (30:49)
Yeah, so I mean, it works. It kills mold the same way it kills everything else. One, it can destruct those biofilms on contact because you can’t repel, it’s harder to repel oxygen than it is to repel a chemical or your immune system. So it attaches those biofilms and breaks them through attachment. Two, it’s stimulating your immune system. It’s turning on your immune system to even higher levels to really get after that stuff.
Three, I always add the ultraviolet light to my O-zones because that will actually kill things in your blood on contact with the light. So you’re killing whatever mold is available and you’re basically making a natural inoculation to the mold because you’re frying it, you’re leaving it whole, it passes into your bloodstream and your body will attack it and learn how to kill it.
Kyle Hulbert (31:37)
I like that. I like that approach. The other thing I’ve heard that has been a huge benefit for people is NAD+. So I’ve heard that people with mold toxicity, I don’t think it necessarily treats it, but it alleviates most of the symptoms, especially the brain related symptoms. Have you done anything with that or heard anything about that?
Ben Kosubevsky (31:59)
This is the first I’m hearing about that one. It makes sense, but do you want to give us more detail?
Kyle Hulbert (32:04)
Yeah, yeah. I mean, it’s literally Entity Plus is usually used for longevity reasons, IVs and things like that. It’s also used for like addiction recovery. So it can help people ease off of alcohol or other substances. But basically, it’s a chemical associated with like aging, your levels decline as you age. And I’ve just heard a lot of people in the biohacking community talking about how, like, you know, they tried everything to feel better from mold.
Obviously they weren’t specifically talking about removing it and getting to the root, but they were talking about symptom alleviation. And NAD plus just pushed them through and made them feel that much better, turned their brain back on, it felt like they had their life back. That gave them the energy to then go chase after the root. So that’s what I’ve heard. I haven’t seen research on it, to be honest with you. Again, this is just what I’ve heard in the biohacking circles.
Ben Kosubevsky (32:49)
Interesting.
Okay, well, that’s good to know.
Kyle Hulbert (33:02)
Might be something to try. Maybe try it on my sister next time.
Ben Kosubevsky (33:08)
I don’t think she’s a good candidate for NAD. We’ll have an answer about NAD, but for those of you don’t know, NAD is kind of a brutal IV. You feel terrible the whole time you’re doing it. It goes away when the time the IV is over, but it’s four hours of just chest pressure and nausea.
Kyle Hulbert (33:11)
Yeah. Ha ha ha.
Yeah, when I did it at Ivy, it felt like I was being punched in the gut for four hours. It was not fun. Although I have seen pretty cool new ways to take it. There’s an electrophoresis patch now out, 500 milligrams of NAD+. You stick it on your back. Basically you drip the NAD into one side. You put saline on the other side. You pull off the patch, it activates a battery and it uses electricity and the polarization of the two things to drive it through your skin.
Ben Kosubevsky (33:53)
wild.
Kyle Hulbert (33:54)
It is wild and I can 100% test to the fact that I felt a difference. I used it to, I used it to actually get off of caffeine. Um, so I was, I was on coffee. I usually cycle off once a month, but a few years ago I was, I was on it for like a year straight and I wanted to get off it and I had zero headaches, zero low energy. I felt great. I was like, this is, this is definitely the NAD because normally when I go off coffee, I’m just like.
Ben Kosubevsky (33:59)
interesting.
Kyle Hulbert (34:22)
I have lost my will to live. So, yeah, we should definitely do an episode on an AD+. That’d be, that’d be a good one.
Ben Kosubevsky (34:27)
Very cool.
Oh, we absolutely will. OK, so let’s get into the back half of this episode, which is going to be about mold in the home specifically.
Kyle Hulbert (34:42)
mold in the home. So I mean, we’ve talked a little bit about not being able to avoid it. And if we can’t avoid it, why does it matter? Well, the thing, the place you spend the most time is generally your home, especially your bedroom. So if you can’t avoid it overall in your life, you can minimize it. So if it’s in your grocery store, okay, shop quick. You know, you’re in there for 30 minutes, you’re in and out. You know, but if it’s in your home,
You’re being exposed constantly up to 12, 14 hours a day, um, throughout the night. And it’s harder for your system to clear and fight that. Um, now where do I see it in the homes? Oh, you name it. I have seen all kinds of bad construction. Um, I don’t know which way you want to take this, Dr. K. Got any, any guidance for me here before I go off on a tangent about bad construction?
Ben Kosubevsky (35:29)
So, yeah, I’m sure you could fill a full four or five hour talk just about mold in the home. So let’s have an overview today and then maybe we’ll see what people are interested in and then we’ll deep dive those more. So there’s two types of homes, right? There’s new construction and pre-built or pre-owned I guess. So let’s take a couple minutes and talk about new construction first.
Kyle Hulbert (35:37)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay, I like that. Actually, I’m gonna hijack a little bit. Before we go into construction, I’m gonna go back 100 plus years. So very, very old homes often don’t have problems with mold nearly to the extent that our currently built homes have. And that’s because when they were built back in those days, the airflow from the inside to the outside of the house is often pretty high. This houses weren’t insulated very well.
Ben Kosubevsky (36:06)
Okay.
Kyle Hulbert (36:24)
And this led to a restoring of the natural balance of the air within the house. Kind of like I mentioned earlier in the episode, how nature, there’s mold out there, but it’s in balance. So it’s not really an issue for us. So houses that are over a hundred years old, generally don’t have as many mold issues as houses that were built more recently. Now, new construction houses. Actually, I’m gonna progress on the timeline. So around the 1950s or so, we started figuring out,
how to make houses more insulated, which is good because we’re green, we’re saving energy. The only downside of that is we’re hurting ourselves. So when we insulate houses, we basically make this little capsule of air that doesn’t get exchanged with the natural air that’s in balance, leading to all kinds of indoor air quality issues. And this is not just mold actually, it’s VOCs, it’s carbon dioxide, it’s a bunch of different things that build up in the house because there’s not a frequent air exchange.
between the inside and the outside of the house. This is when you start seeing those articles, I think in the 80s it was really popping off, 80s and 90s, sick building syndrome, because people were working in these giant, well-sealed buildings for a long time that were starting to become filled with mold. So from there, we advanced and we advanced, and nowadays we have even tighter houses. And this is where it gets tricky because new homes can be either amazing or terrible.
depending on how you do it. So there are all kinds of systems, but things you wanna look for when you buy a new home, like a new construction home is really if there’s a way to intake fresh air. So a fresh air intake is key. You also wanna look for an air purification system and probably dehumidification system. So that was a giant synopsis, but I’m gonna go a little bit into specifically like where and how we find mold in the house.
So common sources are, and I mentioned the air system, are the HVAC. So especially in places like Florida that are humid, mold, certain species of mold can actually grow whenever the relative humidity is over 50%. So regardless of whether you have an active leak or not, if the moisture in the air is over 50%, mold can grow. And where that mold grows is generally in your HVAC system.
which is difficult because most places in wetter climates like Florida are over 50% in homes. So it leads to this growth in the HVAC system. So that’s probably the number one place. Number two place is kitchens and bathrooms. A leak in a pipe, you know, under the sink, it’s dripping. If it drips and it stays wet for more than 72 hours, most likely mold is growing there because there’s some
Mold spores in the air, generally they’re everywhere. And so if it stays wet for 72 hours, they find their way there and start growing. And then the last biggest places like the bathrooms, the showers, the wet areas. If they’re not taken care of well maintained, the grout is kept up, water will make its way through cracks and crevices, build up even on like certain silicone agents and sealing materials. And it’ll just, it’ll start growing over time. So maintenance is key too.
That’s as broad as I think I can go.
Ben Kosubevsky (39:45)
That’s pretty good. I think that gives people something to think about.
So, how do they know if their house is actually full of mold or not?
Kyle Hulbert (39:48)
Yeah.
Well, that’s another, man, you’re giving me just things I could go off on for days.
Ben Kosubevsky (39:58)
Well, let’s start with, so where I was headed with that question, there is a test, I think both you and I are big fans of the EnviroBiomics Swiffer Pads.
Kyle Hulbert (40:08)
Yeah, so this is actually key for testing. So like if you wanna test your home, the thing most people go to is air testing. Like let me walk around, you can buy these air testing things online, they’re cheap, really cheap. And you can send a sample in or test it with a little machine and it says you are negative for mold. The thing is, it’s kinda like the provocation tests. The mold is not just generally floating in the air. There will be low levels floating in the air and usually it’s not an issue.
The mold is actually most likely in the dust or in the settled areas of your house. So that’s why we like to use something like a Swiffer pad. Basically, it’s a cloth that you go and you go over your door frames and you go over your refrigerator and you go in some dusty areas and you send this to a lab and they test it for species of mold and mycotoxins. That will give you a much more accurate reading of your mold levels in your home. And then of course, you should do a visual walkthrough.
Like walk through your house, look in all the cabinets, look at the ceiling. Are there any obvious water damaged areas? Because that will be a very, very bright red flag for you to investigate that further.
Ben Kosubevsky (41:18)
The other thing you may want to get is the thermal cameras that will show you if you have any water leaks behind your bathrooms.
Kyle Hulbert (41:26)
That’s a really good one. They, um, they actually sell them for iPhones. Now you can literally like plug them in the bottom of your iPhone and they’re like a few hundred bucks, the cameras. Honestly, it’s, it’s like the price of one of the, one of the tests. And you can, you can kind of look around and say, like, you can run your water, you can run it on hot and you can kind of see if there’s air or water leaks. Uh, that’s actually a really, it’s a really good point. Okay.
Ben Kosubevsky (41:49)
Yeah. OK, so let’s say they found mold. Now what?
Kyle Hulbert (41:53)
Burn it down.
Ben Kosubevsky (41:55)
No, we do not recommend arson on this page. I may suggest it sometimes, but I don’t recommend it.
Kyle Hulbert (42:02)
No, so actually, I have a story I like to tell here, but the Bible in Deuteronomy actually has a mold protocol for if your house has mold. And it goes something like, if your house has visual mold, you basically clean it really well, take it apart and clean it really well, because it’s like Stonehuts type deal. You go away for seven days and you come back and if the mold is still there,
You take it apart and you clean it really well. You go away from seven days and you come back. And if the mold is still there, you burn it to the ground. So that’s the official, the official deuteromity for the Israelites protocol for removing mold from your house. However, not necessarily needed nowadays. We have lots of technology and things like that, but it is very tricky, very, very tricky. I don’t want to go into too much detail on this because
again, this is…
Ben Kosubevsky (42:50)
Let’s start with the most common misconception, bleach.
Kyle Hulbert (42:55)
Yeah, bleach, that’s a good one. Yeah, bleach is, bleach doesn’t kill mold. So it actually, imagine that’s bleach bleaches mold. Wow, it does what it says it’s gonna do. It’ll actually kill around 70 to 80% of the outside of the mold. But what it doesn’t kill is the things that the mold, the attachment of the mold that usually goes in the surface, that little nub right there, it doesn’t kill that part.
And what happens is after you bleach it, you’ve killed this part of the mold.
That’s gone. There we go. There’s our vigil aid. So that’s just left. What happens is this mold grows back and when it grows back, it’s pissed off. It’s stronger. It’s more resilient and it’s making a lot more mycotoxins, which are more damaging. So bleach is actually worse than not bleaching it, believe it or not. Essentially there are a few things that will kill mold. It is very difficult to do it. So.
Ben Kosubevsky (43:52)
So what do you do?
Kyle Hulbert (43:59)
Hydro peroxide will kill it, but it needs to really be a non-porous surface. And if it is a porous surface, it really means high percentage hydrogen peroxide scrubbing, high percentage hydrogen peroxide scrubbing. The real answer is to remove the surface, to remove whatever the mold is growing on. That’s, that’s the real answer, how to get rid of it. So if your sink leaked and you have mold in the bottom of your cabinet, remove the cabinet.
Look everywhere else, see if there’s any drywalls damage, remove that, replace it all, and then that is how you remove the mold. You also need to purify the air afterwards.
Ben Kosubevsky (44:36)
How do you do that?
Kyle Hulbert (44:38)
A whole host of ways to do this. And it’s a good time for me to mention our sponsor, which is my coaching company, Toxic Roots. We have a lot of articles. And we’ll probably link to one in the show notes about air purification and things like that, and mold cleaning protocols. So we’ll link to some of those in the show notes. But in terms of air purification, you just need to get a really good purifying unit if you’re not modifying your HVAC system. So you can modify your HVAC system and put a system that’s HEPA plus.
So, you know, CR16, very advanced air filtration that filters the air in the entire house. Most people, it’s just not feasible. Those things are expensive and it’s hard to retrofit a system. So a unit like Air Doctor is a good choice. They’re relatively inexpensive as compared to other models. I like Molecule just because they look like sporty metal tubes and they kind of look good. Air Doctors don’t necessarily look good, but they’re a fraction of the cost and they do a great job.
So a purification unit is a great idea, you know, whether or not you have mold, especially in your bedroom, you know, you’re sleeping there eight hours a night. I would get a purification unit just to improve the overall indoor air quality, reduce VOCs, reduce carbon dioxide, and reduce mycotoxins, just to increase your sleep quality and health.
Ben Kosubevsky (45:56)
The other thing I would add is to get a home ozone generator. And now these cannot be run, this is a disclaimer, do not run this while anything alive is in the house or for two hours after it’s been run. The idea with these is you find a day that for eight hours everyone is gone, you run it for I don’t know like six hours and then you know you’re gone for eight so I’ll have time for the ozone to dissipate but that thing is gonna kill everything out there.
Kyle Hulbert (46:25)
Yeah. And to be clear, do not run this while something’s in the house. That means pets too. If you leave your pet in the house while you’re running this generator, it is not going to be a good thing.
Ben Kosubevsky (46:30)
Yeah.
Kyle Hulbert (46:35)
Ben Kosubevsky (46:36)
know that it will you know we talked about this in our episode those things it’s not like IV ozone those things would generate a ton of nasty dirty ozone which is really good at killing stuff and that’s what you want but is not compatible with human life.
pet lo…
Kyle Hulbert (46:52)
Yeah, or animal life for that matter. So yeah, that is another good way. Actually, that’s actually a really good protocol if you wanna wrap it all together. If your sink leaks and you’ve got mold in the bottom of your cabinet, you take out the cabinet, you take out the drywall, anything that has visual mold on it, you hit it with the Ozone, and then you buy a purifier, put it in that room, rebuild the thing, and that’s probably a really good solution to get you most of the way there.
Ben Kosubevsky (47:19)
Yeah, I would agree with that. And then there are some people, you can hire mold removal people, you know, if you wanna run these through insurance and all that stuff. The best thing to do is find someone that’s used one that actually had a good experience with them, because unfortunately there are a lot of shady mold people, there are a lot of really good mold people, same as anything else. And you don’t know who’s who until you’ve used them or has a friend that’s used them.
Kyle Hulbert (47:21)
So this.
Yeah, that’s very important. There are, like you said, a lot of shady mold people and a lot of them aren’t necessarily like shady just because they want to do bad. It’s just because they don’t know. They’re just not educated in it. And then that leads to bad outcomes for people. So especially the big names like Serve Pro, they’re really here for like water damage restoration. They’re not here to make sure that you’re healthy afterwards. So.
So we covered mold symptoms, we covered basic mold treatments, we’ve covered testing, we’ve covered mold in your home. Is there anything else we need to hit?
Ben Kosubevsky (48:19)
I think that’s enough about Mold for today. If you guys want to hear more about it, send us messages telling us what specifically you want to hear about Mold because it’s such a broad topic where you kind of need direction where you guys want us to go with it.
Kyle Hulbert (48:33)
Yeah, send us Q&A’s to our Instagram. We want to run a Q&A episode, so we’d love to get listener questions in here so we can answer them. I think that would be really good for us and our audience to kind of dive deeper and connect. Cool, well, thank you guys so much for watching. I’m Coach Kyle.
Ben Kosubevsky (48:52)
And this is Dr. K, thanks for joining, we’ll see you next time.