#4 - Building Biology: How Your Home Affects Your Health with Dr Nicole Bijlsma

Jess Kismet

Hey Nicole, thanks for joining me today. Very welcome.

Nicole Bijlsma

Always looking forward to chatting about something I'm passionate about.

Jess Kismet

Yeah, absolutely. So take us back to the start of your journey 25 years ago, I believe. Is that right? You started this building biology journey? 

Nicole Bijlsma

Yes, 1999, 25 years ago, exactly when I started the college. So it was before that, that I started to investigate how our homes were making us sick.

Jess Kismet

Yeah, 25 years. That's a lot of time to develop some expertise. So tell us how it started. Like what, what spurred you to go into building biology? Let's get a bit of history.

Nicole Bijlsma

Yeah, I started the building biology industry in Australia and it has started for two reasons. I was working as a clinician at the time, a naturopath and acupuncturist and noticing a certain percentage of my patients with asthma allergies, chronic fatigue syndrome, border immune disease were not getting better by changing their diet and lifestyle, giving them a bag full of herbs or supplements.

And many of them by the third consultation will be going, you know, I think I've got mould in the house. What do you think about that? Or I'm sleeping near a meter panel. Do think that's an issue? I thought, didn't we think much of it? Until we moved into our first home around the same time. And within two weeks, my husband and I were developed insomnia and didn't even think the house was an issue. We just weren't sleeping well. We were waking up tired. Within 12 months, I felt pregnant with, was 30 with my first child and miscarried at 11 weeks. And then we went on to have 10 miscarriages in this house and started to reflect back on the fact that everything went pear shaped moving into the home. Then realised we were sleeping next to the metre panel, that there was a European wasp nest in close proximity to the bedroom window and a dowser, I got a dowser to come in so he said there's significant geopathic stress underneath the master bedroom. And Parks Victoria were regularly spraying pesticides because we're on the boundary of the Yarra River and we're right near a very busy T-intersection even though we were in Warrandot which is a beautiful environment probably one of the nicest place I think in Melbourne close to State National Park to the city of Melbourne but we were on a T-intersection so I thought this can't be a coincidence that everything would be pear shape. So I started to look at electromagnetic fields and there were two studies at the time to show that increased exposure to elevated magnetic fields could increase risk of miscarriages and I thought that's an interesting coincidence. So I said to my husband, we need to get out of the bedroom and get to the back bedroom, which was reluctant to do, but we did. And next time I fell pregnant, I fell pregnant naturally with twins. We didn't qualify for IVF, by the way, because I got pregnant easily. And we went everywhere, recurrent miscarriage clinic at the women's, no one could help us to figure out why I was miscarrying. And they excluded all the obvious pathologies. So it was just a matter of keeping trying. and trying to figure out what was going on. So by the 10th, I made it my mission to find out why if I couldn't have kids, why is it that we'll miscarry and given medicine was unable to give me an answer and I'm like a dog at a bone. So I'll just spend my life finding there's always a reason why people get sick, always. So I just kept looking at it and told my ex to get to the next bedroom, back bedroom and had three under three. Now teenagers shoot me now.

But it is challenging. You've got kids the same age, I believe. I do. It's a matter for me. I went into naturopathy to, you know, make the world a better place. And I know that's really pie in the sky stuff, but I wanted to get to the cause of the problem. And I came out going, we're really treating symptoms a bit like medicine. And that's not what I signed up for. So it's been a very long journey of three decades since I graduated as a naturopath to really look at why are we so sick?

I mean, more than 50 % of the adult population have a chronic disease, 40 % have two chronic diseases. And so when I started to research this, it became really apparent to me over many years that environmental chemicals, man-made electromagnetic fields, mould is having an allergen, they're having a huge burden on chronic diseases. And I would say that environmental exposures are probably one of the number one causes of chronic diseases, not genetics. We know that very clearly in the literature.  Because genes don't change. Those gene variants and detoxification pathways have stayed for generations, but what has changed is our toxic load has dramatically changed in the last five decades. And we know autism has increased 4,000 fold since 1931. We know neurodegenerative disorders like Parkinson's were virtually non-existent pre-farming, 1950s.

There are so many diseases that have dramatically escalated and a lot of it seems to be associated with environmental chemicals, especially pesticides, is probably my number one worst chemical. And of course the introduction of electromagnetic fields has what I would suspect has a synergistic effect in terms of enhancing the permeability of blood-brain barrier, affecting people's sleep.

So I recently published a randomized control trial on the impact of a baby monitor on healthy adult sleep. And it was statistically significant, which was horrifying. Like I say that in my work and my building biologists, so creating the building biology industry, but to actually get the stats, I mean, it took seven years from ethics to get it published in a high-end journal to say that a baby monitor and a wifi enabled device causes significant sleep problems is very concerning and something that very few people have an awareness of.

Jess Kismet

That is crazy. I did see that come through the other day last week on your newsletter, the link to the article, and I haven't read it yet, but I did sort of scan it. I mean, every family that has a baby these days is going to have a wifi activated baby monitor. 

Nicole Bijslma

Did you have a baby monitor?

Jess Kismet

I did, but that was a million years ago. So mine was like… Yeah, it was a hardwired baby monitor, but I know tons of friends of mine use their mobile phones and iPads and things to monitor their children. Yeah. So you only had to move bedrooms and you were no longer affected by, so two questions. Your meter box was next to your main bedroom at the time and your bed head. Cause actually one of my kids has got, we got a smart meter installed when I moved into this house and her head is on the other side of the wall the smart meter box. And so I think I even, yeah, I need to get, I need to change that. So you only had to move bedrooms. So by the, to the distance away from that meter box changed, changed how it was impacting you.

Nicole Bijslma

Yes. Look, at the same time, we sent our bloods to a US clinician who had a good success rate with miscarriages. And he said something's impacted your immune response. Essentially you're immune between your husband and you you know, his sperm wasn't that great. So a few factors. Yes. Yeah. And my system was attacking the fetus as an foreign agent ironically, the by the time we got our bloods there, we didn't have to go to the US. And for him to assess it the day he was meant to have that phone call with me at five o'clock in the morning because he's based in Chicago. He died two hours before. And I remember ringing the clinic.

I've missed a phone call. He hasn't rung. What's going on? She goes, I'm so sorry. Alamby has just passed away. He was 74. My goodness. And I thought, my God, finally someone who may be able to explain why I'm miscarrying. And he's just died on us. I walked into the room with my husband. I said, you're not going to believe. He died on us. He goes, what are you talking about? I said, I can't. I said, you know what? F the universe.  I'm gonna have kids no matter what it takes, no matter what's going on, I'm gonna find out why we can't have kids. Instead of, I could have gone one of two ways. I could have gone into depression or I could have gone, F it I'm gonna figure this out now, this is not okay. This is the universal having a joke and I'm gonna sort it out and I can't help it. There's always a reason why people are sick. So there's a whole other backend story to that.

Jess Kismet

Holy moly. And then you were like, and then I'm to start a college and I'm going to teach the whole of Australia how to do, how to avoid the problems I had to face. Like that's next level. Like I like educating people. Like part of my job is to educate people about healthy homes and building science, but starting a college. Like, did you start a college?

Nicole Bijslma 

Well, didn't, I didn't aim to do that. So was lecturing naturopathy at the time for about 12 years at Melbourne college of natural medicine in nutrition and history and philosophy of natural medicine which I utterly loved and trained over a couple of thousand students then. But then of course had all these miscarriages and started to research at the same time electromagnetic fields and environmental causes. And when I looked at the US EPA's website during the miscarriages, I'm going, my God, there's so much data here on air quality. Why didn't I learn this in my double degree? You know, I've studied naturopathy for years. That was an applied science course. I did acupuncture degree for four years and I went to China to do more training in acupuncture in 92. Why didn't we address any of these environmental issues? And I just spent 10 years, much to my husband's frustration, off my own back researching to find out how much evidence is there in this field. And as I was teaching my naturopathic students, going, you need to do a course in this because this is, here I'm trying to teach a nutritional lecture very quickly so I could quickly get onto the environmental stuff.

And they just kept saying, need, why don't you do a course in this? So I thought I started doing courses in it. And then by 2005, I've got it nationally accredited and went to the US to do the building biology course. And it was pretty average because it had been translated from the German course 20 years before that. So it was old, it was outdated and it was all American based. So I literally came back after spending 10 G's there with a piece of paper and the 25 principles. And I got engineers and PhD consultants to pull this the nationally accredited building biology course together and has been running it ever since, since 2005.

Jess Kismet

That's fantastic. So you had a teaching background before this. So you didn't just go from Neutropathy like as a consultant and just start a school. You had a background in teaching.

Nicole Bijslma

Yeah. Look, I was very lucky because in my first year of Neutropathy, did a massage course. And then the next year I was only 19, cause I wanted to get through uni and earn a pretty good income and get into clinical practice straight away in massage initially to build up my patient clientele while studying naturopathy and acupuncture. Like was 40 hours a week, double degree, it was crazy, plus three jobs. the college said to me, know, our oriental massage teacher has just pulled out after God knows how many years he was there, can you fill in? I thought, God, I've only done tweener, like the acupuncture tweener is part of my acupuncture degree, sure, I'll help out.

And so from 19 onwards, I started teaching adults. So I've been teaching for 30 years, adult learning. Yeah. So it's just sort of, I was very fortunate that I had those opportunities early on and it just built up from there.

Jess Kismet

Wow. Okay. That's awesome. So I'm grateful for you. So that second question I have, which I didn't get to before, is you were talking about geopathic stress. Could you explain what that is, please?

Nicole Bijlsma

The Geo's Earth pathos means disease, like pathology pathos is disease arising from the Earth. So there are sacred sites and also sites around the Earth that have unusual anomalies. We call these sacred sites and people go to these sites because they uplift, they either enhance their energy or they do the opposite. Von Pohl was one of the first researchers in the 1920s and 30s to look at cancer rates in various villages throughout Germany and found that there was elevated levels of geopathic stress.

Examples of Geopathic stress could be fault lines, layer lines, geomagnetic lines, all of those sort of things. It's very esoteric, probably the most esoteric thing we teach at the college because there's really no scientific device you can use apart from dowsing rods to pick this up. But when all else fails and you've checked for mould you check for electromagnetic fields and someone has a weird autoimmune disorder that doesn't seem to be based on stress or emotional trauma, then geopathic stress is where we often go to.

And often we're looking for signs in the environment like bees, wasp nests, bees nests, termite mounds. You're looking for ivy. So certain plants thrive with geopathic stress Certain animals thrive with geopathic stress. So you're for signs in the environment that is indicating that there could be geopathic stress anomalies in those areas. So bees and wasps are attracted to those areas. They'll they'll put their nests where there's areas of geopathic stress. So fault lines, for example, is where you've got rocks coming together and causing what we call the piezoelectric effect, where they're coming together at such pressures that they're emitting actually frequencies directly above them. And if you sleep or spend time above that, it is thought to cause adverse health effects, especially immune dysregulation. But there's very little in literature on that. mean, I have - I love my feng shui, but I also love my building biology. And of course, you know, I've done my PhD on environmental exposures and chemicals and EMFs on health. But I also love the esoteric because ultimately when I started the college, I wanted to create environments that people could walk into that will support their mind, body and soul. That, know, to me, your house is like as important as your diet and your food and the people you surround yourself with. It should be something that when you walk in, It's like a vitamin shot. feel you're not just protected from the weather, but you're also supported on every level of your being. But unfortunately, as I started to walk into lots of people's homes, it became really apparent that, you know, yes, clutter is an issue, et cetera, and colors and furniture placement is a nice thing. Most people have got serious physical issues going on in their home, like water damage and electromagnetic fields and air pollution, which we now know is having massive ramifications for cancer risks and respiratory disorders in most Western countries. In fact, most people would be shocked probably that Australia's airs, the pollution in major cities often exceeds the World Health Organization's guidelines.

Jess Kismet

Yeah, yeah. I know that's very serious issue in Australia. I just want to go back. You said a lot in that last thing there. We talked about mould you talked about what were they? There's three things you mentioned. clutter was one of them. And there was another one. but you've actually got a subject in your course for clutter. And when I saw it, was like, what's clutter got to do with anything? And then it dawned on me, of course, if you've got a cluttered home, it's probably going to be on like less clean and there's much more risk for all the little dust mites and mould to grow in a cluttered home.

Nicole Bijlsma

Absolutely, clutter restricts airflow. didn't even occur to me. and feng shui was the other one. Yes. So it dramatically increases your exposure to allergens. So wherever there's dust, there's going to be allergens. And as you know, in my course, carpets are the archaeological dig site of the entire house because they've got everything in them. And on the dust, you've got chemicals, know, your semi-VOCs, you've got your dustmine, you've got your fungal particulate, you've got your chemicals attached to that. So your solvents and your perfumes and your flame retardants, which is a big problem in a lot of new carpets. And the reason why so many cats have hyperthyroidism is because of the flame retardants in the carpets. And very few people know that, let alone doctors know that about that in patients. So carpets and clutter, know, clutter is a big issue because it's hard, it's impossible to clean, especially if you can't see the floor.

And it's very difficult for me to do my job if I can't moisture map the floor, get a good visual, et cetera, because it's impossible to clean. And cleaning is a really important part of establishing a healthy home.

Jess Kismet

 Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So feng shui is also a topic which a lot of people think is woo woo. Now I've been hearing the term woo woo a lot lately, so I'm going to dive into the feng shui. what, could you tell me about the relationship between feng shui and a healthy home? Please.

Nicole Bijslma

Well, building biology is more what I would call modern feng shui. So building biology focuses more on the physical parameters that could impact mental and physical well-being. We've mentioned allergens and electromagnetic fields. We've mentioned, you know, dust mite and mould and all those sort of things. Feng shui is more colour, more the textures, more furniture placement, more why is it that I don't study well in this room? Why when I walk in this space, I can't sleep in the bedroom?

You know, it's the more subtle things like, you know when someone has an argument and you weren't present when it happened, but you walk into the room, it's like the air cuts like a knife. There's a lot of subtle things that we pick up intuitively, because we're intuitive beings. You know, we tend to be quite rational in the way we educate our children, but we're actually, especially kids are very intuitive. So if things don't feel right, like for example, when you look for buying or renting a house, you walk through the front door and you go, something bad, it's not right, it just doesn't feel right. And you can't rationalize why it is. That's the study of feng shui. Why is it in a straight road, you have multiple car accidents? That's the study of feng shui. Why is it that the same business goes in that shop, goes bust time, time again, regardless of the business that moves in? That's the study of feng shui. It's quite esoteric, but to me, really helps. Being intuitive and also, which everybody is, it's just that they're, you know, so busy using their rational mind that they don't realize and have not enhanced their intuition like a lot of children already have. To me, that's what Feng Shui is. Walking to a space where you go in this lounge room, I can actually sit through a whole movie and feel comfortable. I could sleep in that bed and wake up feeling refreshed. I could study on that desk and be really productive. It's that understanding and that connection. 

Like you have with people. Some people we connect with, some people you don't. And sometimes you can't even rationalize why that is the case. It's the same with spaces. Spaces are powerful and they have, unfortunately, they are very much neglected because we focus a lot more on our nutrition, which is good, but our homes is, to me, is just as important as I mentioned, as our food, as the people we surround ourselves. It's not just a form of shelter. It has a huge capacity.

to impact people's mental and physical health. And certainly, you know, the lighting can make dark cluttered houses nearly often synonymous from my experience with people feeling more depressed or anxious. Not that that's the cause of depression or anxiety, but it certainly can contribute to it. And we now know lighting has a huge ramification on people's mental health. That blue light suppresses melatonin, which is important for sleep. Most important neuropeptide for anti as an anti-cancer neuropeptide. And our lighting that we're using, especially our LEDs, are a big issue, especially now that ADHD affects 10 % of the population and autism has increased significantly. These kids are so sensitive that even the lighting is having a massive impact. So there's much we can do by having an understanding of these parameters, whether it's the lighting and the electromagnetic fields and all these other things that can have huge ramifications for helping our kids sleep and being more healthy. 

Jess Kismet

So what is your favorite topic in your line of work? Cause mine is mould, because I'm in the building science game, but what's yours?

Nicole Bijslma

Look, I have to say mould. Yeah, it's funny. And the reason why I love mould, mean, mould, because it answers many of the questions I had 30 years ago with my naturopathic patients going, why aren't they getting better? Why have they got these weird autoimmune diseases? I see quite a few women with multiple sclerosis that start in water damaged buildings. And I look at the literature and going, why isn't anyone asking these questions?

I know with testing water damage buildings and every person that I train like yourself, that that's gonna have a massive effect on enhancing community health because you'll see many clients who you'll test their buildings or at least give them advice when they're at the building stage how to prevent the condensation of mould. And that can save their marriage. I see a lot of families living devastated by water damage where their gene,  is such that they're far more susceptible than their partner. They're often spending more time in the water damage than their partner. So their partner may not have a understanding or empathy to go, you know, my wife's lost her mind. And actually I can validate she probably has, and this is the neuro, this is the pathology behind it, but there is hope and this is what's causing and triggering that. And this is what needs to be done to fix it. So Mould answers many of the questions I had 30 years ago with.

tricky patients with autoimmune disorders and chronic fatigue. We definitely know it's probably the number one cause of chronic fatigue. EMFs would also play a role, definitely multiple chemical sensitivities. So that's why I dedicated my PhD to, you know, people with environmental sensitivities and the need to upskill clinicians to diagnose this and to have more people at the ground level to actually go and properly test their buildings to see what's going on.

Jess Kismet

Yeah, I don't think that I have, you know, any sort of, so I don't think I have service, but I definitely have some very unexplained symptoms that I've had my entire life, including, electric shocks is a massive one. get electric shocks constantly and tingling all over my body. That seems to be getting worse and no one's ever I've been to neuro neurologists and all sorts of, no one's ever been able to pinpoint it. So, know, every time someone tells me they've got a pain or a, or some sort of, you know, illness, I'm like, If you've got mould in your house, it's sort of like the first thing I think of now to explain an unexplained symptom or a chronic illness that they've never been able to get a hold of. 

Nicole Bijslma

Well, electric shocks often come because there's an issue with antidiuretic hormone, which governs the water in your body. So what happens especially, it's common with clients who have CIRS Chronic Inflammatory Response due to mould illness, that 60 % of them will have issues with antidiuretic hormone, which means they're often thirsty, they're often urinating frequently and they get electric shocks simply because they're dehydrated. So there's more salts on the surface, which means when they're touching things they're actually getting more electric shocks. So there's actually pathology behind that. Now that doesn't necessarily mean you've got CIRS but it's normally symbolic that ADH is actually being impacted by that. So there is science behind that. And the classic thing is they go to the doctor, especially if they have excessive thirst and lots of urination, doctor suspects there's

diabetes, they get tested for that and it's not there, then the first thing I would be looking at is potentially water damage in their car or their home that's eliciting those symptoms.

Jess Kismet

Yeah, the car was an interesting one. At our prac on the weekend, so we had, I've been doing my mould testing subject since the middle of the year and on the weekend we had our prac and there was a girl there who had a really bad mould issue in her car. I've never heard of a mould issue in a car before.

Nicole Bijslma

That's a different place to have a mould I've heard it quite a few times and I had a car dealer once coming through the course going, Coles, it's not unusual to leave the windows open accidentally when they're in the car yard and get a rain storm event. Yeah, right. It's not unusual and that's why it's important to ask in the history, how old is your car? Did you get it second hand? Is there any smell? Some older cars you can't actually service the air conditioner. So it could be a source of microbes and fungi. That's not unusual either. So unfortunately with CIRS it's really delicate. They need to get a secondhand car because of the chemical smells they can't cope with. It can't be too old, but the air conditioner can't be serviced. You know what I mean? So it's this delicate dance that they have to modify their life in order to try and live in a, know, Western culture.

Jess Kismet

And it's the same with furniture. Like you get a secondhand couch that's full of mould spores What's the option? Like you get a secondhand couch that's full of mould or you get a new couch that's full of VOCs.

Nicole Bijslma

That's right. So what I would say is to all my service clients and chemical sensitivity is to get a couch that's been on the floor for six or 12 months. The demo model. And then allow it to stay as long as it can.

If you do put it in the garage, whatever, allowed to out gas during hot days outside. So it's not out gassing those semi-vox inside the house. So there are ways around that.

Jess Kismet

So let's move on to my favorite topic, mould So it's a bit of a biggie in the building biology world. And it's also a big deal in construction because we have a lot of issues with a particularly during winter with construction mould on timber frames. So what there's a lot of confusion around how to remediate mould on a timber frame. It's a lot of people go into forums and they're asking, my timber frames gone mouldy What do I do? And then there's all this, you know, keyboard warrior advice about how to fix it.  So what's your advice on the best way to fix a multi-timber frame during construction?

Nicole Bijslma

Because it's semi-porous and it's porous, so the fungal particulates going to be in there. You can't just get a HEPA vacuuming and microfiber cloth, which is the standard procedure for condition two surfaces. So the key there is sandblasting, blasting basically is what's needed. There are companies that specialise in this because of what's happened along the eastern seaboard, especially up north, just specializing on timber frames and removing fungal particulate from that. So, I mean, the reality is with building, even in the past, prior to the pandemic and, you know, now that we're, the resources have been really challenging, getting materials and the building industry has really had a tough time since the pandemic, no doubt about that. That stick frame always used to have some form of contamination, even at the mill. So, you know, if you saw him would be quite common, but of course, when you've got a delay in construction, then, and you've got more water dam, you know, more water events raining, then of course it's going to add the load to the fungal particulates. So the only way really is blasting. Either remove it again or blasting. That's it.

Jess Kismet

Yeah. And we're just not going to knock our timber frames down and do it again. Are we? That's just not really feasible, so sandblasting. What about, is there a sealant you can put on the frames to stop the mould spores from spreading or?

Nicole Bijlsma

That's not what the S520 recommend. Encapsulation can be used in some scenarios, but it's not considered to be the best standard of care. So the problem is with soft pines, they become more challenging, especially using soft pines in humid environments and specific climate zones, not recommended.

And, but it's because we have a restriction on what's not restriction, but a lack of supply for hardwood is becoming more expensive. That's also another challenge for the building industry.

Jess Kismet

So you mentioned condition two particulate, that condition two mould, and you also mentioned S520. So could you please go back for our listener and tell them what those two things are?

Nicole Bijslma

Well, I'm fortunate to be a committee member for the first Australian standard on mould, which will be coming out next year. Essentially, we're endorsing the S500, which is a textbook from the Institute of Inspection, Cleaning, Restoration Certification, I ICRC, in the US that has protocols on best practice for cleaning. S500 looks at how to dry after a water event in order to prevent it becoming a mould-related problem because

As we know, with water loss, mild spores are everywhere from the Arctic to the Antarctica. It's normal in a healthy home to have mould spores and a little bit of high fear, et cetera, is normal. However, when you have a water event, what happens is it, within 48 hours can dramatically increase microbial growth. And depending on the substrates that it's on, because many substrates will be ideal for mild growth and bacteria.

And as a result of that, can result in the release of fungal particulates, spores, hyphae, et cetera. Condition one is considered to be normal fungal ecology for that house in that environment. So that's fine, no remediation. Condition two is high settled spores, which can be picked up on an air and or surface sample. And that normally happens when you've had a water event, there's been growth and that microbial growth has resulted in the release of fungal structures like spores and hyphae in the nearby environment, so it's contaminated a nearby environment. And that could be within the room, it could be in adjacent rooms, could be the whole house, depending on the extent of the water loss and how quickly it was dried. So the key with the S500 is to dry in a timely manner and hopefully, you know, within 24 to 48 hours, if possible. After that, it becomes a mould remediation issue. And that's when it goes from maybe a few hundred dollars or a couple thousand to, a lot more expensive because the process of mould remediation is to get to the source of moisture, dry any wet materials because they can be a source of microbial growth, discard any materials that are water damaged or porous items, any items that have condition three that are porous or semi-porous, normally you tend to throw out, there are some that are salvageable, non-porous items you can save.

So condition two is critical because you can't see it with the naked eye and that's the reason why when people are in homes that they suspect are making them sick that the worst times I see I cannot see or smell mould and it's until I get those air and surface samples that I go yep your house is fine or no this is actually really bad or worst case scenario you're gonna have to get out with just the clothes on your back and get into a hotel and get the insurance company involved because this is really bad.

Fortunately, that doesn't happen too often, but it does happen. And I'm quite surprised the percentage of the housing stock that I'm seeing with significant water damage is so much higher than I ever imagined, ever imagined. So condition two is high settled spores, you can't see it. Condition three means visible mould, actual growth is often damp, musty, odour, there's visible mould. By the time you see visible mould, you're talking about millions of spores per centimeter squared.

So it's what you don't see, that's an issue. To me, being in this industry for the past two decades, what I've noticed is that the exposure history is probably one of the most valuable tools to have as a mould testing technician. Because the symptoms I see in clients who are impacted by water damage is they have either asthma, allergies, upper or lower respiratory tract infections, chronic sinusitis that doesn't dissipate with treatment, bronchitis, tonsillitis, laryngitis, otitis media, and pneumonia. So recurrent colds and flus that keep coming back and not resistant to treatment is the first red flag that there could be water damage in their home workplace, school, or their car. It's common for kids to have colds every year, maybe six or seven times and they get over it quick. When they persist for weeks or months, that's when it becomes a red flag, especially when it's happened after a bathroom reno, a water event,

or after moving into a home that potentially has significant water damage.

Jess Kismet

Yeah. And we love our bathroom and kitchen renos, don't we? We love them. And people rip into their bathrooms without knowing what they're dealing with. I did it. My previous house, we ripped out the bath, the bathtub, and all behind the bathtub. And yeah, it was the whole bottom plate was all mouldy. Didn't think anything of it. My laundry ceiling was mouldy. My bathroom ceiling was mouldy. This is before I knew anything about it. So, you know, when I talk about electric shocks and tingling. know I've had, you the house before that, we lived in Queensland with a evaporative cooler and the couch, shoes, everything went mouldy. So I've actually had, if I think back, significant mould exposure in my life. you know, sorry, go. 

Nicole Bijslma

What's interesting is clients who end up with chronic inflammatory response, which is the sort of new term for chronic fatigue syndrome, is there being multiple water damage environments by the time they actually get sick. Which shows me the body's incredibly resilient because, you know, for them to be in one home where they got sick but hadn't been in previous water damage building, it doesn't exist. They've been in many water damage buildings, whether it's workplace or their homes or childhood, that would be really common in the history.

Jess Kismet

So there is a, there is a statistic in the building industry. There was a research paper done down in Tasmania a few years ago and they determined this in 40 % of Australian homes, 40 % of new homes, there is a mould issue. I would say based on my experience, it is way more than 40%, way more. And that's why I started this study, because I want to know what's going on in new homes and I want to know what's going on in existing homes. And I want to be able to flag things for people. And I mean, you know, when you know better, you can do better. It's a bit of a, you know, that's what I've been repeating lately. And that goes for so many things, but in particular, avoiding mould growth in a new home and assessing it in an existing home. Like if mould, if inflammatory,

Illnesses are responsible if mould and mycotoxins is responsible for all of those illnesses. I mean, we're all sick. Like, you know, to some degree, some of us are more sensitive to mycotoxins than others, but we have all, all you've got to do is ask somebody one question about a mouldy home and they'll tell you stories. yeah, my daughter's allergic. yeah, this house had mould all through the bathroom,  yeah, the laundry flooded and we had mould. It's just everywhere and not in the healthy levels, like problematic levels. And people don't know what it could be doing to their health and how to fix it.

Nicole Bijslma

 Well, look at asthma. We're the second highest rate of asthma in the world. And at least 60 % of asthmatics are reacting to fungal particulate. And most clinicians and their doctors aren't asking about their homes. This is the thing.  They've been through the whole medical merry-go-round and hopefully found an Naturopath that could that picked it up or you know it's just profound the story they have and often medical gaslit at the same time which is really sad it just adds to that trauma. But to me if you think about it we spend 90 % of our time in the built environment especially if your work isn't related to you know landscaping and being outside. So it makes sense the longer you are in an environment that's you know, toxic, the sicker you're gonna get. And this is what we see in classically with especially young parents, normally the mother with young children who's at the house, you know, more often than the breadwinner, her partner, for example. you know, because of the duration of exposure, they're often sick and they show symptoms and he or she may not. So it's very interesting to see these correlations and it's so common. But as you mentioned, the big ones for me where people get really sick is the bathroom renovation where they're stripping the tiles and the gyproc and the mould is hidden. And I'm always surprised how well the building envelope can contain very high levels of fungal particulate, like doing wall cavity sampling going, my God, there's 700,000 Aspergillus Penicillium in the wall, only 200 in the bathroom. Then the builders come and ripped it off. Now it's cross contaminated adjacent rooms, in some cases the whole house, because they didn't test, they didn't set up containment, they didn't put it under negative airways scrubbers and now it's just a very expensive process. If the client even discovers that otherwise, you what happens is the kids are sick and now they're at home in the environment that's created the sickness. It's very sad to see this, which is why it's become the number one course that I teach now. I'm having the only nationally accredited course in mould testing and in EMF testing that we've had 400 people come through the

the course tradies, which is great to see to upskill them about the impact of mould. And I think they're shocked to listen to people in my course, like in your course, where you had clients with CIRS who are living in caravans currently. And its just pulled into perspective, the devastating impact it can have on people's health.

Jess Kismet

 Yeah. When I first found out about CIRS I was made aware of people living in tents in their back gardens because they simply could not be inside their houses.  Like it just blows my mind how this can impact some people as literally destroys lives. And, you know, we live in Petri dishes. We're building our homes out of porous materials and, and, and moisture laden materials because they're not being covered up during construction or where we're building with concrete and concrete as we discussed on the weekend is another big one, a massive moisture source impacting relative humidity inside and contributing to microbial growth, condition two microbial growth that you can't see. It's, you know, I was watching one of the case studies on the, on the platform, the moodle platform earlier, and someone came out with two and a half, 2.3 million mould spores, as aspergillus penicillium in their wall cavity. There was no visible mould. The lady was like, the, the, the homeowner was, am convinced there is a problem with this wall. There was no water pipes in there. It was an internal wall. There was no reason why that wall should have been a problem. But when it was tested, it was massively high and it was put down to construction moisture. Yes, so you want to construct properly.

Nicole Bijslma

So in terms of mould in concrete substrates, concrete slabs I generally don't find are the cause of a major mould issue. Obviously you want them to cure and that's always an issue when you're on a time frame in terms of the construction. It's when you have tilt concrete slab construction, walls, floor, ceilings in multi-story apartments, that if that's not dried and cured, that becomes a huge issue for water vapour condensation and ultimately mould. This is becoming such a problem. And of course, there's a lot of reports now

strata multi-story apartments, especially in Sydney that have ended up at the Supreme Court because they're just not designed to be lived in.

Jess Kismet

Yeah, yeah, there's some study going on that I'm aware of as well on concrete and mould risk for concrete. you know, people who've worked with concrete for years, they report it, you know, literally crying, crying down the walls of concrete, like tilt up panels, because it wasn't cured properly before construction. Yeah, serious issue. So I think you've written a book, I have, write and she does it.

Yeah, so tell us a bit about your book because I'm going to buy a copy when the new version comes out next year. 

Nicole Bijslma 

So it's currently sold out. I started to first version 2012 on Healthy Home, Healthy Family and it was really written because when I was doing assessments of people's homes, they wanted detail and my reports were so big I thought I'm just going to write a book just give them a book as part of my assessment because you know I'm not going to go through all the sheets and the linen and the cookware and all the plastics and blah blah blah so I'll write a book and give them one that was part of the reason because I hate writing reports but it sold 15 000 copies mainly in Australia and got a bit of leverage through the media so, occasionally, I've done over 30 television interviews as a result of the book and the issues that I've raised in there. So electromagnetic fields, mould, et cetera. It's currently in the third edition, which is sold out and I'm currently writing the fourth edition. But essentially everything I put into that first edition in 2012 hasn't changed. All that's changed is the data in the scientific literature has exploded to validate what I thought was a problem.

So all of those issues that I raised at Chemical Electromagnetic Fields mould it's the same. I've just gone more into detail into the four dog defense, conflict of interest, industry, conflict of interest, corporations, and going what's actually happened here. And it all comes back down to, know, corporations have a fiduciary responsibility to have share, to make sure their shareholders are earning money. And that often comes at the cost of human health. I'm not anti-capitalist, but...

What I see is public health is largely a misnomer. Apart from removal of lead in petrol and better sewage system, there hasn't been a lot of breakthroughs in public health. And if anything, there've been a lot of disasters in public health. And because it takes 50 years or so to prove that A causes B, in the interim, all your kids are exposed to all these chemicals and toxins because researchers like me are going to spend a lifetime to prove that it's a problem, which is the system is flawed.

And that's why started the college to educate people that the change is not going to happen from the top down. You know, it's got to happen from the ground up. So by getting more building biologists out there and, getting them into people's homes to educate them, what's really going on and giving them good content that that was the only way that that change is going to happen. 

Jess Kismet

You know, I'm finding a similar thing in the construction industry. The change is not coming. mean, the building code is changing. It's evolving very, very slowly. And some of the building science is finally being taken into consideration in regards to condensation management. South Australia has recently put a pause on the building code for 10 years. So we won't see any further developments from a legal framework perspective for a decade, which is a real shame. It doesn't stop me from doing my job though. So I will still be pounding the pavement. But what I'm finding is that the change is coming not from the building code level, it's coming from the homeowners. It's coming from homeowners who are listening to podcasts, they're getting on the forums, they're listening to the YouTubes and they're saying to their builders, can you please make sure that my building has got this building wrap on it? Or could you this membrane? Or could you please make sure that we do a blower door test? And there are some builders that will go, what are you talking about? And aren't willing to learn. And there are other builders that say that, that get on board and they say, let me, let me learn about that.

And that's going to cause a divide, I think, between those who, there's going to be, a gap between those who know about it and are building the better buildings and those who get sort of left behind, particularly when the building code isn't forcing anyone to do anything else. So yeah, it's the drive does come from the people, the people who want, who are being directly impacted by these problems. 

Nicole Bijlsma

Yes, absolutely.

And for me, from my experience, it's often the mothers seeing their kids being unwell or they're unwell. And we know women especially are more susceptible to many of these environmental exposures. That certainly was the case with my baby monitor study that the cohort within seven nights of the baby monitor, one third of my participants, all women, mature age women in their forties and fifties, developed clinical insomnia, like actual medical grade insomnia within seven nights of the baby monitor next to their on their bedside table, which is what they would do if they had a baby monitor. Definitely, so it does down from the ground up, it takes courage to be able to go beyond and question everything. think we're at a stage now, when I was younger, we had our world book encyclopedia and that was our knowledge base. Now we're so overloaded with information, so overloaded with good and bad information. There's so much on social media. I've literally switched off during my PhD looking at social media, because there's just so much stuff that's out there I just cringe that's giving me misinformation. I will get back into that because I now realise I have, I feel a responsibility to get good content out there and to help people who are using clover mould for goodness sake or doing stuff that's actually adding to the toxic burden and to, with scientific justification.

So yeah, it is an important time and it's great to see that people are thinking outside of the square and critically thinking. You have to critically think every bit of information that's out there and who it's coming from and what are their qualifications and who are they to say, because everyone's got an opinion. Everyone has an opinion. But do they know what they're talking about? Are they actually disseminating information that's not accurate because they haven't applied that? It takes experience to do that.

Having done my PhD in environmental chemicals, know, looking at mould and electromagnetic fields, when I first started in the industry, I had a lot more opinion about, you know, plugins, EMFs. Now I'm very cautious what advice I give because I know what I know and I know what I don't know. Whereas when people get into the industry initially, they have a lot of opinions about what works when in fact that's not the case. And that's often exacerbating more problems. So it is a challenging time because we're overloaded with information, but

You know, people need to question everything and don't get it from one source. It's like nowadays, if you get a cancer diagnosis, you don't go to one doctor, you go to many doctors, you know, as many people for a second opinion. And then you're quite shocked at the different opinion and treatment strategies. So then you can make an informed choice. Same thing. Read widely, question where is it coming from? And you know, get, always get a second opinion.

Jess Kismet

Yep. Yep. Great advice, Nicole.

All right. Well, I, we're nearly ready to wrap up. There's two more questions I want to ask you. The first one is what shouldn't, what should people absolutely not do when it comes to cleaning mould? And the second one is what is the main thing you want people to know?

Nicole Bijlsma

 Ooh. Okay. So cleaning mould, lot of people, if you have mould on textiles, the rule of thumb is to get rid of it. Don't clean mould off shoes and clothes.

Once the mould is on the shoes and the clothes, they're gone, gone ski. I find people exposed to very high levels of mould when it's on a curtain that they're opening and closing every day. So I demonstrate that to my students. do an air sample in the room. I then get one of the students to remove the curtains, do another air sample, and it goes from a few hundred spores to 10,000 spores. So that's what those clients are exposed to. So once you have mould on a porous item, discard it, you can't save textiles. I was horrified to see on a major television network this woman who's a cleaning expert show how to scrub mould off leather shoes and that's horrifying to me because that could end up, it's an asthmatic in hospital with an asthma attack. So you know, that is not okay. When it comes to cleaning mould, do not use chemicals, do not use essential oils. You must actually vacuum with a HEPA filter first followed by with a microfiber cloth that's been dipped in dish liquid, followed by vacuuming. That's the way the professionals do it. That's the way you should do it. So first of course is what caused the mould. Mould is only there if there's moisture, whether it's condensation, water vapor or liquid water. Get to the water first, fix up the roof leak, fix up the drainage. Otherwise you're never gonna prevent it. So that's the first thing and then vacuum it off the surface and follow it through with the microfiber cloth and vacuum again.

Jess Kismet

The HEPA sandwich, right? The HEPA sandwich. And the last question is what is the one thing you want people to know?

Nicole Bijlsma

Look, to create a healthy home is actually quite easy. You'll see reading my book, the only thing I recommend people buy is a good vacuum cleaner, an air purifier and a water filter. The rest is knowledge. Keep your house as clean as possible, reduce the dust load. Don't wear your shoes inside where you track all those pesticides in. If you've got any respiratory problems, asthma allergies, get rid of the carpets can make a big difference and no fabric curtains. Your roller blinds are far better and that can make a huge difference to the allergy reservoir. And the last one is no wifi enabled devices in the bedroom because that could impact sleep. Great, great advice. Thank you, Nicole. This has been absolutely wonderful. Thank you so much for joining me. Thanks, Jess.