Be gentle, I'm a forum virgin...

Hi everyone,
I've been lurking for a little while on these boards and finally had the courage to introduce myself. As my title says, please be gentle as I'm new to any forum, not just this one.
A year ago (Dec 2016) my husband and I were in the 2nd from final stage of toxic mold poisoning/syndrome... the final stage is death by brain bleed. Eew. We made it but lost our home and shortly after our cat. As we recovered from the mold sickness we developed severe sensitivities to petro-chemicals. This is also known as Multiple Chemical Sensitivity, Environmental Illness, Gulf War Syndrome, Sick House (or Building) Syndrome, TILT and other names I can't think of right now.
My parents took us in but were unable/unwilling to make the HUGE change to using non-toxic products. (Yes, I'm bitter, lol.) Our specialist says if we spend 2-5 years breathing clean air, eating clean food and avoiding further exposure we can be "somewhat normal" again. As it stands now, certain fragrances (aka petro-chemicals) in perfumes, soaps, laundry products, etc will make me act drunk and pass out... or give me vertigo... or a terrible migraine... or heart palpitations... or memory loss... it bites.
So we traded in our sweet little hybrid to buy a minivan we could live in. Surviving this invisible illness means you need to either be secluded from everyday people or have mobility. Van life, as it's so charmingly called, is most likely best when it's voluntary, lol.
We've been on the road for around 6 months now and I can tell you two things: 1) people need to stop idling their damn diesel trucks and 2) rest areas aren't nearly as dangerous as people think.
We are wanting to settle but finding a safe place that's warm enough is difficult (woodsmoke = dizziness & cardiac arrhythmias). As we talk about this, and try to plan, we'd like to start an eco-villlage for others like us and I thought this may be a good community to learn from.
I hope I'm a good fit to this online community... I can be a little timid but I have a good sense of humor (1 part dad-humor to 1 part gallows-humor).
So thanks for reading my short story and if you know of any applicable threads I should read, or anything else, I'm eager to learn.
Thanks everyone!
Hugs, Boko

 

Thanks, Zen, I appreciate the warm welcome! I try to stay positive, there are so many things I never would have seen or experienced had I stayed trapped in my "normal" life.

 

Hi! Welcome! That's some shit you you've been through Boko. I wish you well in your travels towards better health and most importantly i hope you enjoy the company of us here!

 

Thank you! I'm sure I will, y'all seem like good people.

 

Seriously......errr....what?

 

welcome to hip

......well my house is out....wood stove,animals,weed smoke ,incense,....33 below outside right now so even my driveway is not suitable....you'd both be dead in a week....

where are you now?

 

We hung around northeast Tennessee for a while but when it dropped to 20 degrees at night we headed south. We are sweating in Florida currently... where are all those nude beaches I've heard about?
The weed smoke is fine and animals are, too. Actually, both of those are awesome.
I know, Vanilla, it's totally messed up. In the USA, fragrances are protected by trade secret laws so they don't have to disclose ingredients. Across the pond, our friends in the EU have banned roughly 1,200 of the most dangerous petro-chemicals that are being used here. It's disgustingly frightening what our government allows. (And I'm sure it has nothing at all to do with kickbacks!)