The missing piece was hiding in our walls.

For a long time, we had no idea. Our house had no musty smell, no visible signs of water damage, and no staining anywhere. It was only later that we learned we had hidden mold in fourteen walls of our house and underneath our hardwood floors.

It started with leaky windows on the outside of the house. With the humidity and the rain, the mold was just always growing, slowly and quietly, behind the surfaces we touched every day.

When I finally heard about mold and suspected it, we had our house tested twice by reputable mold companies. Both times, they did air testing and an inspection only, and both times we were told our house was completely fine.

It was not until I started looking everywhere myself, because my kids' symptoms matched up so well with mold, that I found old water stains under the windows and underneath our carpet. That is when I called the insurance company. They came out, opened the walls, and we finally found it.

We also had my daughter tested for mycotoxins, and she came back highly toxic for five different kinds. Five. In a house that two professionals had cleared.

This is the part I wish someone had told me. Air testing and a standard inspection can miss hidden mold. Mold tucked inside walls, under floors, or behind carpet does not always release enough spores into the air to show up on a test, especially if the water source is small and slow, like ours was.

What I have learned since is to trust the pattern of your family's symptoms and to look with your own eyes. Where there are windows, look at the walls around them and underneath them. Where there is carpet, look underneath it, especially near exterior walls and anywhere water has ever been.