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Bad Tap Water


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I normally don't post these sorts of things, but I'm suffering from information overload from stuff on the internet, and I'm not finding something that sounds exactly like what I'm looking for.

Here's the problem. My wife was feeling really bad and having a lot of stomach cramps and such a few months ago, so she left the country and stayed with her parents for a few weeks to get better, where doctors discovered that she had an intestinal infection of some sort (she doesn't know specifically what it was) and over time she recovered and came back. Now she is feeling bad again, and I've been thinking about my own problems and we have appeared to have the same problems at the same time with our insides.

In addition to this, we've been watching our dog, who has apparently had intestinal problems as well. We don't eat dogfood, and our dog doesn't eat our food.

We also clean everything pretty well, and we dispose of sponges and things like that regularly. I can't really think of anything in particular that would cause us problems. It's looking like it may be the water here because that is the only thing in common between our dog and ourselves that would carry something bad. We have always had a Brita filter on the tap, and also use a Brita pitcher for storing water that we drink (after putting it through the tap filter as well for good measure.) Still, I can't think of anything else that would cause us problems like this.

So, I'm wondering if anyone has any ideas on what I can do to check and see if the water is polluted or with some disease, and if so, what we can do about it. Houston has either the most polluted air of any city in the U.S., or it is within the top few, so I imagine that the water is pretty bad too. Any ideas?

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Mr P-Mosh -- Get a "reverse osmosis" machine for your water. These things used to be a complicated piece of hardware, but they make them now that merely screw on to your faucet, and produce the desire effect.

Home Depot sells them, most harware store's have them, there is even one set up in our local grocery store (Super One in MN) where you can buy gallons of water, that you purify yourself.

I personally get my water from an artesian well 15 miles from my house, tho the tap water here is not bad at all. The artesian wells on the North shore of Lake Superior have mineral deposits in them (not the best), but if I cared to travel 70 miles into Wisconsin, and visit the artesian wells on the South shore of Lake Superior, the water is 99.9% pure, soft, and straight out of the ground.

If you have no artesian wells around you, go for the "reverse osmosis" machine. It will produce water almost as pure as that which flows out of the ground year round in upper Wisconsin.

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And also ----- Yes, if your air is that polluted, it is bound to affect the water supply. We have minimal air pollution here in Duluth, yet the effects of "acid rain" are being detected in the "big lake" more and more.

Believe it or not, water quality (here in the land of 10,000 lakes) is becoming an issue, whereas folks have always assumed the water was safe enough to drink "straight from the lake"

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Two cents from the Masterherbalist:

Distilled water is best. Not R/O. (Sorry). Dr. Christopher, my teacher, taught this years ago and I thought he was nuts. Then he pointed out that the rains sent to earth are "distilled". Then I thought he might have a point. I had a tough R/O case- he told me it was the best, had spent a few thousand on this and it was the best water. I asked him for a gallon of his water which I would put through the ole distiller and see what we get. Lots of copper, iron and other inorganics. When he saw what was left, he realized that this left over "stuff" actually causes kidney problems.

The digestive problems mentioned in this thread are not unusual. One of the first things I would ensure is that the bowels and the liver are functioning. Then I would look at ways to feed the friendly flora (bacteria). Back to the beginning of the digestive process, make sure that your food is a balance of live or raw food to cooked. See, our mouths have teeth and saliva to begin the digestive process. Most people don't give this a thought. However, our saliva has enzymes to begin the breakdown process. Then the peristalic action down to the stomach. The stomach looks to the liver for bile to breakdown complex foods such as fats. Then to the small and then large intestines where the nutritional absorption occurs (or not). Most Americans have such impaction in this area, very little nutrition can be absorbed. Thus, we are forever hungry, forever overweight, etc. Because our bodies are STARVING!!!

Though water is, next to air, the most important thing to sustain our lives-elimination and digestion are up there too.

Let me know if I can help any further.

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you can have your water tested by the county and see whats in it, I do this once a year. also, it may not be the water, have your home checked for mold content. my exwife had to move from their home because the problem with mold was really bad and they were all getting sick all the time.

my tap water, well water, has so much rust in it it turns everything red in a few days if I don't keep on top of it, and theres so much particals of manganesse it clogs the pipes. get a good water filter at the source, not just the tap.

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If you and your dog are very friendly with kisses, take him to the vet for a parasite check. There are some Canine parasites which can be passed to humans. All of you need to be taken care of at once if he's the carrier and if it is parasites, otherwise you'll just be passing it back and forth among you.

In the meantime, I would boil any and all water used for all of you for drinking or cooking. Steam distilling your own is best...but until you can do that, boiling will work.

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See if you have a mold problem in your house.

I watched this thing on tv about a family who was sick like this. However, they also had light headedness and forgetfulness.

They had a leak in thier home which caused the flooring to mold. That mold made spores and it went through all they had (a similar thing happened to Ed McMann). The child and the man had brain damage from the mold...

There are people who do test the homes - environmental tests.

Also, do you live near a golf course? They use certain chemicals that make people sick.

My sisters' family went through this and discovered their well water was messed up.

Also you may want to go to an evironmentalist Doctor (MD) I used to go to one in PA. named Dr. Harold Butram. He found that the non-stick pans my friend was using was making her sick.

Another friend was falling down unconcious and an environmentalist Doc found he was VERY allergic to the products used in their new rug.

John Travolta's wife was recently on the air about "rug shampoos" the chemicals nearly killed her son.

Let me see if I can find one near you or a page of Doctors. (Where are you TN?)

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Krys makes good points. I was at the healthfood store and the lady was telling me about a woman who came in with an itchy belly and you could see "red". She had been to countless Docs and was told it was "nerves". Her whole family got the red itchy stuff and did not fell well.

So, the Health food lady looked at her tummy and said I think you have parasites. She gave her something to help and the parasites came up on the top of the skin and the woman was pulling worms out of herself!!!

The parasites came from the cat whose dishes were being washed with the human dishes. (I do that in the washer with the dog's stuff)

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For what it is worth...

Toxicity Resources

Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR)

Free information on toxic chemicals and their health effects.

1-888-42-ATSDR or 1-888-422-8737

Email ATSDRIC@cdc.gov

http://atsdr1.atsdr.cdc.gov

Division of Toxicology:

1600 Clifton Road Suite E29

Atlanta, GA 30333

Office of the Assistant Administrator:

1600 Clifton Road Suite E28

Atlanta, GA 30333

ToxNet

http://toxnet.nlm.nih.gov

A cluster of databases on toxicology, hazardous chemicals, and related areas.

I found Dr. Butram mentioned here:

http://www.mercola.com/1998/archive/mmr_im...d_to_autism.htm

http://www.jennerator.com/mcsnyc/directory_phys.asp

"Kracht, DO 5725 Clymer Road Quakertown, PA 18951 ... other specialists are available:

Dr. Harold Butram, MD Environmental ... http://www.celiac.com Dr. Grisanti - The ... "

http://childvaccinesinjury.homestead.com/files/latest.htm

"... Vaccine Scene 1999: Overview And Update. by Harold Buttram, MD. ... Comment by

Dr. Joseph Mercola: This is an excellent review by Dr. Butram. ... "

I will try and hunt down some names Mosh.

Are people in you neighborhood sick? If not, then it maybe your home -- like the mold idea. But a Doctor who deals with this stuff is prob. more likely to get to the cause.

Info that may help you find the right expert:

http://www.jennerator.com/mcsnyc/directory...sp#physoutstate

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P-Mosh: It may or may not be the water. Your wife might have giardiasis, which she could have picked up from improperly washed lettuce or other produce. It's highly communicable, so she may have passed it on to the dog unknowingly, or vice versa.

Here's an info link about the giardia parasite. CDC on Giardia

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Thanks for all the information. I'm feeling ok today, and my wife was as of this morning, but we're going to try changing some stuff and we're going to clean things. However, in response to what has been brought up here I'm going to answer questions/make new questions:

quote:

Get a "reverse osmosis" machine for your water. These things used to be a complicated piece of hardware, but they make them now that merely screw on to your faucet, and produce the desire effect.


Is this different than what the Britta water filters do?

quote:

The digestive problems mentioned in this thread are not unusual. One of the first things I would ensure is that the bowels and the liver are functioning. Then I would look at ways to feed the friendly flora (bacteria).


The thing is that we eat healthier than pretty much everyone we know that is non-vegan. We rarely eat beef, we do eat a lot of vegetables, and the breads we eat (usually very little bread also) is wheat. However, sometimes we eat ice cream or go out for a steak.

quote:

you can have your water tested by the county and see whats in it, I do this once a year. also, it may not be the water, have your home checked for mold content. my exwife had to move from their home because the problem with mold was really bad and they were all getting sick all the time.


I've considered having it tested. The apartments were built a little less than a year ago, so I doubt it's rust, but there may have been chemicals that were not cleaned out from the pipes at first. We've lived there since the first of the year so you would think it would be ok by now, but we want to check into everything. As far as mold goes, it seems like it's too early in the year, but we'll look. I'm planning to talk to various other people in my building to see if they are having similar problems.

quote:

If you and your dog are very friendly with kisses, take him to the vet for a parasite check. There are some Canine parasites which can be passed to humans. All of you need to be taken care of at once if he's the carrier and if it is parasites, otherwise you'll just be passing it back and forth among you.


The dog acts really weird, and doesn't lick anyone or really want to be too close to humans. Also, our dog has had appetite problems lately and the vets have done a variety of tests, including blood and stool tests, and have not found anything unusual other than a slightly higher than normal potassium level.

quote:

I watched this thing on tv about a family who was sick like this. However, they also had light headedness and forgetfulness.

They had a leak in thier home which caused the flooring to mold. That mold made spores and it went through all they had (a similar thing happened to Ed McMann). The child and the man had brain damage from the mold...


With it being a new building, I don't think it's mold, but it is definitely worth checking out. I'm sort of hoping ex10 replies in case she's aware of any weird things that happen like this in the area. I heard on the news yesterday that there's also a type of mold here that grows in your nose and presses against your skull and looks like cancer, but isn't.

quote:

The parasites came from the cat whose dishes were being washed with the human dishes. (I do that in the washer with the dog's stuff)


That's something we definitely don't do. Also, since we mainly use plastic silverware and paper plates, we don't wash that much, just pots and pans.

quote:

It may or may not be the water. Your wife might have giardiasis, which she could have picked up from improperly washed lettuce or other produce.


It's possible. We go eat at Sweet Tomatoes once every other week or so, and in addition to that we do wash our own fruit and vegetables that we eat. I'm not really sure that it came from the water if it was something like Giardiasis, because according to what I've read, our Britta filters should prevent it from getting through. There's another fairly common waterborne illness I read about that I don't think is it, but most of the sites I've found for it online deal with how it's fatal to people with AIDS or cancer, which we know that neither of us have as well.

Right now our plans are to clean everything thouroughly, replace things like our toothbrushes, kitchen sponges, etc. I'm going to see if there's any way to wash vegetables better than we do now as well, because it doesn't seem entirely good to just wash them in the sink.

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It's more likely to get giardia from a restaurant than at home, but since a head of lettuce has so many nooks and crannies, there can still be traces of contaminated irrigation water in one from time to time.

Giardia is not a bacterium, it's a protozoan like an amoeba. Consequently, it can live in a wider range of temperature conditions than most bacteria. Use bleach on all your sinks and fixtures, making sure to get at the grout and gaskets. If the sink nozzle will unscrew from the filter, dunk that in some bleach, too. Use Lysol on such things as toilet paper holders and doorknobs.

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wow that is strange Tom cause my niece has been in the hospital with a stomach infection they say from popcorn but her property has been over run with a beaver population in the last few years !!!!

ate all her populars and she has well water I wonder if the beaver poop is in her water???

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  • 15 years later...

Wow, you folks have some pretty nasty problems!  Though no doubt there are billions of people with no problems.

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I just checked my own water quality, according to the local Water Authority.  This is a precis of what they say.  It's all meaningless to me!  It's nice tasting, but as everywhere in this area, there's a lot of limestone, and kettles and suchlike fur up quickly.

image.png

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Twinky,

Clark degrees, German degrees and French degrees are units of measure, used to express how much calcium and magnesium is locked up in your water. These are used more in scientific applications than in general water treatment vernacular.  More commonly, these qualities are expressed as parts per million (ppm) or grains per gallon (gpg). One grain is equal to 17.1 ppm, (ppm is roughly the same as mg/l) So, lets say someone's water is 10 grains hard. We could alternatively say it's 170.1 ppm hard. It's the same thing, expressed in different units of measure. Doing some rough math, it looks like your water is about 6 grains hard if you are just going by the calcium  content or about 17 grains hard if you are factoring in the magnesium. Either way, it's not terribly hard, but hard enough to cause plenty of mechanical problems.  Think of it this way. You drive from point A to point B. You could say you've driven 1 mile or you could say you've driven i.61 kilometers. How ever you choose to say it, you have driven the same distance.

 

Now about the fuzzies that are left behind:

Water that has calcium locked up in it is hard to use because soaps and detergents have a tougher time working properly.. We call it hard because it's hard to use.  When you heat water that has calcium in it,  the calcium breaks down. Some of it escapes as a gas and some of it is left behind as a solid. That solid, white residue that is left behind is commonly called lime. You can solve that problem by running the water through a bed of resin beads that exchange the calcium ions for sodium ions and then flush the byproduct down the drain. A water softener is a machine that's designed to automatically perform this function for you. Water that has no  calcium left in it is said to be soft or 0 grains hard. There are basic measuring tests and devices that can quantify the hardness for you.

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