i didn’t set out to do this work.

I lived it.

In 2016, my body gave out, in a home we didn’t know was slowly breaking me.
A hidden leak. Invisible mold.
And a quiet unraveling that touched every corner of my life.

Within a year, I lost my independence.
My job. My income. My brand new car.
Nearly everything I owned.

But the deepest losses weren’t things.
They were the pieces of me I couldn’t hold onto.

I lost the chance to give my husband the child we dreamed of.
I lost my identity as a mother, a wife, a friend.
I lost my place in the world.
I lost trust—in people, in systems, in God.
And I nearly lost custody of my children, accused of making it all up.

Mold illness wasn’t “real,” they said.
But I was living proof that it was.

At my worst, I couldn’t walk to the bathroom without help.
I felt like a burden. A ghost inside my own life.
And then I lost something even harder to name:
My faith.
In love.
In protection.
In the idea that anyone was coming to save us.

That’s when I understood why people give up.
Because the weight of-it-all can break something inside you.

But what broke me also woke me.
And in that collapse, a door opened.

I didn’t get into this work to build a career.
I studied mold to survive.
To protect my children.
To prove I wasn’t crazy.
To fight back.

Now, that fight has become a mission.

To give others what I needed.
To show you what I couldn’t see.
To make sure no one else feels as alone as I did in that bed.

**What Came Next Wasn’t Luck.**

It was work.
Hard, relentless work to rebuild a life, and create something that *didn’t exist* when I needed it most.
Hi, I’m PJ Harlow.
Founder of PJ Harlow Wellness Inc., a *virtual* IICRC Certified, Forensic Mold Consultancy built for smart, health-conscious homeowners who want to feel in control of their home’s mold project.
We guide people like you through every phase of the home recovery process, from early suspicion and DNA dust testing to inspection referrals, planning, remediation, small particle cleaning and recovery.
But more than that, **we give structure to a process that can easily consume people**, their health, their finances, their relationships, and their sanity.

not what you expected

Most people picture mold as something super obvious: black spots all over a basement wall, a rotting ceiling, or a home thats been abandoned for years and years.

In our consulting firm we’ve worked on over 2800 home projects, and the crazy thing? They’re generally clean. They’re modern. And on the surface, they look totally fine.

There’s often no smell. No visible growth. No “smoking gun” or anything super noticeable to the occupants that screams danger.

And the symptoms?

They’re just as easy to miss: fatigue, anxiety, brain fog, rashes, frequent sickness, all things we easily blame on stress, parenting, working, aging, or “just life.”

download our free mold testing guide

featured on

I never imagined mold would leave me bedridden for 18 months.

I was so conditioned to believe mold “wasn’t that serious” that even after more than 18 doctors, and thousands of dollars, no one could tell me what was wrong. My labs were always “normal”. I kept getting sicker, but the only explanations I was given were that it was likely due to stress or my PTSD.

Eventually, I was told I was psychosomatic.

That my symptoms were “real to me, but not actually real”. The best anyone could offer was a fibromyalgia diagnosis and a script for Gabapentin.

Not one doctor ever asked about my home environment.

and that’s the problem.

No one teaches you ANY of this.

We’re not taught how to recognize environmental issues, or prevent them.

And when we buy a house?
We’re given keys, not education.
We’re taught how to land a mortgage, pick out tile, and shop for insurance.
We’re told to decorate, not dehumidify.
To clean for looks, not for health. No one teaches us how to care for our homes in a way that actually protects our bodies.

So when mold enters the chat, people do what anyone would do: They scramble to look for local help.

pt 1. hmm…who do you hire first?

Most people go straight to a mold inspector or remediation company. But neither should be your first call.

Your first call should be to a Forensic Mold Consultant. (In case your new here, that’s what we do.)
Once mold shows up in your home, it’s automatically a health-based project. That means it needs structure, sequencing, and strategic oversight right from the start, and that’s our role.

A lot of health-conscious homeowners think:
“If I can just find a good mold company - one that understands health - I’ll be okay.”
But even if you find one that checks those boxes, it’s still not enough.

Inspectors and remediators can’t lead your project. That’s not their job, and it’s a conflict of interest. They’re financially tied to the outcome, which means they can’t be the ones guiding your decisions.
Inspectors inspect. Remediators remediate.
But your consultant? We’re the ones who make sure you know what to do and when, so you don’t make costly mistakes or waste money.

pt 2. your role

This is the part no one tells you:
You will be the onsite manager of your home’s healing project.

Every complex health project needs a project manager. Mold remediation is no different. There are dozens of moving parts, and that role falls to you. You’re the one hiring, directing, and paying. And your goal is a healthy home. But even if you tell a company what that means to you, they won’t know how to deliver it without guidance.

This isn’t something you can outsource. No one else sees the whole picture or catches the gaps between phases. That’s on you (and us).

What you can do is get the right strategy team behind you. Unless you’ve led projects like this before, you won’t know what to watch for, how to keep things on track, or how to protect your health along the way.

You don’t need to be an expert.

But you do need backup.

pt 3. when roles blur

These projects are confusing for a reason: the roles blur.

These projects get messy because the roles overlap. Doctors, inspectors, and remediators often step outside their usual responsibilities to fill the gaps. But guiding someone through this from start to finish isn’t their job, and that’s exactly why so many people end up lost in the process.

And it’s not because anyone is careless.
It’s because the system is outdated.

There’s a huge breach between the medical world and the environmental one, and you’re the one stuck in the middle.

Over the last 10 yrs, awareness around mold & environmental illness has exploded, but the systems haven’t caught up. So what happens?

Now we’ve got contractors talking about saunas & peptides, health coaches & influencers teaching their versions of small particle cleaning, and doctors moonlighting as IEPs selling tests and fogging kits.

But talking about something isn’t the same as being trained to carry it. You don’t want remediation advice from your doctor, or health advice from your inspector. But when there’s no clear guide, that’s exactly what ends up happening.

👉 And since you’re the project manager, all those mixed voices land on your shoulders.

The result? You’re drowning in advice but starving for clarity.

pt 4: the spiral

This is what it looks like when roles blur & no one is clearly steering: analysis paralysis. Information overload. Doom spiraling.

Your doctor tells you to get-out based on your ERMI score…then suggests fogging your belongings and hiring some company you’ve never heard of, Johnny Five Remediation.

In line at the post office you see a mold expert on Instagram say fogging is dangerous.
In a Facebook group, two moms swear Johnny Five is a scam, and two say he saved their lives.
You start thinking about the inspector you spoke to last week who said ERMI is junk and you wonder if he was right?
When you get back into the car, the podcast you’re listening to starts talking about CIRS labs and how mycotoxin tests are inaccurate. You just spent $1,600 on four urine tests for the entire family and now start to regret something you were so sure about only an hour before.

When you get home, you try to share what’s been weighing on you with your spouse, that maybe you’re not sure anymore, that things are starting to feel overwhelming. But before you can get it out, he’s already asking, “How much is this all going to cost?”…and adding how, “None of these functional doctors seem to really know what they’re doing. Are any of them actually experts?”

And just like that, your window to be vulnerable slams shut.

You swallow your doubt. You start defending the urine tests and the doctor whom you’re no longer sure about, not because you believe in them both 100%, but because you’re terrified that if you don’t, he’ll tell you to drop it all. That he’ll say it’s all nonsense. That he’ll stop listening. And deep down, you’re not just scared of mold.

You’re scared this is your only chance to get your family well, and you don’t know if you’ll get another one.

So you carry it. Alone.
The baby starts whining. She’s itchy again.
You glance at the clock, you feel like going to bed & it’s only 6:13 p.m.
There’s 10 loads of laundry staring at you, and oh yea, you forgot to defrost the chicken. Your eyes well up. And now you’re crying in the hallway because you don’t know how to do any of this, but you keep going because your strong, you have to be, and your family’s health is everything to you.

pt 5: the anchor

This is where we come in.
With a system, a way forward.

We give you peace.
We give you control, in a situation where you often feel powerless.

Because you need more than a good company.
You need someone who can chart the path forward. You need grounded, tailored support from someone who’s led this process successfully, and under pressure. You need someone who validates your fears, but then guides you into a steadier rhythm.
Who can hold both the science and the emotion. Who helps you carry the weight of the problem, without letting it crush you.

That’s what we do.

Because we’ve done this thousands of times.

We know how to lead.
We know how to pivot.
And we know how to hold the line, when your nervous system can’t.

You don’t need to make any big decisions right now.

Just this: