I Think We Need to Dehumidify the Basement

The dampness in our new basement really freaks me out. To tell the truth, when we did a walk-through a few months before we moved in, the whole house felt damp. It is either better from being lived in and the doors and windows opening and closing, or (eeps!) I've gotten used to it from being here for two years. The basement, however, still feels cold and damp to me. I've expressed my fears to Mark about mold and the dampness down there, and he thinks it is just fine. Having never had a basement, I am not sure if that is just how they all feel all the time.


Even if we did discover that there was a problem down there, I have no idea how an issue like that would be tackled. I mean, would it be some major construction job to fix it? I thought it might be, but, then, I was reading Oprah's site last week and came across the answer. I was looking for a different story, but, I happened upon one with Dr. Mehmet Oz. Let me tell you, I just love this guy! I have both of his books with Dr. Roizen and I just love Dr. Oz's style! Love it! And he was talking about keeping your house healthy. And he said that if your basement smells, then you do have a problem and you need a dehumidifier. Well - now how about that? I shudder to admit I don't think I've ever really heard of dehumidifiers. We have lots of history with humidifiers. I've got a son with chronic nosebleeds and that is just about the only thing that helps.

As soon as I saw that, I knew we must have a problem. Our basement doesn't smell horrible or anything, but, to someone with a bionic nose like mine - there is a bit of a damp odor down there. No one else has ever noticed it, though. I usually smell things long before the family does, however! Like the gas leaks in TWO different houses - that my husband blamed on postpartum hormones - both times. And he was wrong - both times. Ha! He says that I should work for the FBI with my damn nose! That's for sure!

So I haven't brought it up with him just yet, but, I have been doing a little reading about dehumidifiers. I'm learning a lot about them, like how you might need to have some kind of hose connection to empty the bucket. And if your room that it will be going in is fairly large, you will need a large capacity one. The large ones will obviously be a lot heavier, so that is why a hose would make it so much easier for draining. It wouldn't matter so much with the smaller ones, that are just for bathrooms and such. Our basement is just one, big, wide-open room, so we would definitely need a big one.

Another thing you need to consider is where you will have the dehumidifier, because, you might need a quieter one if it is going to be in earshot of any bedrooms. All of our bedrooms are over the basement, but, for some odd reason, the noise from down there is loudest in our master bedroom. Mark will go down there on schoolnights when the kids and I are in bed and watch his shoot 'em up action movies and drive me crazy! So yeah, I'd want to find a very quiet dehumidifier. Who knows, though, maybe it could act as white noise against those movies! Nah, that wouldn't work - Mark would have to turn the movies up even louder to hear! Ok, so I would want a very quiet one!

The only problem is that I don't know if I could ever convince my husband that this is really necessary. You know how guys are when it comes to accepting new ideas or new concepts that they hear from their wives. The best thing to happen would be that one of his buddies decides that this is a great idea for their house, and then shares that information with Mark!