Flood Damage

The morning after I returned from Pittsburgh, MJ came downstairs very early and later told me "it sounded like it was raining inside the house." He realized that one of our upstairs bathrooms had been leaking during the night while we slept, and had soaked through the ceiling into the downstairs. He turned off the water to that bathroom, got every towel we owned, sopped up the water, opened our giant cooler under the worst of the dripping, and ... went to exercise.

I woke up several hours later to a text from him that said, "Lots of water downstairs. Got it cleaned up. There is water damage to the ceiling, though."

That was the world's biggest understatement. I came downstairs to find strips of saturated drywall hanging down from the ceiling. The family room rug was completely drenched. Water was soaking down multiple walls, and the hardwood floors that MJ had dried were warped from the moisture. The water from the upstairs bathroom had also gone under the wall into Little Man's bedroom next door, so his room is also unusable.

That day was a flurry of calls to USAA, who sent out a company to assess the damage. They told me that it didn't matter that the water was clean; because it had originated from a toilet, anything the water touched had to be thrown out. That included multiple walls, carpets, rugs, and the majority of our downstairs ceilings and floors. Wow.

Demo began the next morning, and after it was complete several days later, there were 27 industrial fans throughout the house, running night and day for five days. We moved into a Residence Inn with Amber. It was tight quarters, especially since MJ works from home, and the kids had just gotten out of school and were now home everyday. 

But once the drying process was complete, we moved back home. We're living on subfloor, and we're missing several walls, the downstairs ceiling, Little Man's bedroom, and two bathrooms, but at least we're home!

Now we'll have to find a contractor to do all the repair work. The hardwood floors alone will be a huge process, since they are continuous throughout the first floor. Movers will have to pack up all our possessions from the downstairs and store them in order for the floors to be completely sanded down and refinished. Since we'll be moving out of the house for about a month anyway, I think we'll take the opportunity to put hardwoods in all the upstairs rooms as well.

But I am so thankful it wasn't worse. In a way, it was almost miraculous: we are all okay; the damage didn't affect anything irreplaceable or sentimental; none of the parts of the house that we've already renovated (kitchen, stairs, upstairs hallway) need to be torn out; and USAA has been incredibly supportive and helpful. I am so thankful for those blessings.

BUT ... it couldn't have happened at a worse time! We have three weekends of dance recitals, a baseball game, and a graduation that my dad was planning to come up for!