Ep. 55 | False Alarm
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From Ballin Studios and Wondery, I'm Mr. Ballin, and this is Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries, where every week we will explore a new baffling mystery originating from the one place we can't escape, our own bodies. So if you like today's story, kindly offer to babysit for the follow button, and then right before the follow button comes home at bedtime, make sure to feed all their kids tons of sugar.

This episode is called False Alarm. On the morning of December 18th, 2020, 50-year-old Brooke Stroud wandered into her spacious kitchen in Washington, D.C., where she lived with her husband, Stefan, and their three young adult children. Brooke shook her head and tried to concentrate as she searched for the cup of coffee she'd brewed earlier. She hadn't been herself the last few days. Her head felt foggy and little things, like where she'd put her coffee, had been slipping her mind.

Brooke spotted the cup in a corner right near their large Viking stove. She grabbed it and headed out of the kitchen and into the formal living room. She slipped on a jacket and went out to the backyard, making a beeline for the separate guest house where she'd set up a home office. It was nine months into the COVID-19 pandemic, and most businesses all over the country were shut down.

Brooke was a clinical psychologist and she had switched all her in-person sessions to Zoom. This morning, she had a group call, so she set her mug down at her wooden desk, turned on her laptop, and logged into her meeting. As Brooke said hello to the other participants, a wave of exhaustion suddenly washed over her. Her head felt heavy and every bone in her body was suddenly aching. A scary thought crossed Brooke's mind. Maybe she'd finally gotten COVID, a disease that had already killed 350,000 people in the United States alone.

She tried to power through the meeting, but all she could think about was how awful she felt. And so after only a few minutes of being in this meeting, she told everybody on the call that she just wasn't feeling well and asked if they could actually reschedule. After logging out of the Zoom call, Brooke took a minute to collect herself. She didn't think her symptoms seemed like COVID, so she wondered if maybe she was just overdoing it and was maybe tired from the stress of her job.

She loved her work, but her hours have been crazy since the pandemic started. More people than ever were turning to therapy to get through these very difficult times. So she decided to cancel the rest of her sessions for the day and just go get some rest. She took the familiar path out of the guest house, through the backyard, and into the main house, walking more slowly than usual. Brooke climbed the winding staircase up to the second floor and into the master bedroom. There, she climbed into bed, hoping to sleep off her weariness. Hours later, around noon, Brooke blinked her eyes open.

Groggily, she sat up and felt around the bed. Her crisp white sheets were now totally damp with sweat. Brooke touched her forehead and realized she was burning up. She stumbled out of her bed and into the bathroom to take her temperature, and she saw it was 100 degrees Fahrenheit, and so she knew she was officially sick.

Brooke tried to figure out what to do. She needed to get herself tested for COVID as soon as possible, but at-home COVID tests were not available at this time, which meant she'd have to set up an appointment with her doctor. Until she had the results, she could stay in her bedroom to avoid infecting her family potentially, but then she realized it was likely too late to actually isolate herself.

Her youngest kids, 19-year-old Alex and 17-year-old Olivia, had come home from college and boarding school for the holidays a few days earlier, and they were probably already exposed to whatever Brooke had. So she decided it likely made the most sense to just kind of go about her day as usual, but at the same time try to keep her distance from the kids and her husband. So Brooke put her hair up in a messy bun and headed downstairs.

A few hours later, Brooke gathered everyone for dinner. She sat at one end of their long table while Stefan and the kids were at the other. Brooke wasn't up to cooking, so she ordered takeout from an Italian place, and the table was overflowing with pastas and salads. Alex and Olivia piled their plates high. They always had big appetites when they came home after months of school cafeteria food.

Brooke was glad to see her kids eating, but for her, her fever was still burning and she felt barely hungry at all. She pushed her pasta around her plate as her kids talked about what their semesters had been like with all the COVID protocols.

Alex went to college in North Carolina, and Olivia was a high school senior at the same all-girls boarding school in Virginia that Brooke had actually attended. Brooke's oldest child, Sebastian, went to college in Vermont and wouldn't be home for a few days. Brooke really hoped she'd feel better by then, so they could all spend the holidays together stress-free.

Alex looked excited as he told them all about school, but Brooke could see the sadness in Olivia's eyes as she talked about the way COVID restrictions had basically ruined campus life. Normally, she played on a few different sports teams, but the pandemic had put all of them on hold. Brooke felt sorry for Olivia. Even though the pandemic was hurting everybody, she knew her daughter was having an especially hard time. She had looked forward to being a senior for so long, and now that she was, everything seemed to be falling apart.

But Brooke's job was to be Olivia's mom, not her therapist, and they were all trying to figure out how to adjust to this new normal. After everyone was done eating, Brooke suggested they watch an old Christmas movie. Brooke took a seat at the opposite end of the couch from Stefan and the kids and then willed herself to stay awake. Even after napping for several hours that day, she was still exhausted.

About halfway through the movie, Brooke noticed her husband massaging his temples, and he also had a strained look on his face. She asked him what was wrong, and he explained his head was pounding. Brooke suggested he go check his temperature, maybe he had a fever too. They paused the TV, and Stefan headed upstairs, holding onto the banister for support. A few minutes later, Brooke heard him vomiting, so she mustered what little strength she had left and ran up to find him leaning over the toilet bowl.

She rubs Stefan's back trying to soothe him, but then she heard Alex and Olivia yell for her. Brooke told her husband she'd be right back and she retraced her footsteps back to the living room. There she found Alex and Olivia lying on the couch clutching their heads in their hands as well. They complained that they also had terrible headaches. Brooke turned to go get them some water from the kitchen while Alex shot up from the couch and ran to the guest bathroom. A second later, Brooke heard him retching too. And as if on cue, Olivia started dry heaving as well.

Brooke ran to the kitchen at this point and grabbed a trash can, and she made it back to the living room just in time to set the bin in front of her daughter as she threw up all of her dinner. The following afternoon, Brooke and Stefan sat next to each other inside of a small exam room at their family doctor's office. Brooke had woken up that morning feeling like she'd barely gotten any sleep, even though she'd slept through the entire night, and the rest of her family felt just as bad, so Brooke had decided to get herself and Stefan checked for COVID.

Brooke pulled her mask down under her nose, leaving just enough room for the nurse to insert a long nasal swab into her left nostril. It went so far back that it felt like Brooke's brain was being tickled. Her eyes teared up at the sensation, and she stifled a sneeze. The nurse rotated the swab around her nose for several seconds until it was coated with fluid, and then she repeated the same thing in Brooke's right nostril. And then she did the whole process all over again for Stefan.

The nurse explained it would take about 24 hours for them to receive the test results by email. Then she took the swabs and left the room while Brooke and Stefan checked out at the front desk. The next day, December 20th, 2020, Brooke stared at an email she'd gotten from her doctor on her phone. She and Stefan were both negative for COVID, which was great, but they still felt horrible, and so clearly they were sick with something.

Brooke decided to call Alex and Olivia's pediatrician to see if the kids should get tested for COVID too. But their doctor explained that it probably didn't make sense since Brooke and Stefan already tested negative. Whatever germs they had would have already infected the kids, but very very likely it was not COVID. So the doctor recommended that everybody in the family just stay home, get some rest, drink lots of fluids, and surely this whole thing will just pass.

However, a few days later, Brooke woke up aching all over still. Her fever had stayed steady at 100 degrees Fahrenheit, clouding her mind. The rest of her family felt just as bad too. Their headaches had never really gone away and some mornings they still woke up feeling very nauseous.

But Brooke fought through the fatigue and dragged herself out to her office in the guest house. She knew she was supposed to focus on resting and powering up her immune system, but she felt a responsibility to her clients. Her family was not the only one struggling right now during this weird holiday season.

So, Brooke settled in at her desk and logged into her first Zoom call. And as she took notes and chatted with other clients throughout the day, she felt herself perk up a bit. Slowly, her headache subsided and the exhaustion that had usually overpowered her these last few days began to lift. Brooke thought about how good it felt to focus on other people for a change. Around 5:00 PM, she wrapped up her sessions and made her way back to the house. She felt optimistic for the first time in a while that maybe she was finally getting over this illness.

And so Brooke, feeling really good, decided she would surprise the family by cooking a nice dinner. An hour later, Brooke called her whole family over to the dining room. She'd grilled some nice thick steaks, figuring they could all use the protein. Brooke smiled as she doled out plates of food, silently telling herself that they would all be better by Christmas. She'd gotten sick before everybody else, so it made sense that she was recovering sooner too.

But as Brooke took a bite of this food she made, she suddenly felt all that heaviness in her head and body start to creep back in. She told herself it was nothing, ignoring the queasiness that was growing in her stomach, and she managed to swallow a few bites of food before she just gave up. And she could see that the rest of her family also could not stomach their food either. Brooke watched Olivia push her salad around listlessly. She was usually so bubbly and full of life, but tonight, just like the rest of them, she looked defeated.

Brooks sighed and began clearing their plates covered with uneaten food. After cleaning up, it took all the strength she had left just to shuffle upstairs and fall into her bed. Mr. Ball and Collection is sponsored by BetterHelp.

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The next afternoon, December 23rd, Brooke heard the front door open. She'd spent all morning in bed, but now she'd gathered the energy to limp down the stairs to the foyer, her muscles weak from this mystery illness and lack of physical activity. Her hair was matted, and she was wearing the same sweatpants and sweatshirt she'd been in for the past few days. But she managed a weak smile at the sight of her son, Sebastian, standing there with his duffel bag slung over his shoulder, finally home from his college in Vermont.

He looked fit and healthy, the rosiness in his cheeks a stark contrast to the paleness of her own face. She'd warned Sebastian that his family was not feeling well, but he joked that, you know, nobody was feeling well these days, after all, it's the pandemic. And he said he would rather get sick at home than spend the holidays somewhere else without his family.

Brooke stood at the bottom step, trying to keep her distance from her son even as she told him how happy she was that he was home. But Sebastian just laughed and pulled her into a big bear hug. Brooke allowed him to wrap his arms around her, a sense of relief washing over her. A few hours later, the whole family sat in the living room eating cheese and crackers while Sebastian told them all about his fall semester at college. As he described the off-campus house where he lived, Brooke saw Sebastian slowly sink into the couch and his voice started to sound fatigued.

She asked him if he felt okay, and Sebastian said he was just tired from finishing up his last paper for school and then catching a flight home. Brooke smiled and suggested he go to his room and get some rest. But inside, Brooke started worrying that Sebastian might be coming down with this same mystery illness that was dogging the rest of them.

A couple of days after Christmas, Brooke's daughter Olivia woke up with a throbbing headache just as she had every morning since coming home. Her muscles still ached and she still didn't feel rested at all. In fact, it felt like she could sleep for another five hours and even that probably wouldn't be enough. Olivia looked around her room, noticing all the tissues and dirty clothes she had scattered on the carpet. Usually, she kept her space very nice and tidy but she didn't have the energy or motivation to clean or do much of anything really.

So far, her winter break had been a total disaster. Olivia had expected the holidays to be different because of the COVID pandemic, but she'd hoped to have at least some fun. Now, the only silver lining was her upcoming trip to visit Caroline, her best friend from school who lived in New Orleans. Then, the plan was for them to fly back to DC together and spend two more weeks in isolation at Olivia's house. Their boarding school wanted all students to quarantine before

before returning for the spring semester. So they were going to do that together in D.C. But Olivia was now worried that the family's mystery illness could ruin her visit to Caroline's house too. So Olivia asked her parents to please set up an appointment with her pediatrician that afternoon. If doctors could just figure out what was making her sick, maybe Olivia could get the right treatment in time to go visit her friend.

The next day, Olivia sat down next to her very ragged-looking mom at the kitchen table. Brooke blew on the steaming cup of tea in front of her, cooling it down before taking a long sip. She had purple bags under her eyes and her hair was a total mess. Olivia obviously knew her mom was not feeling great, none of them were, but she needed her mom's attention right now.

She gathered up her willpower, pushing away the nausea and exhaustion she felt, and reminded herself of the argument she'd practiced. She was determined to see her friend Caroline and get back to living her life. First, Olivia gave her mom a rundown of her visit to the pediatrician the previous day. Dr. Stein had given her a COVID test just to be safe. She also checked for Parvovirus, which causes mild respiratory illness, and Epstein-Barr virus, a common illness that would be making Olivia very drowsy.

Olivia explained to her mom that all the results had come back negative. Then, before Brooke could even respond, Olivia launched into the speech she'd prepared. She told her mother, since she didn't have any of those viruses or COVID, she should be able to go see Caroline. All she was doing here was sitting at the house and watching TV. And after saying this, Olivia just went quiet and watched her mom consider her words. She could see the wheels in her mother's mind turning, and for a moment, it seemed like her mom might actually agree with her.

But before Olivia could celebrate her victory, her mom's face got serious and she began to speak in a very soft voice. Brooke explained that she, Olivia, her daughter, was already sick and she couldn't risk traveling and getting worse even if she didn't know what the sickness was. Olivia immediately huffed in frustration and thought about arguing more with her mom, but as upsetting as this was, she knew her mom was right. She did feel terrible and clearly whatever she had likely was contagious because her whole family had it.

So Olivia turned and headed up the stairs to her bedroom, her breathing ragged and her spirits deflated.

Brooke sighed as she heard Olivia kind of stomping around upstairs, obviously still very upset, and Brooke couldn't help but feel sorry for her teenage daughter. This holiday season wasn't what any of them were expecting, but it seemed like Olivia was really taking it the hardest. She thrived on interacting with people, and she had already been through a semester at school full of remote classes and social distancing because of COVID. This trip to New Orleans was supposed to be her big chance to go have some fun and explore a new city with a very close friend.

Brooke wondered if there was anything she could do to salvage the rest of Olivia's break. She stood up from the couch, fighting off the dizziness that came whenever she moved too quickly, and just then a thought crossed her mind. Brooke grabbed her phone off the coffee table and made her way outside to the backyard and began looking through her contacts until she found the name John Shiflian, who was Caroline's dad.

Brooke paced around the garden as she spoke to John, savoring the fresh air, and she explained to him what had been going on at her house and that, unfortunately, Olivia was too sick to travel to New Orleans to see Caroline. Brooke was very clear that her whole family had the same bug as Olivia and that doctors had been unable to figure out what it was, but they did eliminate COVID-19. It was not that.

Then Brooke made her pitch to John. Instead of having her daughter Olivia fly to New Orleans, she suggested that Caroline come to stay with them in Washington, D.C. If Caroline came here, she and Olivia could spend time together and hole up in the house and do their required two weeks of quarantine before returning to school together.

Now, Brooke knew that a lot of parents would immediately reject the idea of sending their child to a house where everybody is sick. But Caroline's father, John Shiflian, was no ordinary parent.

He was an infectious disease specialist at Tulane University's medical school. He studied survivors of some of the world's worst infectious diseases and probably had more information about COVID-19 than anyone else Brooke knew. And so if he was okay with Caroline coming to DC, Brooke was confident that it really was safe.

After Brooke made her pitch, there was a few moments of awkward silence, and then John responded. It was widely understood that the longer somebody was sick, whether with COVID or something else, the less infectious the illness becomes to others. If Caroline visited, she likely wouldn't get sick at all, or she'd get a milder version of whatever Brooke's family had.

Regardless, she wouldn't be in any significant danger. And also, John knew his daughter would totally go for this idea. She wanted to see her friend. And so ultimately, John agreed to the idea. Brooke thanked John and assured him that she'd do everything she could to make sure Caroline was safe. John thanked her, and then they hung up, and then Brooke practically ran into the house to tell her daughter the great news. A few days later, in early January of 2021, Brooke made her way to the front door of her house.

Before she could reach for the handle, Olivia came bolting out of the kitchen and shooed her mom out of the way with more energy than Brooke had seen in weeks. Her daughter was practically jumping with excitement. Olivia threw open the door and immediately wrapped her arms around Caroline. As Brooke watched her daughter light up, she told herself this was the right decision. She turned to Caroline and told her she was welcome to take her mask off, she'd be here for the next two weeks anyway, and her dad was aware of the situation.

Caroline and Olivia grinned at each other, then they took Caroline's bag and headed upstairs to Olivia's room. A few hours later, Brooke was sitting in the guesthouse catching up on her paperwork when her daughter Olivia came rushing inside. In a panicked voice, she explained that Caroline had a splitting headache and was currently in the bathroom throwing up. Brooke shot out of her chair, dizziness and anxiety bubbling up inside of her at the same time.

Brooke couldn't believe what she'd done. She'd promised John that his daughter would be safe here. Now she was just as sick as the rest of them. Brooke followed Olivia out of the guest house and back to the main house, fighting off dizzying vertigo with every step. The next evening, on January 5th, 2021, Brooke stood outside the bedroom where Caroline was staying. She was trying to figure out if Caroline was asleep or not. Brooke gently knocked, and a few seconds later, Caroline opened up.

Brooke realized that Caroline was actually on a video call on her phone and she quickly apologized, saying she could come back later. But Caroline said don't worry about it, she was on the phone with her dad. Seizing the opportunity, Brooke asked if she could speak to him for a second. Caroline handed over the phone and Brooke told John she was absolutely mortified at the way his daughter's visit had gone so far. She repeated the apologies she'd been giving Caroline ever since she got sick,

But John just waved her apology away. He said it was okay. He'd been the one who signed off on this trip and he knew that the whole family was sick. And so Brooke felt her anxiety ease a little bit. At least John was not openly blaming her for what was going on with Caroline. However, John wasn't quite finished with his response. He did want to call to Brooke's attention something that Caroline had brought up to him. Something very important.

Caroline had told him that her symptoms lessened whenever the girls went for a walk around the neighborhood. She also said that people seemed to get very sick very quickly when they came into the main house. That suggested to John that this was not an infectious disease. John thought it was much more likely that it was some kind of environmental illness, meaning there was something in the house doing it. And John actually had a sneaking suspicion about which environmental illness it was.

So, he recommended that Brooke go to the hardware store as soon as possible. There, she could buy a device that would prove John's theory. Brooke was shocked at what she was hearing, but she promised John she would go to the store first thing tomorrow morning and then she passed the phone back to Caroline, anxious but excited that they might actually finally figure out what was making everybody sick. The next morning, January 6th, 2021, Stefan returned home from the hardware store with this new device in hand.

Brooke grabbed her husband by the arm and rushed him inside, eager to see if Caroline's father had been right. She grabbed the device from Stefan and then hit the on button. And right away, the machine began blaring. The kids ran downstairs, shouting over the alarm to ask what was going on. Brooke pointed to the device and told Stefan to explain it to them as she fumbled with her phone.

She very quickly dialed 911 and ran out into the yard, explaining to the dispatcher what was going on through panicked breaths. She pleaded with them to hurry. Within minutes, Brooke heard sirens. She rushed to the door and hurried the firefighters inside, showing them the device that was still going off. The uniformed men yelled over the alarm and instructed everyone to go outside and wait while they dealt with whatever was going on inside the house.

Brooke ushered Stefan and the kids out the door and across the street. Pretty soon, curious neighbors were standing in small clusters all along the sidewalk, their eyes wide as they took in all the emergency vehicles before them. As they watched the commotion unfold, Brooke turned to Caroline and asked her to call her father. She wanted to tell John he was right. The firefighters would discover that Brooke's family had a serious carbon monoxide leak in their home, and everyone, including Caroline, had carbon monoxide poisoning.

Carbon monoxide, or CO for short, is an odorless, colorless gas that kills hundreds of people every year. When somebody has carbon monoxide poisoning, what happens is the carbon monoxide in the air replaces the oxygen in their bloodstream. As a result, the heart, brain, and body are starved of the oxygen they need to survive.

The firefighters who responded to Brooke's call quickly figured out that the leak was coming from the basement furnace. A clamp had come loose and was spewing carbon monoxide throughout the four-story house. That explained why Brooke felt better every time she worked in the guest house and why Olivia and Caroline had fewer symptoms whenever they were out walking around in the neighborhood.

Brooke was shocked that their smoke alarm already in the home didn't warn them about the poisonous gas exposure. But after inspecting the alarm, she realized it didn't have a CO detector at all. It had been installed a year before Washington, D.C. required them in all residences.

In the end, Brooke's family and Caroline all recovered well from the CO poisoning. After the leak, Brooke bought four plug-in detectors that she installed on each level of the house, but every time she goes into the basement, she can't help but check to see that the furnace is still properly connected.

From Ballin Studios and Wondery, this is Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries, hosted by me, Mr. Ballin.

A quick note about our stories: we use aliases sometimes because we don't know the names of the real people in the story. And also, in most cases, we can't know exactly what was said, but everything is based on a lot of research. And a reminder: the content in this episode is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment.

This episode was written by Natalie Pratsovsky. Our editor is Heather Dundas. Sound design is by Ryan Patesta. Our managing producer is Sophia Martins. And our coordinating producer is Taylor Sniffen. Our senior producer is Alex Benidon. Our associate producers and researchers are Sarah Vytak and Tasia Palaconda. Fact-checking was done by Sheila Patterson. For Ballin Studios, our head of production is Zach Levitt. Script editing is by Scott Allen and Evan Allen. Our coordinating producer is Matub Zare.

Executive producers are myself, Mr. Ballin, and Nick Witters. For Wondery, our head of sound is Marcelino Villapando. Senior producers are Laura Donna Palavoda and Dave Schilling. Senior managing producer is Ryan Moore. Our executive producers are Aaron O'Flaherty and Marshall Louis for Wondery. For more than two centuries, the White House has been the stage for some of the most dramatic scenes in American history.

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