In this job, I often see how devastating mental illness can be to an individual and their family when it ends with a call to Advanced Biotreatment to restore a home or property in the aftermath of a heartbreaking loss.
There are two types of death when talking about mental illness… Many times those suffering with psychological impairments end up committing suicide when the burden of their condition becomes to much to bear. This group, I have found, chooses to go out with a bang (no pun intended) and they end their lives by burning out all at once.
The second group is, to me, incredibly sad. Over many years, they slowly allow themselves to be taken over and drained by their shortcomings to the point where they no longer care and give up. They withdraw into themselves and away from society, even cutting themselves off from family and friends as they descend into an irreversible depression. Drug and alcohol abuse is common in this category, as they try to self medicate or numb their minds to escape their inner turmoil. Some end up living in such putrid conditions, wallowing in their own filth, surrounded by trash and animal feces, that death almost seems like the more humane option. Eventually they “fade away” completely, until they succumb to the consequences of their lifestyle.
One such case involved a lady who suffered from severe alcoholism.
The home we had been called out to was located in a charming, old school southern neighborhood just east of Atlanta, Georgia.
Once inside, the smell was so strong it made it impossible to think. Hundreds of boxes, once having contained alcohol of some kind, were stacked everywhere. Piles of cat feces, and a mummified litter of kittens which had apparently gotten lost inside the maze of trash, were scattered all over.
The insurance adjuster had mentioned in his call that the woman, in her mid 40s, had suffered a massive stroke and had died next to the couch, surrounded by a sea of beer boxes. Her bodily fluid had seeped out and into the flooring, requiring ABT to go all the way down to the concrete foundation to remove all bio hazards left behind after her body was removed.
The hardest part to stomach was the knowledge of what had happened in the weeks after her death, before she was discovered by a utilities company. The two cats that she owned had been trapped in the home, and once food ran out, they did what they needed to do to survive… they fed on their deceased owner. In fact, when the body was found, she was missing her nose, ears, lips, her finger tips and the pads of her toes.
The clean up took quite a few days to complete. We had to begin the job by fumigating the home to kill all the bugs, including hundreds of flies and their thousands of maggots that had feasted on the victim as well. Next, we had to thoroughly sanitize and decontaminate the scene, not only to remove all the odor causing agents, but to also protect the health of any future residents to the property. Finally, after every piece of trash, pile of poop and alcohol container, along with all the biohazardous waste material, had been properly removed and disposed of, and the home had been completely cleaned from top to bottom, we brought in our Ozone machine to finish the job on a molecular level.
At the end, after I had handed the keys back to a very pleased client, I burned every piece of clothing I had worn to do the job. It was that bad. And not only did the smell burn itself into my memory for all of time, but now I swear I catch my cat giving me funny looks which makes me wonder what he’s thinking… before I make sure his food bowl is overflowing with yummy cat treats.
Regardless of whether the scene is at your home and personal property, a commercial business, or industrial site, we’ll strictly adhere to OSHA regulations and API Worksafe guidelines in our cleanup efforts. We only deploy EPA registered hospital grade cleansers and disinfectants.
