Mothball Fumes Are Toxic. I Found Out the Hard Way.

My staycation became a cautionary tale about the chemicals behind the classic smell.

- KIERA CARTER

No one likes a kitchen renovation until it's done. That was especially true for me, a mom of two toddlers with one kid in the picky-eating phase and the other in the throwing-food-everywhere phase. Perpetually stressed about mealtime, I booked a local rental to ease the pain of not having a usable kitchen.

This was supposed to be the easy part of the project. We wouldn't choke on dust from the demolition, we'd get a break from the banging and drilling, and-my favorite perk-we'd cook! No cereal for dinner, no washing three-piece sippy cups in my bathtub next to a pile of PAW Patrol toys. We'd have it all: warm food, dreams of new countertops, and a little staycation.

The listing seemed perfect for my family of four. My older daughter looked forward to a room with a “big-kid bed,” and I was excited to explore a new neighborhood. But unfortunately, the second we stepped in, the smell of mothballs hit us harder than the deposit for the contractor had hit our checking account.

Not knowing much about mothballs except for recognizing that telltale smell, I brushed it off as a manageable inconvenience, and we went on with our stay. I stocked the pantry with ingredients for my kids' favorite foods (pancakes). I made lobster mac 'n' cheese. The mothball odor was ever-present, but I pushed on—moms are used to weird smells.

Then I spent a night vomiting uncontrollably. When I wasn't hovering over the toilet, I curled into a ball, the only position that eased the weight on my chest.

I wondered, had I developed an adult-onset shellfish allergy? Not likely, considering that I had eaten shellfish three weeks earlier and felt fine. Meanwhile, my husband's eyes were incessantly itchy, and my 1-year-old would not stop crying.