Re: Toxicity of a "Reloading Room"?
************ FEAR ANY & ALL LEAD ************************
From prior to the time I was born, my dad was a SERIOUS, ACTIVE competition Trap (shotgun) shooter. Being a wealthy man, he bought Lawrence Brand, # 7.5 shot in Ton lots when he felt he needed more. A spare bedroom upstairs served as his loading room.
Me being his little buddy & He my hero, from the time I was in diapers I just had to be involved with everything he did. So from the time I was in diapers, my first job was inserting wads into his Ponsness/Warren progressive reloading press. To this day I can still hear the sound of spilled shot bouncing around on the old oak "reloading" desk. It was shot that missed the mark when refilling the machine.
I can remember my teeny little hands having a graphite tint from playing in the shot.It was cool and felt neat to grab a hand full and let it pour through the gaps in between my little fingers.
I remember once seeing shot in the bottom of a glass of water on the desk. Dad and I were sipping from it as we loaded and loaded and loaded.
I asked dad "is it bad for their to be shot in our water?" He replied that there was nothing to worry about as it was quite heavy compared to water and would stay in the bottom of the glass with no worries of drinking it in.
I guess in the 70's everyday people had not been made aware of the dangers of lead, especially with children.
I loaded on and was around that press & lead shot for 18 or so years.
In school I was determined early on to be LD- learning disabled (in a textbook format of teaching) ADD and dyslexic. I had SEVERE asthma, as well as practically no immune system strength or so I believe I was then, and am now probably sick, as often as I'm well. As an adult I am diagnosed with fibromyalgia & I oddly started balding in my twenties though male pattern baldness is not on either side of my parents families.
I was recently IQ tested @ 122 I think it was, which I'm told is good. But as I explain it to friends ""Oh yeah, I have tons of horsepower in my head, but my clutch slips- I occasionally have trouble getting power to the ground." I'm constantly dealing with some level of a brain fog.
Fast forward to my late twenties- I was competing -HEAVILY- in IPSC. I educated myself about high production bullet casting. I got the gear and commenced to making bullets literally by the 5 gallon bucket fulls.
I called Sierra BulletSmiths and asked to speak "with the most knowledgeable person about CASTING bullets." That conversation occurred probably 8 or so years ago so I do not remember the gentlemans name I spoke with, however I was calling to see if i could get some tips & tricks from an older & more experienced caster hoping to produce better bullets. I remember the conversation like it was last week. The guy, after I told him what I was up to lectured me about lead exposure like some loving uncle. He made me promise to him I would wear rubber gloves, a synthetic apron, a full face shield AND a lead approved respirator, and with all this still made me promise to do it all outside, and never bring the PPE indoors.
His reasoning is that he claimed to have gone from a brilliant college educated business man to a forgetful oaf that had a memory not as long as his little finger and really had come up with some struggles in daily life. He claimed it occurred in a relatively short period of time, and the only thing that had change was he got into casting bullets. I was made a believer...
I share some of my very personal things, things of vulnerability openly hoping it protects some or many children somewhere. I'm not saying lead is the (only) thing behind all that plagues me, but I'm an isolated case in a generally healthy++ family. And just so happens I was the only little kid in the family with all that heavy lead exposure.
A a grown man convinced me his lead exposure "dumbed him down" GREATLY in a relatively short period of time
You have been made aware, as I wish someone had made my "daddy" aware.
Tres
. We live in a 3 bedroom apartment. We occupy one bedroom, have a 14yr old in another, and the third bedroom is occupied by all my reloading stuff. I'd imagine for the first 6 month's or so, the new infant will be with us in our BR, but after that will probably deserve its own place. There is room for a crib and other baby stuff in my "reloading room", but was potentially concerned with the toxicity of spent primers, misc dusts, etc. Can anyone confirm or deny my concerns?
