I Painted Over Mold—and Learned Why That’s the Dumbest DIY Idea Ever

There wasn’t much ventilation in the bathroom of my last apartment, and the constant showers made the room steam up and stay damp for a while. The dampness eventually turned into patches of mold all over the ceiling. It was at least ugly and made me feel uneasy.

I didn’t want the problem to get worse, but no one else in the apartment seemed ready to deal with it, so I took care of it myself.

My “Brilliant” Plan

I ran straight to my solution for everything back then: disinfecting wipes. My ceiling had a lot of block spots on it. I took my small ladder and climbed up to clean my ceiling until it looked “good enough.”

You know that mold can be very hard to get rid of if you’ve ever had to deal with it. My quick fix only got rid of the mold that was easy to see. Instead of dealing with the real problem, I chose to hide it. I took my can of white paint and painted the whole ceiling, covering up what I hadn’t taken down.

Right now, it felt like a win: my bathroom was clean, fresh, and bright again. I never once thought about looking into or even asking myself if what I was doing made sense. The only thing that mattered was that the bathroom didn’t look dirty anymore.

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The Mold Came Back (Surprise)

A few months later, we were back where we started: ceilings that were still wet, mold spots, and now paint that was bubbling. It was like my paint job never happened. It was a humbling lesson: mold doesn’t just go away when you can’t see it, and it gets worse when you don’t fix the problem.

Warning

Don’t touch mold in your home with your bare hands or paint over it if you see it, even if it’s just because of mild humidity. Using bleach that has been diluted is the best way to get rid of mold, but you should never mix bleach with other cleaning products.

A Mistake I’ll Never Make Again

Back then, I was a lot younger and thought I was smart for solving a problem with a wipe and a can of paint. I saw a problem that people often hire professionals to fix, and I thought this two-step solution would be all it needed. In reality, all I did was give the mold a new place to grow.

I wouldn’t have even bothered if I had known then what I know now: that the real solutions are good ventilation and treatment. Instead, I ended up with a bathroom ceiling that taught me a valuable lesson: painting over mold doesn’t make it go away.