My wife arrived home one day recently and found a note on our door handle notifying us that our water meter had been going nonstop for over 24 hours. The note let us know this could indicate that somewhere we had a leak, either a dripping faucet, a running toilet, or a loose or damaged pipe fitting. That same day we got our water utility bill in the mail and our normal $40 water bill had swelled to $220!
We immediately called a friend and some neighbors to help search for the problem, checking every toilet and faucet. Inside and outside fixtures were checked. Not a drip to be found. One of our more knowledgeable friends found our water meter and sure enough, the little blue dial that is an indicator of water usage is spinning, and a spinning dial when water isn’t actively being used is a bad sign. A painful sign that equates to dollars being thrown out the window.
A little more investigation and it appeared that the leak is stemming from beneath a rock wall built ten years prior during the original house construction. Digging wasn’t going to help us get any closer to the leak. We were going to have to rent an excavator and a skilled technician to get to the problem causing all the aforementioned “pain.”
Phone calls were made and last weekend an excavator was dropped off at my house. Several guys with the knowledge of how to safely move hundreds of pounds of heavy rock with machinery came by to scout out the leak and actually fix the problem. It turns out the problem was a tiny hole in one of the pipes.
After digging up the problem area and repairing it, they cleaned off the injured pipe and gave it to us with some knowledge of what likely happened, because as it turned out the guys who fixed it that weekend happened to know the guys who did the original work.
The plumbing was installed before they decided to build a rock wall on the back side of the property where it abutted a major road, leveling out the back yard. The copper pipes are nearly impenetrable, so placing hundreds of pounds of rocks on top didn’t seem to be much of an issue.
It turns out that ten years of pressure and subtly shifting earth slowly nudged a hole the size a pinhead in the “impenetrable” pipe. It was enough to cause water to spray out constantly, filling a nearby swale during the driest months of the year.
The problem started ten years earlier. The problem was small – the size of the point of a pin – yet it was significant enough to cause a huge pain to my utility bill. To correct the problem meant spending hundreds more dollars in experts and labor and time out of our weekend to get to the cause.
Now think of your spine. You know how long the pain has been there. How long has the problem been there? How much is that pain costing you? Are you willing to spend the time and money it may take to let your chiropractor get to the cause? Let me assure you, the cost of fixing the problem now is pennies compared to letting the problem go unchecked. You are worth it.
Share This Post...
