I am getting so frustrated with the water/plumbing problems at my house that I feel like either crying or screaming! My house is 32 years old and still has the original well. Since the day I bought the house in 2004 I've had problems with there being a lot of sand in my water.

I put a sand seperator on the main water pipe to the house and that helped a lot. Then a couple months ago I started loosing water pressure and there was a lot more sand coming from the well then usual. First thing my dad and I checked was the filter which turned out to be clogged with very fine sand (it looked a lot like popcorn salt). When we ran some water through the pipes into a bucket there was a lot of small black flecks in it. Turned out the black flecks were all that remained of the bladder in the expansion tank. Around $200 later a new tank was installed and running. Thank God that my parents live right next door and that their so experienced in home remodeling and repair! My dad is very handy at fixing things that break around the house.

The water pressure was up and everything seemd to be running good. So I thought that my water problems were solved. That was wishful thinking. Later that same week I get up to get ready for work, turn on the faucet to brush my teeth and there's no water. Now, I'm not the most cheerful person at 6:30 in the morning so you can just imagine my reaction to that! I checked the circuit breaker to make sure there was power to the pump, there was. Then I put my robe on and go outside to look at the well. I can hear the pump running and the sand seperator is clean so I have no idea what could be the problem. So since I'm up anyway I go next door to get ready for the day and then call into work to tell my boss that I won't be in. The next calls are to local well-pump and drilling companys. I'm in luck, the second company I call can have a truck out to my house within a half hour. By this time it's around 8:30 am and I've relized that the pump hasn't shut off once since the first time I checked it. Not a good sign!

The well guys get there and first thing they do is turn on the hose connected to the seperator to see if they can get any water. They get water all right. Only the water is a reddish color and very, very hot! The pump has gone bad, is apparently in it's death throes, and since it could no longer turn off on it's own it had basically brought the water in the well to a near boil. The good news is that the well doesn't appear to be in any danger of going dry. So $1,045 later I have a new and upgraded well pump. And a big mess in the front flower bed to clean up.

Now I relly think that my water problems are over. After a few days the rust that was stirred up when the pump was replaced settled although it took a couple more weeks before the sand that had built up in the pipes due to the bad pump was gone. Turned out the amount of sand coming up with my water was a sign that my pump was in trouble.

That was about a month and a half ago. This morning I got up to get ready for work, turned on the water for my shower and within a few minutes the water coming out of the shower head was nothing but a tiny trickle. I said a few choice words and then gather up my toiletries and my cloths for the day, went next door for my shower, and then went to work. Called a plumber from work and he will be out to my house first thing tomorrow morning. I'm really, really hoping that whatever the problem is that it's cheap and easy to fix. I really can't afford another major repair bill!

Thanks for putting up with my ranting but I really needed to get that out of my system. The last few months have just been very frustrating.