There was just a recent thread on this where some experts chimed in. Hopefully you will find it reassuring. The concern with asbestos exposure is generally from long-term exposure in industrial settings.

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/6213706/asbestos-in-water-leaking-from-ceiling#

You are not doomed. Most mesothelioma cases are people who worked with it long term. Even with those its a small percentage that have actually get it. Why don’t you get a sample and have it tested? This way either it doesn't have asbestos or if it does you can look into having it professionally removed. It seems like the peace of mind would be worth it. We have a lot of dust in our asbestos free house but if we had asbestos somewhere we would have it removed versus covering up as many times happens.

Thanks so much for the quick replies guys and I do find it a bit reassuring that you are both saying most asbestos related diseases are due to long term occupational exposure as I have read and also heard from others, i.e workers in mining or construction that handle this stuff daily for 20-30 years, and that even not all of those workers get the diseases. I'm hoping that my year and a half would not be part of that category but I'm not sure what is considered short and what is considered long term exposure.

Testing of the popcorn ceiling is currently in progress and I am awaiting the results for the %. I pretty much know it'll come back positive because a flooding occurred two units down from me as well and that unit was sealed up with negative air pressure and warning signs for asbestos while they handled the removal. I believe the next steps would be abatement and removal and a clean air quality test before and after. I'm anxiously waiting on that step as well to see how bad it actually was in there.

Sounds good! I’m glad you are planning to have it removed, peace of mind is priceless.

Absolutely appreciate the advice and I'll probably update this post with more as the process moves along. Hope you all can continue to provide advice as the situation progresses

Thanks so much kudzu. I've seen you post in other asbestos related discussion posts so I appreciate your advice. Thank you for the reassurances and from my experience, I also knew not to scrape or disturb the ceiling but was worried the water stained ceiling would drop asbestos fibers. I have read that water damage tends to make popcorn ceiling flaky or crumbly although I have not seen any actual popcorn ceiling fall off or even peel off.

Given your background in the area, would you know if water stained/damaged popcorn ceiling would disperse any asbestos fibers and what color it would be? The reason why I was asking is because the dust that I would wipe up did look white-ish when I saw it but when sprayed with lysol and wiped up, was completely gray or black, like any normal dust. Do you think the air purifier helped? Just to be clear I am talking about dust that occurred prior the recent flooding a couple weeks back that I would find on my bed's end table when cleaning up dust and vacuuming every month/few months

You can't identify asbestos dust simply based on visual observation. However, any asbestos fibers would be pretty strongly embedded in the rest of the sprayed-on popcorn mixture compound and I wouldn't expect asbestos to start being released from simple wetting of the type you describe. I think you have plain old dust. I doubt the air purifier did much (if there was anything to do). Besides, asbestos particles are so small as to be invisible, and what's in the air rather quickly gets dispersed due to the many air changes that occur within a dwelling each day. You would only have a problem if a lot of asbestos fibers were released, and are in dust piles that you kept disturbing. That's why the best thing, if you have continuing concerns, is to wet down dusty surfaces, wipe away the residue with paper towels, and dispose of them in plastic bags. Then go on with your life.

Remember that asbestos is a naturally occurring mineral in some of the most populated areas of the U.S. People in Southern California spend their entire lives breathing in asbestos. These are generally under the levels that are considered dangerous, but likely so was your exposure.

This is just one more thing you have done that has an incredibly small chance of killing you 30 years from now.

Thank you so much everyone for your input. I appreciate all your expert advice on this @kudzu9.

It's been a few months since this occurred and I got the test back that the popcorn ceiling was positive for asbestos at 5%. After moving out after those 2 days after the incident, I did not go back to the property and basically threw everything in the property away. I did take some things with me such as paperwork, monitors, laptops, phone, wallet, soniccare etc. and continually wet-wiped those down prior to moving out and then afterwards as well, but disposed of those as well about a month later aside from the paperwork, after working with insurance to get some reimbursement for the personal belongings.

I spoke to an expert on the phone a few times. He worked for the company that did the asbestos testing on the popcorn ceiling and he did say a lot of the same things that you guys said - i.e. people that get diseases are ones that worked in the field for many years and are exposed daily for 8 hours a day for several years and that all the rules and regulations are to protect workers that do this kind of work and have this exposure at an occupational level. That did give me some sense of relief.

I am not so much worried anymore about the actual flooding that occurred and the popcorn ceiling that started hanging down due to it, as I now know that wetting the popcorn ceiling actually keeps fibers in and that the popcorn ceiling is bonded together so if a big chunk is just taken off, not many fibers would actually be dispersed.

I did want to ask if any of you know how badly I screwed up/exposed myself from the vacuuming of the material. As stated above, after the handyman came in took out chunks of popcorn ceiling and cut through the wood in the ceiling, he left some small amounts of debris in both the closet and the living room while dragging out his tarp and garbage bag in which he put the large chunks of popcorn ceiling he removed. That same night, not realizing that it would make things worse, I vacuumed up the remaining debris, probably spreading the asbestos. I could hear the cracking of the popcorn ceiling debris as my vacuum rolled over it, breaking the small chunks apart. It was not a ton of debris, but my vacuum did not have any hepa filter or sealing in it, so dust was assuredly dispersed. The next day I used the vacuum again for a few minutes thinking that it was a good idea at the time to vacuuming my laundry basket and hamper because they may have been contaminated with asbestos since they were in the closet area. I vacuumed in the living room and obviously regret that decision terribly now as that is basically what exposed my whole condo and all personal belongings and where I slept thinking the bedroom had been contaminated. I did wear a kn95 mask while vacuuming and also when I tossed out the debris from the bin. I stayed and slept in the living room one more night before leaving the property. I watched a video on how much fine dust can come out of cheaper vacuums because they don't have any type of seal or hepa filter. I did want to mention that I did not see any visible dust, but I know asbestos dust is so fine that it is invisible to the naked eye. The expert I spoke with said that it wasn't a huge worry and wouldn't be that bad since the popcorn ceiling is bonded together, but I wanted to ask if you guys knew how much would stay in that vacuum and how much got dispersed. I did have my air purifier on so I hope that did help.

In the grand scheme of things, I know that even if all 100% of the asbestos was dispersed it wouldn't be that much since it only 5% of the small amount I vacuumed, and of that, the amount that got in my body is probably much less since I only stayed for maybe a total of 24 hours in the property after vacuuming, and some may have gone out the window, some on my personal belongings that I tossed out, and some on the walls, carpet, etc., but I did just want to get some expert opinions on this.