Judy, the "white mold" you mention could very well be Boisduval scale, a hellishly difficult pest to get rid of. As another poster mentioned, pests are often attracted to "weaker" plants and when present in sufficient numbers, will outright kill a plant. Sounds like you have a combo of things and if your summer was anything like ours up here (cool and wet), that certainly contributed to it. My suggestion to you is to take the plants out of their pots and clean them thoroughly using a mild dish soap like Ivory and lukewarm water. Get rid of any dead roots or growths. Stand up in the pot and place a bit of damp sphag at the bottom around the roots. Now dip or spray them like crazy. Repeat every 7 to 10 days or as recommended on the product you'll use. Keep your plants in a bright and warm spot, with ok humidity and air circulation. Spray the sphag when it is dry. The advantage of leaving the plants more or less bareroot is that it is easier to see any returning bugs and to then treat them. You're also less likely to rot anything. Hope this helps. Julie

Notes in the link relate to Phalaenopsis culture in Canada. You might be able to revive the plant by using the spag and bag routine but the road back will take ages. Maybe better to read up on culture and start again with a new plant. All this misting is deadly dangerous, the plant likes to be moist but not continually wet and the roots must dry out a little bit between watering. These are in my opinion not good beginners orchids (especially for here) but people cannot bear to throw a plant bought as a cheap bunch of flowers in the trash can. I have about a dozen Phals growing indoors on the top of a heated fish tank. Winter sun filtered through matchstick blind.Current temp there 19C Humidity 64% .) Plants watered twice a week. NO MISTING!. Here is a link that might be useful: Phal. Notes for Canada

Thank you all for your advice, I truly appreciate it. I am not experienced in keeping houseplants and this is one of my older plants and since it was a gift from my boyfriend who never likes giving flowers its very sentimental. In response to your statements/advice: I'm guessing the white pot it sits in has no drainage holes? it is in a plastic orchid container suspended about an inch off of the bottom, inside of a white ceramic pot. if any excess water is in the pot after watering I dump it out. I had been watering it only when completely dry and until it was in the miracle grow mix it got watered about once a week. The MG mix seems to never dry out and it would go 2-3 weeks between watering, but now that I know the extent of the root damage I assume Jane is correct with the pot being entirely too large for the root system. I was watering in "sips" with the occasional soak only when dry, I know they can't handle constantly being in wet material. Here they mention that Phals like to be keep evenly moist and not on a wet to dry schedule, that seems to contradict Jane's advice (and my limited understanding) of how to treat them. Is that better to aim for and if so what is the best way to water them where it keeps the bark evenly moist but not soaked? The wet to dry is how I grow my citrus and I assumed it would work for the orchid as well. http://www.aosforum.org/newsletters/pages/feb10.html You are killing your plant. If you want to give it a try, you need to learn about the plant. We can help but you need to understand the basics of orchid growing. I understand this and that is why I have asked for help, previous to this I felt like I was doing a good job, it kept putting out new leaves and roots, the mix wasn't over watered and it was growing in size. This last watering is where it all took a turn for the worse by not drying out and molding. I am happy to take any advice given and have started reading from the link you shared. Your plant is also underlit. The leaves are too dark. You need to put the plant in a bright window. I have it currently on my desk at work about 6 feet from a floor to ceiling wall of SW facing windows. I was concerned about putting it too close as it got sunburned before but I will move it to a book case about 10 inches from the window. My coworker has 10+ Phals in her cube with no natural light and little office light (nothing directly over her) and they are all doing fantastically, I have asked for her advice on growing mine and she seems to just get lucky with hers because she practically ignores them except for watering (low light, no fertilizer, heavy watering - her bark is always wet) She is the one who suggested to keep mine wetter then I was, I didn't completely listen as it went against what had been doing well before but when it kept wetter for longer on its own I thought it wasn't as much of a problem until the mold growth happened. Put it in a small pot (your pot is too big for the plant). You want a pot just slightly larger than the plant. Small, small, small! I am happy to repot it into a much smaller container, that was the one it came in but its root system way much larger at the time. What size do you recommend? its current one is 4 1/2 dia. The smallest I can see on amazon is 2 in is that ok? https://www.amazon.com/HIDGrowTM-Net-Pot-10-Pack/dp/B014LNOIDG/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1492704270&sr=8-7&keywords=2+inch+orchid+pot you can tie the Phal to a stake (like I mentioned above) and suspend the phal over a bit of sphagnum in a pot or cup. I plan on this method so I can monitor the roots better, my only concern is I keep this plant at work since I have no windows that get much light at home and would I be able to keep the moss wet enough to hold the plant over for weekends? Also if I suspend it over damp moss should I also be soaking the root at any point to give it a more thorough watering or leave it alone with the damp moss? After better root growth (fingers crossed) I will move it into the better grow mix you recommended. Thank you again for your help, I have tried many times to google about proper orchid care and either its incredibly simple "just add ice" type of instructions or very in depth scientific explanations, and I'm needing something in between. I appreciate all of your straight to the point clear instructions and hope to greatly improve my orchid keeping abilities.

I would worry that you could have the same problem from amazon (or anywhere else). Difference being having to return to lowes or having to ship it back to amazon.