Yucky Chemicals in my Toothpaste

Back in the spring, I started trying to make some healthy changes to my life. I started a test-run of eating vegan and liked what I saw and felt and am still going strong in that department (you can read about my vegan adventures here.)

I also was hoping to rid my medicine cabinet, make-up bag, and cleaning supply cupboard of all things containing chemicals and replace them with natural products or home-made natural concoctions. I am someone who hates waste and is also very frugal, so I figured that I should use up what I have and replace them as they were used up. There are a few problems with that line of thinking. First, I have some products that have been on my shelves for possibly up to 20 years! How quickly I thought I would use those up, I am not certain. Another thing hampering the usage is...the usage. I don't use cleaning or beauty products very often, so even though I have a mountain of them, they don't really get much use. I could possibly take another 20 years just to try and use *some* of these babies up. The last thing is that I keep reading more and more bad things about the ingredients that are in many of these products and I just can't tolerate using them anymore.

So, some time over the Christmas break I am just going to offer up almost all of them on freecycle. I will save only what my non-natural lovin' honey thinks he needs. I have already started putting some things in boxes- let's see if I miss them.

Two things prompted me to finally take the leap.

1. I am so sick of clutter! I came to a breaking point in this. I took pictures of my cluttered house. These are my "before" pictures. I plan on sharing them with you as soon as I feel I can also post some "progress" pictures. I am imagining a life without bottles and tubes and jars of stuff that I rarely or never use. Sigh. Bliss. Love.

2. One change I made early on was a switch to a more natural toothpaste. A couple of months ago, I sort of slipped back into using our normal toothpaste again (which my family is still using). I got two horrible canker sores in a row. I thought this was a little odd, so I googled "causes of canker sores". Although no one is certain what causes canker sores, it is suspected that one cause is a reaction in some people to sodium lauryl sulfate, a common ingredient in many toothpastes. Since I had switched from a toothpaste without, to a toothpaste containing sadium lauryl sulfate in the time I had the canker sores, this was the obvious guess for me. I switched back to my natural toothpaste and haven't had another canker sore.

However, around the time I started getting canker sores, I also got a rash that is a lot like acne behind my ears and on the back of my neck. If I had a reaction to sodium lauryl sulfate in my toothpaste, then it would be pretty likely that I would also have a reaction to the same ingredient in my shampoo! I am just in the process of switching out my shampoo. This was just the motivation I needed, though, to get rid of all these chemicals from my house.

Thank you chemicals for making yourselves known and showing me that using you up does more harm to me than I am comfortable with. It is best we go our separate ways.

Who Can You Trust?

I know that everything these days "causes cancer" from the food we eat to our makeup and sometimes even our clothes (fire-retardant anyone?). I mean, how does anyone these days keep from joining the ranks of the obsessive-compulsive? Tonight I came across this article talking about the lack of regulation of sunscreens. I know to avoid phthalates, sulfites, and parabens. I know it is generally a good idea to avoid food or other products that have a list of ingredients that you can't pronounce. It happens to be a lot of work to find fairly safe products and foods these days. Is it too much to ask that the companies receiving our almighty buck might try to keep us alive longer so that we can keep shelling out to them? ...because after all, it is all about the money right? (We have to give these guys some motivation they can understand- BIG eye roll inserted here).