Quitting the tox as a family - our story

Did you know that it only takes 2 minutes for the chemicals in products to be found in your bloodstream! Crazy, right!

We have gone through a big journey over the last 2 and a bit years from not knowing, nor even thinking about, the products we were using. In my mind, if it’s at the supermarket it can’t be that bad. Surely they wouldn’t sell anything that could harm us? Wrong!

Or when it came to my personal products and in particular, my skin care, if I’m buying it at a department store and paying top dollar, that means it’s got to be the best right? Wrong, again.

It all started when, I went to a workshop around natural wellness and essential oils (and can I be honest and tell you that I only went for a girls night out), but little did I know the impact it would have on our lives.

But I remember the woman running the workshop, who is now my very dear friend, was talking about knowing the ingredients of what we use and how those ingredients can impact our body. Take perfume for example, we wear perfume to feel more beautiful and to be more in touch with our femininity. Have you ever looked at the ingredients of perfume though? It is hard to find, but when you do find it, you will notice that it is also full of synthetic chemicals that are actually attacking your hormones, thyroid and reproductive system. These chemicals are called endocrine disruptors, because that’s exactly what they are doing.

A great way to begin to learn how to read ingredients list is to download the Chemical Maze App. In the app, you just search for the ingredient and it will give you a report of how that chemical is derived and what are the known effects on the body.

Another thing on chemicals, the word ‘Fragrance’ is a chemical hot mess. Basically companies can put a cocktail concoction of whatever chemicals together and label it as ‘fragrance’ and don’t actually have to tell us what is in that ‘fragrance’. And yes, that is legal. Think about that the next time you are using something with fragrance in the ingredients list. I highly recommend watching the documentary ‘Stink” on Netflix to learn more around this.

So where now do you start?

This is where I have LOVED getting essential oils into our home. We got started with the homes essentials kit and were able to DIY overhaul pretty well everything and have since stopped using products that were actually causing my son’s skin for flare up in eczema rashes and products attacking my already unbalanced hormones. If you’re ready to get started, visit the ‘Buy Essential Oils” page on this site.

Really though starting is simple. All I want from this is for more women and mothers to actually just start.

Start by reading labels and ingredients list. Remember that companies can use the words “pure”, “natural”, “vegan” and even “organic” and it actually means nothing. This is type of marketing is called ‘Green Washing’ and it’s important we begin to recognise it. I certainly used to fall for it often, thinking I was using a clean, better choice.

Then just start to make better decisions. Once we know better, we can do better.