What Are You Unknowingly Ingesting?

I’ve been teaching a lot on the detox process lately – why you might want to consider it and how to go about doing one safely.  Simply put, a detox is a way to give your body a break from the stress of digesting and processing toxins while at the same time supersaturating your system with high quality nutrients that promote the release of those toxins. Much of the focus during a detox is on the food we eat, which of course is important and where my expertise lies.  However, as a holistic practitioner, it’s important to me that you also consider how we’re exposed to toxins in many other ways.

If and when you choose to do a detox, ideally, you will take steps to ensure that your physical and emotional environments also support this cleansing process. Gentle physical exercise, rest, minimizing stress and using clean household and personal care products will greatly contribute to the effectiveness of the detox process.

Regardless of whether you decide to do a detox, it is more important than ever that we make sure we are using products with pure and safe ingredients. What you put on your skin can be absorbed into your body in 26 seconds, much faster than what you ingest! So, the next time you’re in the shower or using some lotion or brushing your teeth, take a minute to turn the bottle around and read though the ingredients list. If you’re reading things like tallow, glycerin, collagen, lanolin or “natural” ingredients, it might surprise you that there is likely animal fats and by-product from the animal rendering process in that product. The David Suzuki Foundation published this great little guide that highlights ingredients to avoid in skin care products.

Synthetic chemicals ( ie. phthalates and parabens) used in beauty products, air fresheners and cleaning products are messing with our endocrine system, which regulates metabolism, growth, development, sleep patterns and mood. Studies have shown the link between these chemicals and scary stuff like cancer, obesity, issues with the development of a child’s nervous system, ADD and ADHD, thyroid diseases, infertility, asthma, and birth defects.You can learn more about this in the World Heath Association study on The State of the Science on the Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals.

So in addition to reading food labels and bring concerned about what you eat, it’s a good idea to be cognizant of what you’re putting on your skin and breathing in.