Ways to Avoid Toxins
Cleaning Products
Even if you don’t live in California (especially if you don’t live in California), check for State of California warnings, which are required on any product containing ingredients that state’s regulators believe cause cancer or reproductive or developmental harm.
If your product has warnings about how dangerous it is, consider not using it. (In future newsletters I’ll provide tips for making your own natural products. Do that, or consider Ava Anderson non toxic (www.avaandersonnontoxic.com/ wendylkuhn)
A new study has just come out about the dangers of using Round Up (more about Round Up)
Food
Check out the amount of sodium. Sodium hides in almost everything. New studies reaffirm the link between too much sodium and heart attacks. Check your processed foods for sodium amounts per serving Serving sizes on packaged foods are often small.
Check out the amount of sugar. Four grams of sugar is equivalent to one teaspoonful. Women should eat less than 6 tsps a day of sugar and men less than nine, at the most! Sugar often hides in the most unlikely places. Check out your drinks, your cereal, your protein bars, your spaghetti sauce, your salad dressings, etc.
Avoid food dyes. While the FDA tests and approves individual food dyes, they don't test combinations (for example, they test yellow and blue, but not green)
Read the label. Next month I’ll provide a list of ingredients to avoid, but consider this: if you have no idea what something is or how to pronounce it, maybe you don’t want it in your body. My eyes often start to glaze over when I'm reading ingredient lists. I think that is a sign that I should not buy the product.
The easiest answers
Eat more fruits and vegetables, drink more water, and eat fewer processed foods,
Instead of using toxic cleaning products, use baking soda, vinegar, water, lemon juice, olive oil, etc (all in the appropriate combination for the appropriate task). Or buy the fabulous Ava Anderson Non Toxic products at www.avaandersonnontoxic.com/ wendylkuhn
And, just as a reminder, here are the tips from last month:
Look up products on ewg.org/skindeep. They list many individual products and, if your product is not listed, you can enter the ingredients and it will provide you with a report.
Keep the “Dirty Dozen” and “Clean 15” list with you when you shop. Make informed produce decisions (and, yes, there’s an app for that)
Don’t automatically trust the label when it says something is “natural” or “organic”. If it is organic, it will have the USDA seal. Until October 2014, even organic apples can have certain antibiotics on them -- it's good that this will end, but very troubling that it is currently the case. (More about organic apples)
Cleaning Products
Even if you don’t live in California (especially if you don’t live in California), check for State of California warnings, which are required on any product containing ingredients that state’s regulators believe cause cancer or reproductive or developmental harm.
If your product has warnings about how dangerous it is, consider not using it. (In future newsletters I’ll provide tips for making your own natural products. Do that, or consider Ava Anderson non toxic (www.avaandersonnontoxic.com/ wendylkuhn)
A new study has just come out about the dangers of using Round Up (more about Round Up)
Food
Check out the amount of sodium. Sodium hides in almost everything. New studies reaffirm the link between too much sodium and heart attacks. Check your processed foods for sodium amounts per serving Serving sizes on packaged foods are often small.
Check out the amount of sugar. Four grams of sugar is equivalent to one teaspoonful. Women should eat less than 6 tsps a day of sugar and men less than nine, at the most! Sugar often hides in the most unlikely places. Check out your drinks, your cereal, your protein bars, your spaghetti sauce, your salad dressings, etc.
Avoid food dyes. While the FDA tests and approves individual food dyes, they don't test combinations (for example, they test yellow and blue, but not green)
Read the label. Next month I’ll provide a list of ingredients to avoid, but consider this: if you have no idea what something is or how to pronounce it, maybe you don’t want it in your body. My eyes often start to glaze over when I'm reading ingredient lists. I think that is a sign that I should not buy the product.
The easiest answers
Eat more fruits and vegetables, drink more water, and eat fewer processed foods,
Instead of using toxic cleaning products, use baking soda, vinegar, water, lemon juice, olive oil, etc (all in the appropriate combination for the appropriate task). Or buy the fabulous Ava Anderson Non Toxic products at www.avaandersonnontoxic.com/ wendylkuhn
And, just as a reminder, here are the tips from last month:
Look up products on ewg.org/skindeep. They list many individual products and, if your product is not listed, you can enter the ingredients and it will provide you with a report.
Keep the “Dirty Dozen” and “Clean 15” list with you when you shop. Make informed produce decisions (and, yes, there’s an app for that)
Don’t automatically trust the label when it says something is “natural” or “organic”. If it is organic, it will have the USDA seal. Until October 2014, even organic apples can have certain antibiotics on them -- it's good that this will end, but very troubling that it is currently the case. (More about organic apples)
