We are constantly being bombarded with toxic exposures we have little to no control over. For this reason, we must do everything we can to avoid toxic exposure to the things we can control.
Toxic Beauty
According to the Environmental Working Group, women use an average of 12 products a day, containing 168 different chemicals. This daily chemistry experiment in the body of women can lead to systemic hormone imbalances and must be addressed by either reducing, replacing or eliminating these total daily exposures with safer alternatives.
Reducing Exposures
Clearing out all endocrine-disrupting chemicals from every place possible is an essential step toward naturally balancing hormones, including:
Make-ups
Cosmetics
Personal care products
Shampoos
Conditioners
Soaps
Lotions
Serums
Fragrances
Home cleaning products
Laundry detergents
Dry cleaning
Cookware
Bedding
Towels
Clothing
Home furnishings
Non-Toxic Alternatives
Utilizing the Environmental Working Group’s Skin Deep database and downloading the Think Dirty app and the Yuka Food & Cosmetics scanner are easy and convenient ways to evaluate all the products you’re already using to see if they are toxic or clean. If any of them are toxic, these resources also provide clean alternative product recommendations to replace them with. Branch Basics is a great option to consider for clean non-toxic laundry detergent and home cleaning supplies. You can use this link to save $10 off your order.
Toxic Burden Testing
Evaluating the total toxic burden in a patient's body is an essential part of a functional medicine work-up. Organic acid testing is a signature functional medicine lab that uses dozens of markers to evaluate environmental pollutants, chemicals, heavy metals and other toxins in the body. Using these test results, we are able to determine how much toxic accumulation a patient is dealing with and how well they are clearing toxins from the body.
Supporting Detoxification
With this data, we know the level to which toxins may be contributing to health concerns and can begin to address supporting detoxification pathways in a proportional way to start clearing toxic accumulations from the body using antioxidants, amino acids, vitamins, herbs, minerals, binders and more.