Toxic Baby: a must watch for mamas
For our sweet new babes, its so important that we are using safe, clean products on their delicate skin. Our skin is the largest organ of our body and it drinks what we put on it. For infants, this is important to note because they don’t have the same detoxification we do as adults and their little bodies are still very much developing.
One of the main reasons I joined Young Living and started ditching and switching products out of my home is because I was a new mama with a young baby who started becoming curious about the ingredients in the products I was buying and putting on my sons skin. Little did I know just how incredibly bad my home was for toxic pollution even though I had always tried to buy products labeled with ‘green’, ‘natural’, ‘organic’. I quite literally was shell shocked when I started doing my research. There was nothing ‘natural’ about any of the products I had in my home, most had the classic chemical hidden ingredient ‘fragrance’ on the label plus a bucket load of other toxic crap I can’t even pronounce.
QUICK FACTS FOR YOU:
Every year in NSW more than 3000 children are hospitalised as a result of poisoning from household products.
In 2021, girls as young as 2 & 3 are showing signs of early puberty.
Babies are born with up to 200 chemicals in their bloodstream.
The prevalence of asthma has risen fourfold in the last 20 years.
The air pollutants in your home are 5-7 times higher than the air outside your home.
Children have lower levels of some chemical-binding proteins, allowing more of a chemical to reach "target organs".
Systems that detoxify and excrete industrial chemicals are not fully developed for newborns.
An immature, porous blood brain barrier allows greater chemical exposures to the developing brain.
Knowledge is power and I want you to take some time out to watch this TedTalks video by Penelope Jagessar Chaffer. It could be the most valuable 17 minutes of yours and your families life.
Penelope is the director and producer of the documentary/surrealist film Toxic Baby. She works to bring to light the issue of environmental chemical pollution and its effect on babies and children
A little about her background:
“In 2004, I became pregnant with my first child. Like many mothers to be, I invested many, many hours researching pregnancy and preparing for my baby. I had taken some steps to reduce toxic chemicals in my home and to what I was exposed, so I was shocked and dismayed to find out that the toxic chemical problem actually affected EVERY product and item I brought into my home, I put on and in my body, and that children were the most vulnerable. At a friend’s child’s first birthday party, I discovered that the most commonly used preservative in baby care products mimicked estrogen and had been found in breast cancer tumors. It was a breast cancer survivor with a young daughter who was sharing the information that she had and I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
I went home and immediately jumped on the internet. Within seconds I found the research study and emailed the scientists who authored the study. Within a day, my life would irrevocably change. I found out that parabens were just the tip of the iceberg, and I kept saying to myself “I can’t believe I don’t know anything about this!! Why don’t I know anything about this?!” This question became Toxic Baby, which looks at how chemicals in the environment affect the health and development of babies and children and what we can do to address this situation, told through the lens of the mountain of research and studies that have been done.
It’s taken almost ten years to bring Toxic Baby to life. It’s been a long and hard journey to bring this science to life and were it not for the love, support, and encouragement of my female friends and relatives, I would not have gone the distance. This community of women coming together echoes the wonderful work of Women’s Voices for the Earth, whose incredible work allows us to harmonize our voices to produce great change and great advocacy for inner and outer environments.”