What do Allergies, Asthma, ADHA, Hormone Disruption, Mental Health Issues, Leaky Gut, and Cancer all have in common. If you guessed they are all medical conditions, you are right. But wait there’s more to it. Today, I want to talk about the commonality of this list as it pertains to improving your health and lowing your risks for future illness.
For decades our society has embraced living a healthy lifestyle. The exciting news is that never before has there been this much medical research and available resources to you and me to take charge of our health. We have choices…. and some really good ones!
I have always been conscientious of living a life which promotes health and wellness. However, 7 years ago I overhauled my life by incorporating some major changes. One area was in food. I made a firm commitment to only buy, cook and eat real food. Eating food that is not real is shown to contribute to the illnesses referenced above.
This change required being very intentional about reading labels and basically not eating anything that contained ingredients I could not pronounce or ingredients not coming from natural (plants) sources. High Fructose Corn Syrup or anything ending in “ose” was immediately put back on the shelf as these common ingredients are chemicals, not real food. I also began buying organic dairy and grass-fed meat. Why? I did not want the antibiotics and steroids being given to the livestock to pass through my system. Added to my organic food list was the top 12 (dirty dozen) fruits and veggies found at www.ewg.org . Why? Because I did not want to consume pesticides.
When I began this change 7 years ago, eating organic or finding healthy alternatives to packaged food was expensive, but because of large consumer demands over the years, today’s prices are going down while choices are increasing!
Enough About Food
So now that we have tackled the food, what about the household cleaners in the home or the little plug in fragrances that you breath into your lungs? What about the laundry soap, all the lotions, soaps and makeup you put on your body? Your skin is the largest organ of the body and serves to protect you, but Friends, you have over 2 million holes in your skin and your lungs are big beautiful spongy organs that absorb everything you breathe!
What about reading the ingredient labels on these products? What you breathe and what you put on your skin matters, but reading these labels are not as easy as the food labels. Another scary fact is that safety tests are not currently required for cosmetics and many household cleaners do not even list the ingredients on the package! And yet, a large number of these products are filled with poisons and ill health promoting ingredients that put you at high risk for many of the medical conditions stated earlier.
Where to get help? Again, there is much research and you have choices. The Environmental Working Group (www.ewg.org) has tons of resources available to help you make better choices. Another resource that I recently started using is an app on my phone called “THINK DIRTY”. This app allows you to scan the bar code from products and gives you a complete list of which ingredients are dirty and clean. THINK DIRTY also will give you tons of alternative available products that fall within the clean zone. Did I mention, it’s free and easy to use? Take the app with you to the store and scan the products before you buy. It’s fun!
A third resource to check out is the use of Pure Grade Therapeutic Essential Oils. My website www.tammybarnett.com has information on the brand I use and is found under the “Resource” tab.
Coaching Tip
Consider 1 or 2 areas that you would like to make changes in to promote you and your family’s health. Baby steps!
Consider finishing out whatever products you currently have and replacing when empty with healthier choices
Consider doing your own research to raise awareness to become a more conscientious consumer
Realize this change is a journey and it will not happen overnight. It’s taken me 7 years!
Let me know if you have tips that can be shared with others. We are on this journey together. If you need additional help, please contact me. I would love to hear from you!
You can do this…. YOUR life matters!
