I was looking forward to meeting with another mom to plan an upcoming event. My family and I were new to the area and I was excited to build a new network of friends. I learned an unexpected lesson about why I need to speak up about toxin-free living alternatives even if it takes some extra courage.

When I got together with this other mom, I immediately registered something was up. I needed to keep my curious toddler a safe distance from her sweet little baby. My new friend revealed most stunningly at just six months old that her infant was already well into chemotherapy treatments.

Cancer is not new to me.

Cancer is not new to me. My dad had endured months and months of chemotherapy himself not too long ago, the thought of the ordeal can still bring him to tears. It was impossible to imagine a child enduring something so painful. This wasn’t even a child, but a sweet, brand new baby girl who was born with a condition and needed chemotherapy.

She had the biggest smile on her face as she sat tucked into her car seat next to her mother. I made small talk asking the mom where she was from, where her family is, and I eventually got around to asking how the chemo was coming along. She explained the treatments were every other Thursday and as she talked I began to imagine how consuming this must be for these two, brand new parents.

I inquired about whether or not the doctors gave her any guidelines on reducing toxin exposure within their home. This was met with a blank look and definitive, “no”.

I know all too well the importance of a low to no toxin lifestyle. My work and business revolves around knowing what to give the body and eliminating what it doesn’t need for lifelong vitality and health. There are simple ways to avoid toxins especially in personal care products.

Many are shocked to realize that the federal agencies charged with protecting the public from agricultural poisons and toxic additives in foods and personal care products have banned less than 20 ingredients. This is in stark contrast with the roughly 1,400 chemicals banned in products by the European Union. These poisons are now in the water, soil, and air and have found their way into us!

It’s no secret that studies of umbilical cords have found chemicals called “forever chemicals”

It’s no secret that studies of umbilical cords have found chemicals called “forever chemicals”, because these chemicals do not naturally break down. Instead, they accumulate in human bodies and the environment, and that is only the beginning.¹ 

I was crestfallen to think, this little infant’s troubles could have started in the womb! It is a focus for me and my business to understand and avoid routine exposure to chemicals with serious side effects. And yet, this young mom’s response made me realize she may be already overwhelmed by the task at hand in caring for her daughter. I decided at that moment it was best for me to back up for the time being.  She is clearly in the thick of intense medical treatments and knew much more about her circumstance than I did.

So here is the question: I know timing is everything, but do we share life-affirming and possibly saving information about toxin-free living at the risk of straining or even breaking relationships? Or, do we hold off in efforts to be “polite?”  

Do we hold off in efforts to be “polite?”  

When it finally came time for our event, I couldn’t help but notice the scented trash bags she was using. To many, this would not seem like a big deal. Knowing what I know now, however, scented trash bags would never have been in my house. They certainly would have been gone the second I found out about my child’s diagnosis.

I was 10 years old when my mother walked throughout our entire home with a trash bag. She had just been introduced to a reputable brand creating toxin-free (read: good for you, safe for your children, and devoid of harmful chemicals) products ranging from shower soap to hand lotion to nutrition supplements. She “ditched and switched” all within one day.

My mom didn’t have to worry about what her children were exposed to in our home.

My mom action-oriented. When she found out about the toxic ingredients in our shower soaps and lotions, she replaced them with clean products. Despite being included in “reputable” brands, many of these ingredients were clearly indicated in reliable research as cancer-causing, hormone-disrupting, and ineffective . As a wife and a parent, she didn’t have to worry about what we were being exposed to in our home after making this change.

I also spoke with a close friend and mentor who, as someone in her seventies, has more hindsight and wisdom to draw upon than I do. I shared with her how heartbroken I was to see this baby girl walking through cancer with parents who don’t know there isn’t any governmental agency regulating the safety of household products and foods being marketed to them.

What she told me was shocking. She said, “Brigitta, we didn’t hear about or know children who needed pediatric chemotherapy. It simply was not as common as it is today.” Today a chronic disease like cancer that once largely plagued older people but has now invaded younger and younger populations.

Why is Pediatric Cancer so Common Now?

And I don’t think I had ever stopped to consider that. But why, then, are they so common now?

Is the exposure of pregnant mothers to toxins (which are transmitted to their babies) at an all time high?

As development of a baby inside the mother’s womb progresses, the division of cells (Cancer begins with a mistake that isn’t “caught” and thrown out during cellular division) is happening at an unfathomably quick pace. 

If I could go back in time, I would throw my social manners out the window to tell this mother to ditch the toxins (aka embrace a more toxin-free way of living). Begin by throwing away the scented trash bags and the plug-in air fresheners. Switch to a cleaner laundry detergent and throw out all the Lysol disinfectant sprays. Buy an inexpensive water filter and start learning how to cook without additive rich, pre-made mixes from a box. There are cleaner options out there, we just have to find them. All these small routines make the world of a difference that ultimately accumulate to save lives.

If my position focusing on toxin-free living seems extreme, we can point to the growing children-with-cancer population that used to be nonexistent just a handful of generations ago.

If you need a starting point, here are some recommended places to begin. Another great resource is my friend, Leah. We chatted about hormone health, but she is also a wealth of knowledge when it comes to toxin-free living.

Recommendations:

Water Filter: AquaTru

• Why? Our water is contaminated with more things than it used to be such as heavy metals and hormone-disruptors (things that can contribute to infertility and hormone levels being suboptimal)

Skincare: Arbonne

• Why? This brand has been formulating skincare for forty-five years without ever venturing into dangerous ingredients. Many brands become cleaner over time as market trends demand safer products, but this one has prioritized quality sourcing and ingredients since day 1.

Candles: Rowe Casia

• Why? You don’t want to inhale fragrances. These candles contain essential oils and a beeswax (not soy) base.

Cookware: Cast iron skillets or Caraway Cookware

• The coating on your pan that makes it a nonstick pan rubs off with time and into your food. The same goes for wooden cutting boards instead of plastic ones.

Whole-Family Supplements and Nutrition: Arbonne

• For something your whole family can enjoy, we want to avoid soy-based protein (hormone disruption), whey protein (inflammatory and typically very cheaply sourced and, as a result, difficult to digest and causing bloat), and all artificial flavors, sweeteners, and dyes. This brand does that and more so this is what we choose for multivitamin, immune-support, greens supplements, and protein.

Coffee: Bulletproof

• Why? Coffee is often contaminated with trace amounts of mold due to how it grows in moist environments. This coffee is mold-free.

This list is not all encompassing, but just a handful of brands that are doing the right thing for your family and making it feasible for you to reduce and eliminate harmful toxins surrounding us in the marketplace.

If you go just one step at a time, take the approach of “follow the leader” with someone who has removed toxins from her home ahead of you, you can take away 99% of the potential to overwhelm and sail right into new routines that can help your family absolutely thrive.

Steps like my mother took long ago will, of course, not guarantee avoiding cancer, but it is something she did and we can all do to reduce exposure to toxins and endocrine disruptors that are among the most frequent causes of and contributors to cancer within our society.

Once you take the steps yourself, pass them on! We need to share these messages and the best way to do that is through friendships, local groups and mentoring one another towards better lives for our families and future generations to come.

1.  https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/sep/23/forever-chemicals-found-umbilical-cord-blood-samples-studies ↩︎