Petrochemicals in Your Everyday Products

WOMEN'S HEALTH ARTICLE
Las Vegas Guide to Healthy Living, APRIL, 2004 -
THE SKIN'S DIRTY DOZEN- What you put on your skin can go into your body
and affect your health either negatively or positively
by Cheryl Martin

Everyday we use products on our skin that we think are safe.

BUT the truth is that products are not always safe and manufacturers don't have to tell us so.

Ever since 1938, when the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted self-regulation to the cosmetic industry, such products can be marketed without government approval of ingredients, regardless of what tests show. Most of the 25,000 chemicals used in our everyday skin products have not been tested for long-term effects. In a typical day, you might be exposed to more than 200 different chemicals - many of which are suspected of causing cancer or disrupting hormones.

Most people do not know what ingredients are being used. Detergents, preservatives, stabilizers, colorings, artificial fragrances, and petroleum by-products are more common than you know. What you put on your skin can go into your body and affect your health either negatively or positively. You can choose which, if you know the facts.

Start checking all product labels and watch for these ingredients in your skincare products:

1. Propylene Glycol (PG) and Butylene Glycol: Found in antifreeze. Strong enough to remove barnacles from boats. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) considers PG so toxic that workers are required to wear protective clothing and to dispose of it by burying it in the ground.

Instead: Use water, herbs, essential oils, olive oil, or almond oil to wipe your make-up off.

2. Sodium Lauryl Sulfate (SLS) and Sodium Laureth Sulfate: Detergents used in garage floor cleaners, engine degreasers, and 90 percent of cosmetics that foam. Animals exposed to SLS experience eye damage, depression, labored breathing, and even death.

Instead: Use essential oils, herbal infusions, or just gently rub the skin with a 100 percent cotton face cloth.

3. Diethanolamine (DEA), Monoethanolamine (MEA) and Triethanolamine (TEA): Hormone disrupting chemicals that can form cancer-causing nitrates. In shampoo, shaving cream and bubble baths. Restricted in Europe. No alternatives necessary.

4. Phthalates: Large group of chemical compounds used in cosmetics such as nail polish. Affects lung, liver and kidney in the developing testes of male embryos.

Instead: Use nail polish without phthalates, which can be found in health food stores.

5. Triclosan: Synthetic antibacterial with chemical structure similar to Agent Orange. EPA registers it as a pesticide. In a class of chemicals suspected of causing cancer.

Instead: Use bio-enhanced grapefruit seed extract.

6. DMDM and Imidazolidinyl (Urea): Two of many preservatives often releasing formaldehyde that may cause many symptoms, including joint pain, allergies, depression, headaches, and chest pains.

Instead: Use Japanese Honeysuckle plant.

7. Polyethylene Glycol (PEG): Carcinogenic petroleum ingredient that leaves the skin vulnerable to bacteria. In oven-cleaners and used to dissolve oil and grease.

Instead: Use gentle cleansing products such as Planteren or Organic Essentials.

8. Parobens: Found in underarm deodorants and other cosmetics. These chemicals have been discovered in breast cancer tissue.

Instead: Use bio-enhanced grapefruit seed extract or colloidal silver.

9. Alcohol, Isopropyl (50-40): Drying, irritating solvent that strips skin of moisture, creating vulnerability to bacteria and viruses. Made from a petroleum derivative also found in shellac and antifreeze.

Instead: Use bio-enhanced grapefruit seed extract.

10. Mineral Oil: Coats skin like plastic, interfering with ability to eliminate toxins. Promotes acne and slows down skin and cell development. Causes premature aging of skin.

Instead: Use Ceramides, jojoba, grapeseed oil, or any organic vegetable oil.

11. FD&C Color pigments: Synthetics from coal tar that deposit toxins on skin. Absorption into body can cause depletion of oxygen and death. Animal studies have shown almost all are carcinogenic. No alternatives necessary.

12. Fragrances: Many toxic and carcinogenic. Some contain animal urine. Cause a host of symptoms and affect the nervous system.

Instead: Use aromatherapy and organic essential oils.

We don t allow food or drugs to be sold until they are shown to be safe, but thousands of synthetic chemicals on the market have never been tested for safety. Even fewer have been tested in combination with other chemicals.

However, we do have alternatives. We can find them in health food stores, books to make your own skin care products and from professionals such as aestheticians, nutritionists and alternative health practitioners.

Remember, carefully read the labels on skin products before purchasing or using.

From Julie Chertow:

Here is a response I wrote to someone who asked me how petro chemicals are dangerous and what is hazardous about them.

Hello! What I can tell you is that from any processed foods and packaged foods, environmental pollution and from all the products we use (Hair sprays, shampoos, deodorants, toothpaste's, soap, lotions, face wash and creams, laundry soap, dish soap etc...) all but a few brands have LOTS of petrochemicals in them. Anything with Sodium Laurel Sulfate, Propylene Glycol, and DEA amongst many many others. Propylene Glycol is the exact ingredient that is in anti-freeze for your car, in hydraulic brake fluids, concrete floor cleaners, engine degreasers, paint, etc.. Sodium laurel sulfate makes things foam and propylene glycol keeps moisture in so it can pour out of the bottle easier.

These go right into our mouths, through our skin, through our scalp, through our tissue right into our brain receptors and into our blood, organs, nervous system and more. They release a toxic petrochemical gas that builds up a microfilm over our receptor sites, which are at every nerve ending.

When this happens, the brain cannot receive a clear signal for proper functioning (the synapse firing between the brain and nerve endings become highly compromised) and the human growth hormone shuts down, the immune system shuts down, the thyroid shuts down and nothing is working normally.

These chemicals accumulate and do not leave the body when you urinate or sweat. So day after day, week after week, month after month, and year after year this daily usage is the answer to your question as to why there is so much cancer and diseases like never before. Take a moment and think about this. This is why in the past 20 years especially we have seen such a huge rise to hormonal problems, infertility, cancers of all kinds, auto immune diseases like fibromyalgia, MS, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's disease and disorders like depression, Bi-Polar, memory loss, fatigue.

Well, the good news is that through a lot of research the only thing found that literally digests petrochemicals from the receptor sites are Therapeutic Grade essential oils with high sesquiterpenes compounds and high phenols, such as those found in Frankincense, Helichrysum, Lavender, Myrrh, Melissa, Sandalwood, Oregano, Thyme and Peppermint.

If you want to view a physical demonstration of this, get a styrophome cup and put one or two drops of the orange oil or probably any oil and within a minute it starts to eat a hole right through it! The styrophome is a petrochemical. This is a great way to watch how the oils work inside of ourbodies.

Gary Young blended Brain Power because it has every oil in it with the highest sesquiterpenes. You can put one or two drops on your finger and rub on the inside of each cheek and them a drop on your tongue and push up against the roof of your mouth and them breathe deeply in and hold a vision of it moving up and over your brain.

Also, Oregano and Thyme are excellent when used on the spine, but if it ever burns always use vegetable oil and never water to wipe away the burn. These two oils are hotter oils and could cause a burning sensation. And wash hands after to avoid contact with your eyes.

You can diffuse Frankincense, Lavender, Brain Power, Clarity to breathe them in even more as well.

Next time you order from Young Living, order "Rub a Dub Dub, Is cancer in your tub?" It talks all about the petrochemicals in all the products. Young Living products have no petrochemicals and are fantastic!! You can use the dentratome toothpaste for deodorant as well and it totally works even at the end of a whole day you don't smell! Just use a tiny dab under each armpit and you will see what I mean!!!!!

Julie Chertow~

Here's a link to a website that tells what's in the cosmetics you put on your skin:
www.cosmeticsdatabase.com
Please pass this on far and wide.

Kathy Wilson
4514 155th St. NW, Gig Harbor, WA 98332
Phone: 253.853.4033
Fax: 253.853.4034
Email: Kathy@warrior-priestess.com