how toxic are you?

Cancer is a new disease, so are diabetes, syndrome X, "heart disease" and host of other impediments that did not exist 1000 or so years ago.

Free Radicals, rancid fats, undigestable foods, irradiated foods, preservatives, artificial sweeteners and other toxic substances are prevalent in everywhere in our daily lives, from the toothpastes we use to the grass fed beef we think we are eating that is serving us.

Cosmetics:
Our skin is our largest organ, and it will pretty much start to absorb anything it comes in contact with, eventually some of that "stuff" will enter our body and our circulation. That said, isn't it interesting to see how many cosmetic products on the market today that are meant to be applied to the skin are not supposed to be consumed by mouth? What got me thinking about this was an excerpt I read from an upcoming book by Myra Mychelle Eby, founder of Mychelle dermaceuticals(www.mychelleusa.com). She brings the point to the table that we should be able to eat anything that we are going to put on the body - the sking, hair etc.
There is a host of "toxic" ingredients used by the cosmetic industry, some of the more problematic ones are EDTA, parabens and propylene glycol.

let's take a deeper look at one of them: parabens.
more info here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parabens

basically anything that starts with a methyl, ethyl, propyl etc, these are "esters" of para-hydroxybenzoic acid. I'll save you the chemistry and get down to the problem.
These substances when rubbed onto your body have an estrogenic effect - they disrupt your endocrine system, more estrogen in your body will mean it will be harder for you to lose body fat, get pregnant as well as a host of other issues.

Environmental hazards....
There's a whole bunch of chemicals in your laundry detergents, dishwashing soap, carpets, car seats, etc etc. Now, we can argue that the effects of these chemicals is neglible in the big picture, but think about about the fact that for most hours of the day you are in contact with some for of clothing. Now think about the phosphates and other harsh chemicals in the detergent and maybe the dryer paper that are now sitting around on your clothing, which is touching your skin all day long.

Plastics we might eat from:
I know very vey few people who don't consume hot subtances from some type of disposable container. On occasion, when I get my grilled chicken breast for lunch, if there was cheese on it, I have often experienced the hot cheese burning holes in my styrofoam plate. Thankfully on the most part I have mitigated that problem either by placing the hot chicken on a bed of lettuce or eating the chicken at the salad bar. What about all that coffee and tea that is drunk from disposable plastic or paper cups?
FYI - starbucks: http://www.dispatch.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2007/09/17/starbucks.ART_ART_09-17-07_A1_IF7U38O.html?sid=101
Even with most cups that appear to be paper based, there is a plastic (usually) polyethylene lining on the cup.

If you are heating a bunch of food up in your favorite plastic tupperware.... you're really asking for it, especially if the food is higher in fat.
The heat and fat litterly absorb checmicals into the food which you then ingest. Let's say per serving of tupperware-heated food we can add 3-5 points on the toxic scale.

Most other food packaging materials will leach some toxicity into you food, how much will be a function of the food, the temperature and the material used.

Now we get to the fun part... food that we cook...
If you aren't already eating "certified organic" then you really should, think of the extra cost as health insurance. There have been tales of conventional fruits and veggies, irradiated and frozen for up to year until the distributor decides they are in season and they appear in the grocery store.

So anyway, let's take a couple of conventionaly veggies for example. most likely,they have been genetically modified to look more colorful and lucious, had artificual nitrogen based fertilizers added to the soil to speed up the growth cycle, been sprayed with herbicides, pesticides, fungicides to ensure that little creatures don't get to it before you do, then possibly waxed to give it a slight shine.

Now you buy said veggies and take them home, slice them up, put a table spoon of olive oil in a pan and sautee them with some herbs or whatever.

What you think: "I'm getting a healthy seving of fresh veggies"

What is really going on:
unless you really washed the veggies real good before you cooked it, you are now mutating the toxins even more into a bunch of different substances. Then if you are cooking on your trusty non stick pan, there's some toxicity from the teflon coating on the pan that will enter your food.
Remember also that due to the fact that the veggies are probably not fresh, the enzymatic activity is really low, meaning it will put a higher than necessary burden on your pancreas and other digestive organs to produce extra enzymes to digest and absorb the food.


And that's just from a little veggie, imagine how burdened and toxic your digestive system must get from conventional cooked meat full of hormones and antibiotics?

the problem is that the effects from toxicity do not occur overnight, it might take some months to develop some heartburn or become "intolerant" to something and then slowly as your body is degenerating at a cellular level, free radicals are bombarding you and causing mutations until you reach a point that the body capcity to fight off the free radicals is compromised enough to cause a mutation that will result in one of a bunch of degenerative, auto-immune or life threatening diseases.

A couple of nuggets that might help, most of which are common sense:
- eat organic as much as possible.
- use natural products on yourself and everything you will in contact with, check out Mychelle, Melaleuca and seventh generation
- cook food as little a possible
- take an enzyme blend, preferably from enrichinggifts.com
- take a bunch of anti-oxidants everyday, I take about 2-3g of Vit C, 800IU of Vit E, some grapeseed extract and some greens supplements. (this is probably the most important since you are continually being bombarded by radicals)
- use sunscreen.... unfortunately the ozone layer is damaged and the suns rays are not as therapeutic as you may think.
- Use an internal "cleansing" product every couple of months
- purify your water with a filter before drinking and drink your bodyweight in pounds divided by two in ounces everyday to wash soluble toxins out.