8 easy ways to detox your home!

8 EASY WAYS TO DETOX YOUR HOME!

You may have done some weird green drinking, herb taking detox in order to eliminate internal toxins from your body, but can you say that you have done anything about the toxins in your home? 

The average home contains up to 1000 chemicals, many of which we are unable to see or smell. Unfortunately the air inside our home is three times more polluted that outside  and here in Ballarat in winter we spend so much time indoors. 

Common household and body care products are increasingly being found to have negative health effects and while these chemicals may be tolerated individually and in small doses, problems can arise when one is exposed to them in combination. They can have an effect on any of our nervous, immune, reproductive, endocrine, cardiovascular, and respiratory systems.

Detoxing our bodies and our living spaces will allow the body’s own detoxification to function more efficiently. This strengthens our resilience to the daily onslaught of factors impacting our health.

You could choose to change one thing a week or one a month or heck just choose one full stop and it will be moving in the right direction…

Tip One

No shoes inside thank you very much!

Yep- it’s that easy. That’s how a lot of dirt pesticides and lead can enter your home.

Tip two

Keep the air clean.

Try opening your doors and windows as much as possible to circulate the stale and toxic air (hard here in Antarctica in winter, I know!)

Tip three

Have indoor plants

Plants remove toxins from the air and renew stale air by exchanging carbon dioxide with oxygen. Read our previous blog post on indoor plants here…

Tip four

Switch from standard household cleaners to greener, safer options.

It’ll be safer and cheaper and not to mention, fun to explore mixing up some concoctions!

Tip five

Replace skin care products with less toxic, chemical free products

On average a woman can be exposed to 500 different chemicals in a day from her daily beauty routine. I personally love Twenty8 skin care and use coconut oil for near everything.

Tip six

Keep plastic to a minimum

Some plastics contain BPA, linked to cancer and others phthalates, which are linked to weight gain and developmental problems. Storing food in glass and ceramics is a safer option.

Tip seven

Check for mould

Check your windows and walls for moulds and remove promptly. Mould is extremely toxic especially to children and babies.

Tip eight

Avoid toxic ‘stinkin thinkin’

Finally no amount of detoxification of the body or the home is as important as removing the toxic thoughts. A house full of resentment, jealousy or unhappiness will be just as toxic!

A FUNctional way to detox your home!

Studies have shown that the inside of the home is more toxic than the outside. Along with regularly opening up doors and windows, one way of the best ways to combat this is by using indoor plants

Indoor plants reduce indoor pollution by sucking toxins through their leaves and their soil and root system remove toxic vapours. They also purify and renew stale air by exchanging carbon dioxide with oxygen. Variety is 'the spice of life' and plants adhere to this rule. Different plants remove different toxins so it is best to have a variety of indoor plants. Cactus's for example are ideal to sit in you office as they are great at sucking up the EMF emanating from your computer

I personally have at least one plant in every room of my house. It becomes quite addictive, and just like tattoos - once you get one, you just want to keep getting more!

You can train your Kids like robots!

It's true -you could train them to massage your feet and bring you a beer! That's not quite what I discovered whilst on my health mission but it is true that the first 7 years of a person's life controls 95% of the rest of their life.

Why is this you ask?

EEG's taken of babies and children show they are in  low frequency brain waves known as delta and theta. This is the same state as hypnosis (You will change your own nappy, I repeat, you will change your own nappy!) At 7  it changes to our adult brain waves known as Delta and Beta.  We all know that babies and kids learn by observation. In this hypnotic state they are basically just downloading behaviours, beliefs and worldly wisdom from their parents into their subconscious mind. And once its there-

It controls their biology for the rest of their lives!

As an adult, if your conscious mind wanders (that's the part of your brain that controls your wishes and desires) it will default back to the subconscious mind. It is believed that most people spend 95% of their time on their subconscious mind..........

so basically most of the time your living the life of someone else's beliefs. How many times do you think- My God I just sounded like my mother!

So apparently the areas of your life you are struggling with is likely to be a conflict between your desires (conscious mind) and your beliefs (subconscious mind) Is it any wonder that you do everything to be wealthy but seem to get nowhere when as a child you were told

"Money doesn't grow on trees"
"Money's hard to come by"
"You have to work hard and long hours to make money"   and anyway
"rich people are selfish!"

So what can you do to change these beliefs you were fed as a child. The answer is to live more in the MOMENT. Try and stay in your conscious mind and believe me it is hard to do. Try being in the moment for a minute, then in the moment for a Monday and then maybe for the month of  May!

As for my kids- I'm trying to teach them about nutrition and be a good example. I'm trying to train them like a robot, telling them things over and over again like "It's important to love yourself", "You are amazing", " You can do anything you want when you grow up, as long as it makes you happy:" So that when they grow up they Love and respect themselves and their bodies, have a job they Love and if they have any tough times know that they are amazing!

If you want to know more a great book is 'Buddhism for mothers'  by Sarah Napthali or google anything on this topic from Bruce Lipton

A letter to the 18 year old me! Pre- M.S diagnosis

I wish I knew then what I know now!

Dear 18 year old me,

In 7 years time you will be diagnosed with M.S, an auto-immune disease that will greatly affect you and those you love. It’s not one thing that causes it, it’s everything! So here are a few tips of things that I have learnt along my journey that will prevent this from occurring.

*The world today is quite toxic, you must do all you can to remove toxins from your body. They are coming to you in the form of the food you eat, the air you breathe, the water you drink, the things you put on your skin and even your toxic thoughts.

*Please note that your often occurring farting is NOT ok just because you have 3 older brothers but a warning sign that something wrong is going on inside your gut. Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine 2000 years ago said “All chronic disease begins in the gut”

*So PLEASE investigate foods that you are intolerant to. Even though they may be ok for someone else, they are causing inflammation in YOUR gut.  I’ll save you the trouble.....for you its gluten and dairy!

*Please take note of the other warning signs, i.e.: the acne you’ve just developed especially as you never had it in your early teens when others did- another sign of inflammation in your body.  The little pot belly you’ve always had- it’s not just cause Mum has it too- It’s inflammation!

*I want you to get your mercury fillings removed that you had put in as a child; every time you chew toxic mercury vapour is released into your body. There is a strict protocol for the disposal of mercury into the environment but apparently it’s ok to put it in to people’s mouths!

*Please buy a water filter. The chlorine they put in the water to kill bacteria will also kill the good bacteria in your gut, imperatively needed for digestion. Not to mention the added fluoride in our water that is causing an iodine deficiency and your thyroid to slow.

*Don’t play with plastic toys and especially don’t put them in your mouth (hang on- your too old for toys, but I had to put that in to make it relevant to my blog!) Most plastic toys are made from non- renewable petroleum that contains many chemicals including arsenic, lead, bromine, chlorine, BPA, mercury and phthalates. If you don’t play with toys anymore be mindful of the amount of plastic you are exposed to. Packaged foods, receipts and food storage to name just a few.

*Pay attention to the things you are putting on your skin and using to cleaning your house (not that you have one yet) All of the products you are currently using contain chemicals. On average a woman puts 500 chemicals on her body per day through all her body care products! Recent research has classified that two chemicals commonly found in beauty products- parabens and phthalates as obesogens, meaning they promote fat storage in the body (remember phthalates in toys- hello chubby bubby!) MSG and fructose also have this same effect (rampant in processed foods these days) which brings me to the next tip.

*Just eat REAL food- not packaged, denatured chemically altered, low fat, high carb CRAP. Investigate into the Primal diet (It’s not a fad yet) But hey, it’s only been around for about 2 million years. It’s the way your paleolithic ancestors ate and they didn’t get M.S (or Alzheimer’s or cancer for that matter). Eat as organically as much as you can afford at each stage of your life. Eating organic grass fed meat is specifically important as grain-fed cattle are toxic! Your body stores toxins in your fat (hello muffin top) so the more toxins you ingest the more fat that will follow! Fat does not make you fat Jane- toxins do!

*Take note: DO NOT go running around like a headless chook, doing one thing only whilst thinking of the next task. It will only cause your adrenals to be exhausted. It is not your god given right as a woman to multi-task! Your future husband will break his leg 6 weeks before the wedding! You will run on adrenaline for weeks, working full time, organizing a wedding, and taking care of your beloved invalid. SLOW DOWN- this is just further depleting your adrenals, where cortisol is made, a hormone needed to calm the inflammation down consequently there because you’re living off low fat yogurt crap and exercising heaps too loose a few kilos for the wedding. Is there any wonder that you will suffer from you first M.S attack on your honeymoon!

*Quit your Interior design course half way through.  You don’t have to finish it just because you don’t like anything to get the better of you. It’s ok to reassess your life and take a different direction. You won’t enjoy decorating other people’s houses in the end anyway!

*So, find your life purpose! Hang on maybe you ARE supposed to get M.S so you can research all this stuff and spread the word to your family and friends?!

*The most important lesson that I have learnt is to be kind to yourself! If you talked to your friends the way you talk to yourself then you wouldn’t have any!!  You would never expect as much from them as you do yourself. YOU are the MOST important person in YOUR life (have you ever noticed that in EVERYTHING you do, you’re there?!)

Best of luck

Love from 33 year old me. Xx