5 Toxic Ingredients in your Everyday Personal Products
So there has been a TON of talk about ingredients, and buying “organic” skin care and all that jazz. But why is it worth it, and why is your “vegan” “creulty free” personal products not really as great and ethical as you think they are. I compiled a list of 7 of the top ingredients that are on my watch list when I am shopping, and why you need to avoid them.
#1 Parabens
What a shock, it’s a preservative. Yes, it is nice that your moisturizer and foundation have long shelf lives, but many of these compounds mimic estrogen (our handy dandy female hormone regulating us) this means that it messes with our hormonal cycles and could lead to cases of breast cancer. Even worse, these compounds are also found as preservatives in several shelf stable food items. You can find this ingredient on so many labels because it is an umbrella term for many toxic ingredients that companies do not want to explicitly list.
#2 Synthetic Colors
You know that awesome mascara you have, do you know why it is such a rich black color, two words “coal tar”. Honestly, I have been on this clean living kick for a while now and when I found that out, I actually made a disgusted face out loud! Colors show up on your label with FD&C or D&C this basically dictates whether it belongs to food “F”, or drugs and cosmetics “D&C”. Do an experiment and see if your mountain dew label says yellow 5 on it and there ya go, fake coloring. These are all derived from petroleum or coal products and they are actually banned in Europe! They are suspected to be a carcinogen and increase health risks with use.
#3 DEA Varieties
DEA, TEA, MEA. The sadly ironic fact about many of these ingredients listed are that they mess with specifically female health. These are known possible carcinogens (cancer causing entities) and they disrupt hormonal health so much so that actual trackable changes in your thyroid may occur. These nasty little things can be found it smooth products like soap and moisturizer, in its raw form, the chemical is a translucent, viscous, smooth substance so of course they will use it.
#4 Formaldehyde
THATS RIGHT FOLKS! The same chemical all our favorite serial killers preserve people parts with in dingy basements, and to think it is legal for us to put it on our eyes in eye shadow. It keeps bacteria from growing in our makeup, but is harmful to the point of causing skin allergies, and disrupting our immune systems. So a lot of the other ingredients listed are deemed “possible carcinogens”, however, this has been publicly and legally deemed as a known human cancer causing agent but can still be found in our nail polish, body wash, shampoo, conditioner, facial cleansers, and eye shadow.
#5 Phthalates
So this one is tricky because it is so broad and usually falls under an even broader title “fragrance”. That term basically was put in place so that companies didn’t have to disclose their secret formulas to create these magical scents, however, it also allows them to hide toxic or possibly harmful ingredients under one umbrella term. But what do these do that is harmful, they are endocrine disrupters, which means they can be linked to infertility, birth defects, and other hormonal or pregnancy issues.
How can I Improve My Clean Living Game
“Okay Annalisa, thanks for all the info but all this sounds terrifying and I don’t know how to avoid these.” Fair! it is all SO overwhelming and I had no clue where to start or how to find companies actually trying to do whats right and not just greenwash to raise prices. Just so you know, yes I do sell and make some of these businesses my business but that is solely because they stand behind the mission of changing the industry for better, higher performing ingredients, and company transparency.
1. Beautycounter. Personal Care gold mine! If you want to begin your safer living journey with your skin, this is the perfect place to begin.
2. Young Living. So oils aren’t your peak of interest? Perfect I love the non toxic toothpaste! Poke around and see all the amazing products and enroll for your own kit!
3. Antler (I know I know, it’s my own brand, but it abides by all these rules to avoid the dangers listed above) We carefully source and select ingredients and we test out our products ourselves before ever putting them online.
