Detoxing My Home

****UPDATED****

Contest is now closed and we have a winner!!

Rachel Rhody, please email me at restorationoilers@gmail.com to claim your prize!!


I know you guys have all heard about detox diets, cleanses and so on.  But do you know what they are used for?  Mainly, detox diets and cleanses are designed to help you rid your body of anything toxic that may be hanging out (especially in your digestive system) so that your body is healthier.  While body detoxing is all the rage (we'll talk about that another day), have you ever thought about the fact that your home might need detoxing, too?  Go take a look under your kitchen sink (or wherever you keep all your household cleaners).  Go on, go look, take a mental inventory of the products and brands that are there.  GO.  This is important.  You need to know what's there.  It'll be important later.
If you're wanting to really make a healthy change for yourself and your family you can't stop with just your groceries or even your personal care products.  One of the most toxic products in American homes is air freshener!  Because the particles are airborne, we breath them in.  If the particles are toxic chemicals and we breath those in, we are doing damage to our health!  If anyone in your family has asthma or other respiratory issues, you understand, because often those products can irritate the airways and cause symptoms to appear or worsen.  But even if you don't have asthma, you are still inhaling toxic junk!  Anytime we come in contact with toxins in our environment, they affect our health in a variety of ways.  You can read here to find out more about some of the worst offenders.
This is all pretty scary, but making major changes can be hard and expensive!  Here's what I recommend:
Start with ONE product.  Just one.  Maybe it's the worst thing you have, maybe it's the one thing you use the most often.  Doesn't matter.  Just pick ONE product and make the switch.
Replace products as you use them up.  This is what I'm doing.  As I empty a container of a product I've been using, I replace it with something better.
You don't have to make all these changes all at once.  Start slowly, do what you can, as you can and eventually you'll be rid of all the toxic cleaning products.
***If you have or have been recently diagnosed with a respiratory disease, consider making some of these changes faster.***

Okay, remember that mental list of products from your stash of cleaning supplies?  Now is the time to dust it off.  Go to this link and find your products to see what toxicity grade they get.  You can search by product type over on the left.

EECK.

Did you look?  Was it bad?  Were you surprised?  For full disclosure purposes, while you were looking at yours, I was looking at mine.  I have STARTED the process of switching to better products.  Because I am aware of the terrible garbage in most of our cleaning products, I have been switching.  I mostly use Young Living Essential Oil's Thieves Cleaner.  (If you want to know more about why I use Young Living products, read here.)  Buuutttttttt, I still have some of the old products. Mostly because I'm a tightwad very frugal person and don't want to waste something I paid for.  So here's what's left under my kitchen sink (I have older kids who have been taught to clean so they avoid my stash of cleaning products like the plague for fear of having to do housework.  If you have littles, I suggest storing them somewhere else, even natural ones):

General bathroom cleaner with bleach:  F 

Toilet bowl cleaner:  D 

Carpet Stain remover: D

My Young Living Cleaner isn't listed on the EWG website, but you can look at a list of the chemicals found in the product and compare it to the list on the EWG website to get a good idea of how harmful the product is.  My guess is that my Young Living cleaner would rate a VERY good grade.  Take a good look at the list of products and the grades some of the "natural" cleaners get.  Not very good, especially when you pay two or three times the price of conventional products for those.  It's super important that we be educated consumers.  If you want what's best for your family you have to arm yourself with knowledge.

So, since you've spent time today arming yourself with knowledge, I think it's time for a little treat.  Comment below with your products' scores on the EWG website and you'll be automatically entered to win a Young Living Fruit and Vegetable Spray!