Most people seeking to be healthier, whether pre-conception or otherwise, know enough to clean up the diet: throw out or limit the junk, transfats, dyes, and try to eat organic and hormone free. But did you ever think of what’s entering your body through your everyday slather of hand lotion, spritz of perfume, or lipstick?
When I was little, I used to think human skin was just like saran wrap, some inert substance that kept the bag of innards and blood from falling out. Skin, however, is much more than that. It’s the body’s largest organ.
People rarely think about the permeability of skin. It’s waterproof–you take a bath, you don’t become waterlogged, but it is permeable. That’s why things like nicotine patches work–it goes through your skin. A study by Greenpeace found all sorts of nasty chemicals in something some people put on their skin every day: PERFUME.
Consider this, when you eat something, it has to go through your gastrointestinal system, which is also a detoxifying system of sorts: enzymes start working in the saliva, you have hydrochloric acid in your stomach, further vetting processes in the intestines. But something applied topically goes right through your skin and has a must faster route into your bloodstream; and if the stuff offgasses (say, with solvents like nail polish remover), you also breathe it in, and then it goes from the alveoli in your lungs right into your bloodstream–who hasn’t felt a little high after cleaning their nailpolish? People working with toxic pesticides, for instance, have been killed merely by spilling a little on themselves or breathing fumes–never mind ingesting it.
There are some 800 largely untested, unregulated chemicals in cosmetics (even so called “organic” ones) that are not allowed for similar use in Europe. That’s some food for thought.
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