A Canary in the Coal Mine

I have spent most of the last 13 years of my life avoiding talking too much one very specific topic. My chronic pain. I never wanted to focus on it outwardly because it rules my life hindering so much of what I want to do with my life and how I exist day to day. Beyond the cursory acknowledgment of it I didn’t want to go into what it actual is like living with it. In short - a nightmare.

The diagnosis

I was diagnosed with trigeminal neuralgia when I was 28 in 2012. The story of that diagnosis is longer than I’d like to spend here talking about it - so perhaps in another post I’ll dive into those details. For now, suffice to say, I received the diagnosis and realized my life would never be the same.

Finding My Way

In the aftermath of the diagnosis and ongoing tests and doctors trying (and failing) to help I have spent the days, months, and years following studying and trying to figure out exactly what could be done to help me.

Within a year of being diagnosed I realized that my body had begun to act as a canary in a coal mine. The first time I realized this was when I noticed the pattern of getting a very large flare up of pain after I dyed my hair. After this realization I brought this information to one of my doctors and she told me that there are people whose illness/pain can be exacerbated by the products we use every day. After realizing my body needed to go non-toxic I did a lot of reading and ingredient list searching and carefully chose brands and products for my home.

I learned time and time again I’d developed a new superpower - I could tell you something was toxic just by how my body reacted to being near it. I learned the hard way that I could tell you a shampoo ingredient list had changed because of a flare up that happened unexpectedly after using a new bottle only to find out the company had been sold and they changed their ingredient list. I could tell you that cleaner that stated it was clean and non-toxic in fact was toxic. This came with a lot of learning about myself and with a lot of time reading the evidence that already exists when it comes to products and ingredients we come into contact with every day.

Crunchy Moms and the Lies of Greenwashing

At some point it became somewhat in style to be a crunchy mom and to go all natural and rid your home of toxins. I was relieved by this push and hoped that if enough people jumped on the bandwagon that the companies had to change. Sadly, much of it was led by greenwashing and companies preying on their ability to market fear instead of the honest truth. The truth being that there is much still needed to be done. It was a marketing ploy that those who did it by choice and not necessity quickly grew tired of.

I grew tired of it too but my body never let me forget that I had no choice. I was doing this because even though it never ended my pain there were modicum amounts of improvements made and I never want to lose ground or cause more flare ups. No one wants to live in constant mind numbing pain.

Hopes for True Health and Autonomy

I worry we’ve reached a point of exhaustion and the ground we could have gained to make the world and the products that we have access to non-toxic may be lost. I understand the exhaustion. Believe me I do. I get sick of reading labels. I get sick of having to find new products that work because my favorite deodorant company got bought out and the ingredients changed. It IS exhausting. It’s why I started this blog in 2014 because I had learned so much and I wanted to be able to share products I loved and trusted.

I also understand people wanting to throw the baby out with the bathwater as the political climate is raging. It can be enough for people to throw in the towel. With all that said, I don’t have a choice and I’m not the only one stuck trying to manage chronic pain and illness - I’m not the only canary in the coal mine.

My hope is to encourage little changes as you go without stressing about what ingredients you’ll tackle next in your home. Unless you are like me and the products are actively causing you issues now there’s no reason to ransack your home and throw everything away. Replace as you go and be at peace with your decisions.

From this canary in the coal mine to you: The studies are there read for you to find and read. The agencies are over a decade behind what we already know. A perfect picture of this is red no.3. It was taken out of cosmetics before it was banned from food AND food companies have until 2027 to remove it. As stressful as it is to say, it’s up to you. You are the one who has to make the decisions for your home because what we thought existed to keep us safe is far behind what science is pointing to … But please remember as you learn more, just take the next step.