Episode #29: 5 Household Toxins that Harm Your Health

Hey everyone!

Coming-at-you with another brand-new podcast! We are going to talk about 5 toxins commonly found in homes and ways that you can reduce your exposures in your home! On this podcast, we will talk about:

• The Unconventional Wellness Program!
• Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs)
• Pesticides
• Heavy Metals
• Molds and Fungi
• Phthalates and Polyvinyl Chlorides (PVCs)

Enjoy!

Here are the show notes from today's podcast...

Frank: (00:00)
Our homes are an absolutely wonderful place, but unfortunately there also might be some things that are harming our health. Stay tuned for this episode of unconventional wellness radio in which I will discuss a five different toxins that might be circulating around in your home. So stick with us. This is unconventional wellness radio, and we'll be coming at you with this content very, very soon. Hey, everyone, and welcome to unconventional wellness radio as a powerful and inspiring podcast set to revolutionize and disrupt healthcare. It's time to put you in the driver's seat and be the force of change necessary for the lifestyle you've always wanted. Hey, what's going on on convention one, this radio. I am frank. I am your host and I am really excited about this topic today because I had to do some research about this one. And, uh, and I actually never knew that these sorts of things even existed in my home. 

Frank: (00:54)
And so what we're going to talk to you about is we're going to talk to you about probably five or maybe six different toxins that are found inside of your home. Okay. So toxins have done a remarkable job of working their way into our environment. And now we're looking at toxins that are actually in our home because you know, that is our safe space. That's our spot where you know, you would think that you would be coming back to and everything would be completely serene and calm and everything like that. And these things could like be creeping into our life and actually causing us problems. And so we're going to talk about some of these toxins today. So, uh, overall in unconventional wellness, which is a program, it's a holistic health program that I am getting very quickly, uh, ready to release here, uh, in a little while is I am looking at what I call the five pillars of health and the five pillars are health involved nutrition. 

Frank: (01:47)
Well, first of all, let me tell you this, when it comes to living an unconventional wellness lifestyle, the reason why I'm calling it that is because I want to live unconventionally in a very conventional world. Uh, we are dealing with opioid crises that are very alarming in our world. We are dealing with, um, people who are on more medications for various things that we have ever seen. And as a certified PA and as a practicing Pa, I saw lots of issues that all I was trying to do is just fix problems when I really wasn't diving into what is going on to really help this person for that preventative piece. And so like, unfortunately, you know, it causes us to have this like bandaid approach or a pill for every ill approach in our western society. And so therefore we're not really doing anything for a person other than maybe the short term. 

Frank: (02:43)
Right. And so like, I want them to really dive into figuring out like how do we, how do we do this to where somebody really can, can grasp a hold of taking charge of their life and really making the choices that are necessary to the life that they've always wanted. So, you know, I started practicing as an integrative Pa, but I was trained by chiropractic physicians. I was trained by acupuncturist, I was trained by, I'm trained by methodic massage therapist and I really learned some amazing things. I mean, like just recently I had a bout of shoulder pain that an acupuncturist completely took care of, not only just utilizing, you know, needles of course to, to go in there, but I didn't even know that there's electrical stimulation that you can do with needles. Now. I didn't realize that there was these really great, uh, decades and, and honestly, centuries old techniques that have been used to help release the inflammation that is causing the pain, uh, in and around the joints. 

Frank: (03:45)
And I tell you what, like my shoulder feels incredible. I did about four weeks of treatment and it feels fantastic and I didn't do anything else. All I did was I just went in there and an acupuncturist was able to take care of it. So, you know, there are very good means that that are natural and, and non, you know, uh, not toxic in nature, but like nonconventional in nature, uh, where we can go. So like somebody, if they come and see me for shoulder pain, more than likely I'm going to find out, you know, as this is an acute thing or is this chronic, uh, based on that, where does it bother you? What are the limitations? Uh, you know, where's the pain at? Those sorts of things. I ask those types of questions and then we move into a physical exam where I'm trying to do maybe a couple of tests that are, that we refer to as provocative tests to sort of isolate and figure out exactly what is causing their pain. 

Frank: (04:35)
So based on all of what they tell me and then what I come up with on my physical exam, well then you have to move into something called your assessment, which is essentially a diagnosis. So based off of that diagnosis, I have a treatment plan that's already been prescribed. It's already something that is used by and far. It's considered good medical practice. And so I will have them follow that. And you know, most of the time it does. Well, I mean, like, it'll absolutely, you know, usually it's very simple. Um, we, we jokingly used to say, when somebody come in with joint pain or something like that, you know, well, what did you do to cause that pain? Okay, don't do that. Right? And so, um, more often than not, that can't actually work. But the thing is, is that you start getting different limitations because of that pain and inflammation. 

Frank: (05:18)
And it may actually move its way from being just an acute thing. It might work its way into being chronic. And so, uh, with that being said, you know, there's a particular treatment plan that we do and if the, if the discomfort or the symptoms don't go away, we may move on to something like physical therapy and Yada, Yada, Yada, right? And eventually go see maybe even a specialist if it's so bad that, um, somebody needs to do that. So I saw lots and lots of cases like that. And so what I started saying to myself, as I said, there's gotta be a little bit of a different way here. There's gotta be something that we can do to educate the patient in between when they come and see me in order to really be able to help alleviate their issues. And so that's when I started like really finding these unconventional methods, these methods of being able to like and teach and instruct a person to be able to actually say, you know what? 

Frank: (06:04)
I think I can actually do this for myself. And matter of fact, I can get pain free or I can get my limitations resolved or whatever their goal might be and be able to actually do it. And so that's what this program is essentially going to fix this problem of not understanding what we can do ourselves in order to be able to help live a lifestyle that is free of conventional methods and being able to actually have that empowerment to be able to take care of ourselves. And so we, we talked about these, these pillars, right? So I have five pillars that are exactly like that. We have nutrition pillars where we have a nutrition pillar. We have a functional movement pillar, which you know, I don't really like the word exercise, but um, I like to call it functional movement cause you know, if you're functionally fit for life then you're unstoppable. 

Frank: (06:54)
So we have that pillar. We have a pillar of getting better sleep. We have a pillar of removing different toxins out of our life. We're going to talk about some today, but we're going to talk about physical and emotional and social toxins. And then we're going to talk about how to get better sleep and also how to reduce stress. So those are the five pillars. Okay. And so therefore we're going to be talking about pillar number five today, which are unknown household toxins or maybe less known to you. And uh, ways to be able to help reduce those toxin levels. That way they don't cause us trouble in our future. Okay. So there are, uh, you know, very simple ways that these toxins getting in our home. We're going to talk about mainly more so of chemicals, uh, and how they're finding their way into our home. 

Frank: (07:37)
Because like I said, our, our home is our safety net. Our home is our place that we go to to kind of get away from it. Right. For a little while. The thing is though is that somehow these products that have these chemicals are making their way into our houses. And so I want to educate you guys on how to better look for these things. And if they're already in your home, well then what can you do to minimize your exposures in order to maintain good health? Okay. And so let's look at it in terms of sourcing. All right. So like, you know, when you look at your home, you're surrounded by products that have materials that were used in order to make that product, right? So like if I have a, a picture [inaudible] excuse me, that has a nice wooden frame. I'm looking at one right now in my office. 

Frank: (08:24)
Um, you know, the wood is going to be, um, brought in from a certain area. May Be a, could be a different country. Uh, it's going to have a finish on it. It's going to have different things that go into it to make it the final product, which is a frame. Okay. The thing is is that like, you know, unless you understand exactly where everything comes from, which is really, really difficult, then you have to say to yourself, I, there's no way that I can know everything that's in that and I don't know everything that is going to be coming out of that as well. And so, um, you know, these, these different exposures to chemicals over a certain period of time, uh, you know, have been in multiple journals. One of which at that, um, that I'm looking at right now is the British journal of Medicine is it was back in 2004 that there is a lot of different toxins that can cause a lot of different illnesses. 

Frank: (09:14)
Matter of fact, you can even cause cancers. Okay. And so, um, the problem with that is that these chemicals that we come into contact with since they are more often than not, are synthetic, uh, and they're not just simply environmental exposure types of chemicals. Then we would be dealing with our bodies, not knowing how to process them. And so, you know, more often than not, our body just looks at it and goes, wow, that's completely foreign. I have no idea what to do with you. I'm just going to put you in a fat cell and you can just hang out there for the rest of my life. And so the, the problem is is that we don't understand these chemicals other than when disease might happen because of them later on. So like you don't know exactly what the effects are going to be. You don't know if you're going to be immediately affected by something or is it going to take 20 years for you to be effected by someone? 

Frank: (10:02)
Think of, think of as bestest. Right? So like, as best as in smokers, uh, in the last couple of decades we have realized that it had causes. Mel Mesothelioma, we didn't know about that unless people were exposed. We had to make the connection. Then you add a, a environmental exposure to asbestos, right? It's a flame retardant. It used to get sprayed all inside of the materials inside of our walls of our homes and different places that we weren't. Uh, it was literally just that it was a protective method that if the place caught on fire, the asbestos would not burn and the fire would go out. The problem is though is that unfortunately it led to, you know, people who also decided to smoke it can cause Mesothelioma, which is a pretty significant cancer in the lungs. And so anyway, we, we often find the issues of particular products that we use maybe on a daily basis, you know, years after we actually become exposed to them for a chronic period of time. 

Frank: (11:04)
So anyway, I say all of that because I just wanted to have a brief overview of sort of like how that works. Okay. So let's talk about five, maybe six, whatever. Let's talk about some different environmental exposures that come into your home and actually can be a household toxin for you. The first one that comes to mind is something called a volatile organic compound. Okay. Volatile means that it has the capability of kind of getting out into the air. Okay. There are a lot of them. There are hundreds of voc seizes with. Another way that you can also get to know them is that you can actually get those from many, many different sources. Okay. Um, the thing is is that because of the fact that we like really create these really wonderful airtight homes, right? We want to make them energy efficient and you know, like you can't leak a anything out of them or something like that. 

Frank: (11:55)
The problem is that those voc is get out into the atmosphere of your home and they don't have anywhere to go. Okay. So like, you know, you got to think of like upholstery and carpet and stuff like that. Those are the things that are usually going to have them, but they also are in different things like wood products, you know. So like I was talking about the frame earlier. There can be in wood products, they can be in dry clean clothing. They're finding them in shampoos, cosmetics, right? They're finding them an air fresheners, like you're trying to freshen up the air in your home and unfortunately you're putting [inaudible] out into your environment. So you know that you may not have some symptoms that are necessarily related to it, but if you have a pretty significant exposure, you can have some eye problems, some ear problems, some dizziness, you know, and things like that. 

Frank: (12:39)
Longterm exposure can actually increase the risk of cancer, right? Liver or kidney, even central nervous system problems. Uh, but how do we actually get rid of voc? Well, the biggest thing to do with any of those, uh, any of these toxins we're going to talk about is ventilation get ventilation in your home. So if you have the capability of doing that, well, first of all, let's back up one step. Try to look for products that have low voc or zero voc, right? Or by antique. Um, you know, furniture, like don't have smoking happening in your home. Stuff like that. Okay? So that's how we can actually do that. Um, you can also allow things to be opened up outside of your home. I know a lot of us, you know, if we buy a new table or whatever we like just want to hurry up and bring it inside of the house. 

Frank: (13:24)
Well maybe like leave it outdoors for a couple of hours, right? So like unwrap it, leave it outdoors and that sort of thing. Um, that we want to do. Varnish or paint something is also good. Make sure you get a paint or a varnish that of course has low voc fees, but then you definitely want to um, you know, try to control the internal environment of your home. So lower humidity is good. Okay. Keep the temperature in, checked on, let the house get super hot because that'll increase the voc is that can come off of these products and then ventilate your home, open up windows, open up doors as best as you can. Use House fans to kind of blow that air out those doors. And that's a great way to help minimize your exposure of EOC. Here's a big one. Number two on our list is going to be pesticides, pesticides, guys are being found everywhere. 

Frank: (14:14)
I remember just saw a recent article about how pesticides are finding their way in the cheerios. Wow. I mean like I ate cheerio's so much as a kid and I didn't even realize it. You know, you just simply eat cheerios. Right. And it's not to say that, um, you know, the, the, these products are, are horrible, but the problem is, is that there's might be something inside of the product that actually might be causing problems. Okay. And so like they come and sprays and powders and all these different things. You know, I live on a, uh, organic practice farm, which means that we don't spray anything. Like we just, we, we have to go out there and we have to use manual for weeds. We have to pull weeds, we have to dig weeds up. We have to do all these different manual techniques. Yes, it is a labor of love, but we do that because we know that we're actually trying to grow as fresh food as we possibly can. 

Frank: (15:05)
Excuse me. That way we can also try to minimize our exposures to pesticides. Okay. It can cause irritation of really if you inhale it, the eyes, the nose, the ears, throat, stuff like that. Um, these are the ways to get rid of it. You want to buy fresh, organic produce or talk to individuals who may grow their vegetables in what is called with organic practices. You can go to a farmer's market and ask a farmer, you know, how do you grow this? Ask them, do they use pesticides? You know, honestly I put them on their spot. Okay. Some organic pesticides are starting to come out now they're trying to get a little creative with those. But I would just simply say to you, put pesticides on it, period. We don't know if it's safe, organic, used by the EPA or not. Just say, do you put pesticides? 

Frank: (15:52)
If so you might want to move on. Okay. The other thing is is like we don't allow shoes in our house. Okay. Because we don't know, like if we go walk somewhere else, you know, we know that maybe our grounds here around our property are our pesticide free. But the problem is that like, you know, if we go and we like visit a water park or we go and visit a museum park or something like that, you know, folks can use pesticides in those places. And so, you know, we keep the, we keep the shoes outside of our door. It's really simple like that. Okay. Um, another thing is you want to do is consider moving toward nontoxic a natural things. Okay. So like one of the crazy things that we use for helping keep some of these Japanese beetles and some of these other beetles off of our things that we use something called Neem oil. 

Frank: (16:37)
N e m oil totally does not come on to the plant whatsoever, but it completely keeps that bugs in the insects away from are things we use. Uh, other things like, Gosh guys, we've used beer to keep slugs away from things. We'll put like a small jar of beer, like near our garden or whatever. And like, sure enough would come back the next morning and it's full of slugs. And so we do that instead of like having a spray, those harsh chemicals. There's a lot of really good tricks with like, you know, doing cohabitation planning and stuff like that. Like you can plants different types of things like that will keep certain bugs away. So do your research and figure out ways that you can be able to do that. Um, if you can't, okay. The next thing is that we want to talk about is mold and other funguses that you can find inside of your, inside of your homes. 

Frank: (17:24)
Okay. There is a lot of problems with breathing in fungus. Um, I remember being in basic training, this is number three by the way. I remember being in basic training and somebody got really, really, really sick and ended up finding out that they had like this really rare version of pneumonia that came from fungus. Okay. And so, um, you know, as much as 33 people I have a problem with, with mold, all right, there's, there's quite a bit of uh, people who can actually be allergic to it. Okay. Um, the, the way that we want to look at it as you got to minimize exposure. So this is where like if you have a internal cleaning environment or a heating environment or an AC environment, you know, make sure that you keep those ventilated and that you keep the filters changed. And if you would like to use filters that help decrease mold and different allergen exposures, totally awesome. 

Frank: (18:17)
Okay. Look around your home for water that might be seeping out of a, have a shower or might be seeping from around a sink or something like that because warmer a room temperature, water mold does fantastic in it. Okay. Um, and then also keep the humidity of your home below 60%. Okay. Um, if you have different places that remain damp or whatever, consider using a dehumidifier. Okay. Um, make sure that you, um, you know, store those things that you know, might be more, um, you know, able to contain mold or something like that. Store those kind of out in your garage or store them in an outdoor shed or something like that. Don't let them be in your home. Okay. Number four that we want to talk about is heavy metals. Okay. Heavy metals are found predominantly in food. When we look at our food, we've got to think about like where is the food coming from? 

Frank: (19:10)
Like what is the source of our food? So there are different types of things like pesticides. Again, unfortunately our drinking water, sea food, Gosh antiperspirants might actually have, uh, you know, heavy metals in them. And so we want to make sure that we avoid those because those have been linked to cancers and different things like Alzheimer's disease or just general symptoms like nausea, vomiting, um, you know, palpitations, things like that. How do we expose or how do we minimize our exposures to those? Well, we have a water filter. Okay. Um, we use cold water because cold water will leach out heavy metals. Um, if you are, you know, cooking and things like that. So like just make sure that you use cold water. It always, definitely helps. Um, make sure that you do the research to find out like, where is your tuna? Or I should say, where is your seafood coming from? 

Frank: (20:00)
There are low, heavy metal areas that have been actually understood and you can source, uh, those particular types of seafood from those places. So like we look for like ones that are not only, um, you know, ones that are not only uh, you know, grown out in the wild and they're wild harvested, but we're also looking for ones that are actually grown in these particular areas as well. So super important to think about that. Um, if you have a house that was built before, say like the 19, like the late 1970s look into, it's eve, it has led paint. Okay. Definitely do not use any type of a pan that has been coated with Teflon. I tell you what, that was something that I used forever when I was a kid and I mean, you never thought about it because it always the best looking eggs, right? 

Frank: (20:48)
So like now we're realizing that stuff comes off in your food and you can ingest heavy metals that way as well. The last one I want to talk about number five is thalates and polyvinyl chloride. So these are really, really things that we don't understand, but they're the things that give like these cosmetics and fragrances like this, like really long life. It's actually a preservative that we started to create synthetically. Okay. It is found predominantly in plastics. It's something that actually makes plastics like moldable and bendable. Okay. Um, it can be found all over different things like drapes and curtains and mattresses and it's found in our cosmetics because it gives it that like velvety kind of smooth feeling to it. Um, but the big thing is, is that it's found in plastic bottles. So like absolutely never microwave plastic. Um, don't put plastic in your dishwasher because higher temperatures and high humidity will drive these things out and then those things can actually be found in your food. 

Frank: (21:51)
Okay. Um, look for things that contain PVC when you're purchasing them. Uh, don't put anything in, in something that has a PVC in it, like a plastic, definitely don't microwave. Like I said, um, look on the bottom. Okay. Of your bottle and you want to look for a number. That number is a three. Okay. If it has a three, that usually means that it has PVC products inside of it. Okay? Last but not least, keep your home. Well ventilated, guys, that's super important to think about. Okay, so that was it. That was five toxins that we can look at in our home and ways to be able to mitigate those types of exposure. So you know how to contact me, it's [email protected] or better yet, leave me a rating, leave me a review or go join our Facebook page. It's called unconventional wellness with Frank Ritz. I'm going to be on there doing probably daily Facebook lives so you can start getting this material and started getting this information and this value every single day in our Facebook groups of go to unconventional wellness with frank rents. If you're a listener, and please go click in there and come join our tribe. Okay? But that's all I've got for this time. I hope that you enjoy this podcast and we will talk to you again very, very soon on our very next podcast. Take care. Everybody. Have a great week.