#30 – Detox in a Toxic World, Part 1: Understanding Environmental Toxins and Their Impact on Health

Today we’re kicking off a new series, Detox in a Toxic World, with a deep dive into environmental toxins and their impact on health. In this episode, we break down what environmental toxins actually are, how they affect the body, and why this topic is both real and often wildly misunderstood. We walk through the major categories of toxins in modern life, including microplastics, pesticides, mycotoxins, heavy metals, food additives, and synthetic dyes, and explain the key mechanisms through which they may drive inflammation, oxidative stress, hormone disruption, mitochondrial dysfunction, and more.

We also explore one of the biggest questions in this space: why do some people seem to tolerate environmental exposures just fine, while others develop chronic symptoms and disease? This episode is here to give you a more balanced, evidence-based, and deeper look at a topic that is too often led by fear, oversimplification, and misinformation, so you can better understand what matters, what may not, and how to think about your health more clearly.

Companion Guide: drmaryellawood.com/guides 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Welcome to the Trip Lab, kitchen table conversations about integrative medicine and psychedelics. I'm your host and attending physician, Dr. Mariella Wood. Hi everyone, welcome back to the Trip Lab. Today we're actually doing something a little bit different, and that is starting a small podcast series with a companion guide on my website all about environmental toxins and health. So the truth is, environmental toxins are real, and they really do impact health in real ways. The other truth, the other side of things, is that there is a ton of fear-mongering out there on this topic as well. And I'll be honest, this topic is really complex. The environment is complex, the human body is also beautifully complex. So what I really want to do with this series is take this topic and help you understand it within that complexity, which is why this has turned into a full series so we can actually do that really well. So today we're going to start by looking at environmental toxins, breaking down what they are and how exactly they impact our health, what we do know, what we don't know. So that's going to be today. We're also going to dive into what I think should be a much bigger elephant in the room in this space, and that is why exposures seem to affect some people so much more than others. So why do some people develop debilitating neurologic symptoms, hormone imbalances, chronic dysfunction, while others don't? And the answer I think is actually pretty interesting, and we'll definitely get into that at the end of this podcast. Then, after today, in the coming weeks, we'll talk about all the things that you can start doing to reduce the exposures that matter most, how you can support your body's natural detox mechanisms, and we'll talk all about what that means. We'll dive into detox supplements because there's a lot of misinformation about that. There actually are some supplements that can be helpful, some not so much, and some are actually dangerous. We'll talk all about the overhyped wellness marketing that comes around detox and detox supplements and protocols. Often, I will say recommended by people who are not doctors and who did not go through 12 plus years of formal medical training to understand the complexity of the human body. And then finally, we'll end the series by widening the lens just a little bit and looking at digital detox and how technology and things like electromagnetic fields may actually be impacting our health too. So for this series, I've actually created companion guides to go along with all these episodes. And these can be found on my website at drmariellawood.com forward slash guides. So D-R-M-A-R-Y-E-L-L-A-W-O-O-D.com forward slash guides. These companion guides will contain all of the information that we talk about in the podcast episodes, and then they'll also go a little bit deeper with some brand recommendations, none of them sponsored, I will add, and some other things that you can do, resources, websites, things like that. So definitely check those out if you find this topic interesting and you want a more organized view, other than a podcast, of everything that we're going to be going over. But today's episode, we're going to start with the beginning. What are environmental toxins and how do they actually impact health? Because before we get into how to reduce exposures, how to support the body's natural detox pathways, or how to separate real science from overhyped wellness marketing, we need to first understand what these toxins actually are and how they affect the body. So, as unfortunate as it is, these exposures are now fully a part of our modern life. They're in our food, our water, air, our homes, our products, and just the whole environment in general. And what actually becomes pretty clear once you start looking at the science is that many of these exposures affect the body through some of the same recurring pathways. They drive oxidative stress, increase inflammation, disrupt hormones, damage our mitochondria, alter immune signaling, and just put more burden on the systems involved in our natural detoxification and elimination pathways. Now, that does not mean that every toxin causes every disease like the internet makes you believe, and it definitely does not mean that every scary claim floating around online is true. But it does help explain why this conversation keeps coming up around fertility issues, neurologic symptoms, hormone imbalances, cancer risk, autoimmune disease, metabolic dysfunction, and just other chronic illnesses. So we're gonna walk through those main mechanisms of how toxins actually affect the body, because I think the framework is actually much more useful than just memorizing a scary list of chemicals. Then we are gonna dive into the major categories of toxins so we can understand them a little bit better. So that includes microplastics, synthetic chemicals, pesticides, mycotoxins which come from mold, heavy metals, food additives, and synthetic dyes. Then we're gonna answer that question that I mentioned in the beginning, which is why toxins seem to hit some people so much harder than others. So let's just get into all of that. So first the mechanisms. How do these toxins impact the human body? So the first major mechanism is oxidative stress and DNA damage. So oxidative stress happens when the body is generating more damaging reactive molecules, what we call free radicals, than it can neutralize. So when that happens, those molecules can damage cell membranes, proteins, mitochondria, and DNA. And actually many of the environmental toxins appear to do this. There is a 2025 study of children living in agricultural communities, where researchers found significantly higher levels of 8OHDG, which is a biomarker of oxidative DNA damage, along with other higher inflammatory markers compared with children in a reference community. There's also studies showing heavy metal exposure has also repeatedly been associated with higher oxidative stress and more DNA damage markers. So clinically, oxidative stress and DNA damage are actually early steps in many diseases. So repeated DNA injury can increase mutation risk and contribute to cancer. Oxidative damage to mitochondria can impair energy production and contribute to fatigue, metabolic dysfunction, and neuroinflammation. And when this process keeps activating inflammatory and immune pathways, it can drive fertility issues, cardiovascular disease, neurodegeneration, possibly autoimmune disease in susceptible people. So when people say toxins may increase risk of cancer, infertility, or chronic disease, part of that claim comes from that oxidative stress and DNA damage part of the picture. Next, a big one is endocrine disruption. So these chemicals are actually called EDCs or endocrine disrupting chemicals. So some of these toxins actually mimic hormones, block hormone receptors, alter hormone metabolism, or change how hormonal signals are sent and received. BPA is a more clear example because it mimics estrogen and has actually been linked in human and translational research to reproductive conditions like endometriosis, fibroids, and infertility. Phthalates are anti-androgenic, meaning that they can interfere with testosterone signaling and have been associated with lower testosterone and poor semen parameters in men. Then we have perchlorate, which works more on the thyroid system, so it actually blocks iodine uptake, which is an essential nutrient that the thyroid needs to make thyroid hormones. And we actually have data showing that exposure during pregnancy has been associated in human studies with altered thyroid hormone production. And I think this part of the story is actually very relevant to not only just hormones and fertility, but hormones regulate so much in our body. They regulate our metabolism, mood, brain development, and immune system. So when hormone systems are disrupted, it causes a long cascade of downstream effects. So related to that is actually the impact on metabolic function outside of the hormones. So some of these toxins are actually called obesogens because they disrupt how the body regulates weight, appetite, insulin signaling, fat storage, and metabolism. So BPA, phthalates, and some PFAs fall into this category. And to bring the evidence in, because my goal with this is to be really evidence-based, we actually have human data on this. In a widely cited JAMA study of US children and adolescents, higher urinary BPA levels were significantly associated with obesity, and participants in the highest exposure quartile having about a 2.6 times the odds of obesity compared with those in the lowest quartile. Now, this may also be because of food choices associated with plastic packaging rather than the plastics themselves. It's hard to tell from this study, but I think it's pretty interesting. Another mechanism that we have that we kind of mentioned earlier is mitochondrial dysfunction. So mitochondria are the energy-producing structures inside our cells. When they aren't working well, the body becomes less efficient at producing energy, handling glucose, burning fat, and regulating inflammation. So I think that right there is actually one clue as to why toxins may affect different people differently. So there's some things that we can do to actually test for genetically predisposed mitochondrial dysfunction. We can also look at baseline inflammation. One specific thing that I look for often is a gene mutation called the MTHFR gene mutation. This is just one example. So if you have a mutation in this gene, you're less effective at methylating or activating the molecules in the body and certain detox pathways. The next mechanism we have is immune system dysregulation and inflammation. So you can start to see here that even though these are different mechanisms, they all impact all of the mechanisms that we're talking about. So we've seen some of these environmental toxins increase pro-inflammatory signaling in the body and shift our immune cells into a more reactive state. PFAs are one example that has been increasingly linked in multiple studies to these pathways. I think this mechanism is a really important one to parse out because we are seeing increasingly that chronic inflammation contributes to insulin resistance, vascular dysfunction, neuroinflammation, and other neurodegenerative diseases, gut barrier disruption, and abnormal immune system activation. There was a 2025 review on environmental and occupational contributors to autoimmune and inflammatory diseases that concluded that a range of exposures, including PFAs, silica, solvents, metals, and pesticides, are actually associated with autoimmune or inflammatory conditions like rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, vasculitis, and inflammatory bowel disease. There's another review, the same year, 2025, that specifically noted that PFAs may promote chronic inflammation and autoimmune disease by disrupting immune regulation and trained immunity. So, we hear people online saying that toxins cause autoimmune disease. I think the more accurate way of saying this is that they aren't necessarily the only cause, but some exposures do appear capable of pushing the immune system towards chronic inflammation and dysregulation, which can increase susceptibility in the right context. The last mechanism that I want to talk about, and this is more of a big picture one, is accumulation over time. Because in real life, most people are not dealing with one dramatic toxin exposure. They're dealing with low-dose, repeated exposures from many different sources over years or a lifetime. So this is where the idea of exposomes come in. The exposome refers to the totality of environmental exposures a person experiences across life, along with the body's individual biological response to them. So more recent exposome research is moving away from the old one toxin at a time model and toward the reality that mixtures and repeated low-level exposures are often what people are actually living with. So I think a better way to understand this and what I explained to my patients is the idea of a total toxic burden, which on one hand, yes, does include multiple environmental exposures. But this whole total toxic burden also looks at genetics, nutrition choices, infections over time, stress, and underlying physiology. So we're starting to get into a little bit why some people have more of an impact from toxins than others. So I think overall, it's very individual, it's all about the big picture, which is why, as we'll see in the following episodes, nutrition, exercise, stress reduction, and other lifestyle factors actually do a lot to balance out the inevitable exposures that we all will have throughout our lifetime. So, with that, a little bit of an overview of the mechanisms of how environmental toxins in general impact the body. Let's look at each of the different major categories of environmental toxins so we can understand each one a little bit better. So, first we'll start with plastics and microplastics. So, just to fully break it down here, plastics are man-made materials. And even when they are recycled, they do not fully disappear or break down into something that's harmless. Instead, they break down into smaller and smaller fragments over time until they become what we call microplastics or even nanoplastics. So tiny plastic particles that are often only visible under a microscope. At the same time, plastics can also release chemicals as they are exposed to sunlight, heat, friction, washing, and general wear, which helps to explain why they generally are everywhere, unfortunately. So some of the more obvious examples are plastic water bottles, food packaging, and other plastic food storage containers. So especially when plastic is touching food, these particles and chemicals can leach into the food and beverages, especially when plastic is heated, microwaved, or repeatedly washed. But unfortunately, these exposures are not just limited to food containers. They're also found in clothing, household dust, personal care products, and the air we breathe. So some common names of plastics and microplastics that you might hear in this category are polyethylene, polypropylene, polystyrene, and polyvinyl chloride, along with other plastic-associated chemicals like BPA, phthalates, and PFAs. And another unfortunate fact is that exposures to these are far more than just a theoretical concern, because they've actually been found in a wide range of human tissue. And a recent JAMA update actually specifically notes that they've been found in the lungs, brain, blood, liver, kidneys, heart, spleen, colon, testes, ovaries, and placenta, which is terrifying. And they've also been detected in breast milk and even in the infant's first stool. And unfortunately, concentrations in human tissue appear to be increasing over time, which is also in parallel with the increase in plastic production. So not only does research show that they are actually being detected in our bodies, but research also shows that microplastics are driving inflammation and damaging our cells and DNA like we talked about earlier. I think one of the more scary studies from the New England Journal of Medicine in 2024 found these chemicals in carotid artery plaques that were removed from patients with life-threatening disease. So they actually found polyethylene in 58%, 58.4% of plaques, and found that patients whose plaques contained these particles had substantially higher risks of heart attacks, strokes, and death. So we're getting a little grim in this podcast, but don't worry, the next ones will be a lot more positive and things that you can do. So moving on. Next we have pesticides. So these are chemicals that are designed to kill weeds, insects, fungi, and other living organisms. And I'll just say that again. They are designed to kill living organisms. So they are biologically active chemicals by design. And major categories of pesticides include organophosphates, herbicides like glyphosate, pariquat, and older organochlorines like DDT. So these ones get to us certainly through our food, but also through lawn and garden care, pest control, and contamination of soil, water, food, and air. And just as an important side note, organic actually does not mean pesticide free. So under USDA standards, organic foods can still contain trace pesticide residues. But if those prohibited residues are found above 5% of the EPA tolerance for that pesticide, the product cannot be sold as organic. So definitely lower, but not zero. But I think the bigger issue is that even though EPA tolerances are designed around safe aggregate exposure, they don't actually capture the real-world problem of repeated low-dose exposures, chemical mixtures, cumulative burden over time, and the fact that some people may simply be more biologically vulnerable than others. So they look at a single dose, not repeated dose over time. So just something to think about. So, how do pesticides impact us? So a lot of it is in the same ways that we've talked about previously. So some of them increase oxidative stress, some act as endocrine disruptors, and some actually directly affect the nervous system. I think one of the clearest examples that we've seen is actually their impact on Parkinson's disease. So the National Institute of Environmental Health and Sciences actually clearly states that pesticides are linked to Parkinson's disease risk. And there's also a recent 2026 study out of UTLA that found that people with long-term exposure to pesticides had more than a 2.5 times the risk of developing Parkinson's disease compared to those without exposure. We're also seeing more and more concerns in the reproductive health world as well. And there's actually reviews from Harvard and more recent endocrine literature that is showing links between certain pesticide exposures and reduced sperm quality, infertility, miscarriage, birth defects, and developmental effects. Correlation does not equal causation, but it's kind of pointing in that direction. Definitely needs to be more studies, but just something to note again. So the next category we have are mycotoxins, which are toxic compounds produced by certain molds. So these show up in water damaged buildings, damp indoor environments, and sometimes actually in contaminated foods too. Now, this one I do want to really break down and explain clearly, because there's a lot of talk about mold toxicity, often in more functional medicine spaces. And I will say that that is actually something different than just one purified toxin. And we can talk about mold toxicity, I have lots of thoughts about it, at a later time. But today we're talking about toxic compounds produced by molds. So how do they impact health? The most established health effects are respiratory, and this one really cannot be argued. So the CDC and World Health Organization both note that spending time in damp or moldy buildings is associated with respiratory symptoms, worsening asthma, allergic rhinitis, hypersensitivity pneumonitis, and other airway problems. Specifically, they actually say that occupants of damp or moldy buildings have up to a 75% greater risk of respiratory symptoms and asthma. So this part is not controversial. But if we're getting into the more functional medicine perspective, the concern is that mold and mycotoxin exposure may affect health beyond just the lungs by driving inflammation, immune dysregulation, oxidative stress, and also possibly mitochondrial dysfunction, which all those things together may help explain symptoms like fatigue, brain fog, headaches, and poor resilience in some people. However, this is where more of the controversy comes in because the evidence is really complicated, much harder to interpret, and there's not direct correlations and definitely not direct causations we see in the literature. I do actually think that broader mold-related illness is a real possibility, at least in some people. But again, it's really hard to prove if that is the root cause, because as we're seeing here in this episode, there are so many different exposures that could be causing symptoms. And we haven't even talked about individual food sensitivities that aren't related to environmental toxins and things like that. The other problem is that symptoms like fatigue, headaches, cognitive changes, and generalized inflammation are very nonspecific and can overlap with many other issues, including other chronic illnesses, infections, sleep problems, other environmental exposures, or more likely a combination of several things at once. That being said, I do see that people generally do feel better when they do remove mold exposures or follow what we call an anti-candidate diet, which is more for candid overgrowth than general mold toxicity, but similar principles apply. At the same time, these treatment plans also involve just eating healthier foods, whole foods, which also may be why people are feeling better. So you see why this is very tricky. I think overall though, mold and damp indoor environments absolutely play a role in respiratory health. Broader systemic effects from mycotoxin toxicity are actually plausible and actually may be the root cause for some people. But that is harder to confirm with certainty. And in practice, it probably reflects mold plus other vulnerabilities or exposures all layered together. Okay, next category. We have heavy metals. And this one, again, I think is also the least controversial parts of the whole conversation. So overt heavy metal toxicity is real, well recognized, and absolutely treated in conventional medicine. The main ones people usually mean here are lead, mercury, arsenic, and cadmium. So these exposures can come from contaminated water, old paint and pipes, industrial pollution, cigarette smoke, certain foods like large fish if you're eating a lot of it, occupational settings, and polluted soil or dust. What also is important to point out here is that heavy metal harm is not always dramatic or acute right when you get the exposure. Lead, for example, is considered a cumulative toxicant, meaning that small repeated exposures over time impact the brain, nervous system, kidneys, and cardiovascular system. Arsenic and cadmium have been linked to cancer, kidney damage, metabolic dysfunction, and impaired neurologic or developmental health as well. And these exposures actually show up in places that people don't always expect. For example, a recent testing of protein powders found contamination with lead, cadmium, arsenic, and mercury. And a recent report found that 47% of products exceeded the threshold for toxic metals. A 2026 Consumer Reports investigation similarly found that most of the protein powders and shakes they tested. Contain concerning levels of lead. Okay, so going on from that, the last category that I want to talk about are food additives, which include artificial colorings, preservatives, emulsifiers, and flavoring systems that are added to improve shelf life, texture, taste, or appearance. The concern here is that some of these additives may affect health by altering behavior and attention, which we do have some evidence I'll get into, disrupting the gut microbiome, irritating the gut barrier, or adding to cumulative inflammatory burden over time. And right now we don't actually know the long-term effect of every additive, but we do now know enough to be cautious with them. I think a good example is red number three, which is a synthetic dye that the FDA revoked in 2025 because it was found to induce cancer in animals, which triggered the Delaney cause. So even though red number three is the one that was formally banned, that does not mean that the other dyes or additives are harmless. It just means that that's the one that was studied and banned. Regulation often moves slowly, and the absence of a ban is not the same thing as proof of safety. So the evidence. We actually do have evidence that there is a link between synthetic food dyes and attention and behavioral effects, especially in children. So reviews of human and animal literature have found that synthetic dyes can worsen activity, attention, hyperactivity symptoms in some children. And this is one reason that they keep coming up in the conversation around ADHD. Emulsifiers I do want to mention as well. So these are additives used to improve texture and keep ingredients from separating, especially in ultra-processed foods. And we have human and other experiential data increasingly suggesting that these emulsifiers disrupt the gut microbiome, weaken the gut barrier, and promote intestinal inflammation. So, along those lines, I actually do want to briefly mention seed oils here. So these are not necessarily an environmental toxin in the same way that we think of pesticides or heavy metals, but I do want to talk about them here because they have for some reason become one of the biggest villains in online health culture. So seed oils include oils like soybean, corn, sunflower, safflower, cottonseed, grapeseed, and canola oil. And people worry about them because they are high in omega-6 fatty acids, especially linoleic acid. So the concern is that our modern diets are too high in omega-6s and too low in omega-3s, which I think that actually is a real concern. So to break it down a little bit, it's not exactly this simple, but we can think of omega-6s as inflammatory and omega-3s as anti-inflammatory. But our bodies actually do need omega-6s. They are essential fatty acids. So what we really want is balance. So we don't want only omega-3s and no omega-6s. We want a perfect ratio, or a more healthier, more optimal ratio of omega-3s to omega-6s. So generally 2 to 1 or 3 to 1. So we need these omega-6s, but we just don't want them to be higher than our omega-3s. Because if that happens, then we're just pushing the body more towards inflammation rather than homeostasis. So that's one piece of it. So we actually do need some omega-6s. So seed oils maybe not all that bad, just thinking about it that way. That's one piece of it. But what I really want to talk about is when we actually look at the evidence for seed oils specifically, major reviews have found that higher linoleic acid, which is in canola oil, is actually associated with a lower risk of coronary heart disease. And an average intake of seed oils does not increase inflammation or oxidative stress in humans. But I will emphasize the word average. That is the key. Dose matters. So foods, substances, medications, supplements, dose matters. So a small amount of seed oil in something like oat milk is very different from a diet built around fast food, fried foods, chips, ultra-processed snacks where these quote-unquote foods are saturated in seed oils in much larger amounts. So that is what's bad, not seed oils in general. So little tangent here, but I really want to bring this up because I think we are often villainizing the wrong thing. The bigger issue is the overall dietary pattern and the imbalance between omega-3s and omega-6s, not the idea that seed oils themselves are inherently toxic. So I think rather than obsessing over tiny amounts of seed oils, it makes so much more sense to just focus on eating more omega-3-rich foods like fish, chia seeds, flax seeds, and walnuts, and minimize the ultraposit foods. But people like a villain, I have to say, people like a villain on the internet. But just think about it this way. If we really want to compare exposures more directly, a small amount of canola oil in your oat milk latte is probably not the thing I would be most worried about. Especially compared with some of the other exposures that come with conventional dairy, including hormones and pesticides. And that's not even including the fact that many people today have dairy sensitivities that cause other issues. But okay, tangent done, let's get back to today's topic. So we've seen the major categories of environmental toxins and their impact on health. And with that, I think it actually is pretty clear that these exposures do have important impacts on human health. Some more than others, and we're definitely still learning, but the impact is actually pretty clear nonetheless. So, the elephant in the room question: why are some people exposed to an enormous amount of toxins and seem totally fine, while others are exposed to much lower doses and end up with autoimmune disease, cancer, or other debilitating symptoms? So this really is the most important piece, in my opinion. This tells us that it's not just about the toxins, it's also about our bodies, our genetics, our nutrient status, stress load, gut health, hormones, age, immune system, and again, the total toxic burden that we are already carrying. So I'll give you some examples of what I mean by this. So first, we have genetics, and we have detox enzyme variation. Some people have genetic mutations, one that I mentioned earlier, the MTHFRG mutation, that impact the efficiency of detoxification, methylation, antioxidant defense, and inflammatory signaling. So this can kind of set us up and put us in a more vulnerable position so that when environmental exposures happen, they may have more of an impact. Next, we have age and developmental window. So exposures during pregnancy, infancy, childhood, or even puberty, or just other sensitive windows, can have outsized effects because organs, hormones, the brain, and the immune system are still developing. Next, we have nutritional status. So if we have a low intake of key nutrients involved in antioxidant defense, methylation, detoxification, and mitochondrial function, that is also setting it up for the body to be harder to handle environmental stressors as well. Along the same lines, we have gut integrity in the microbiome, which we are finding out more and more that shapes the immune function, inflammation, metabolism, and how the body actually interacts, excretes, absorbs, etc., of environmental exposures, which we'll actually get into a lot more in the next episode. Hormonal status also plays a role. So hormones change how the body responds to stressors. So different life stages, like puberty, pregnancy, postpartum, perimenopause, actually all shift susceptibility because hormone signaling influences immunity, metabolism, detoxification, and inflammation. I feel like I'm a broken record here, but you see, the whole body is connected. That's my main point here. Next, there's also virus exposures or other inflammatory burdens. So if the body is already dealing with chronic inflammation, a lingering viral burden, or another immune stressor, and environmental exposure will likely hit harder. Another piece of the puzzle that I do want to talk about is actually socioeconomic status and environmental injustice, which ultimately ties into the total toxic burden. So people living in disinvested communities often face higher exposures to pollutions, poor housing, contaminated water, occupational hazards, and chronic stress, which we know affects everything all at the same time. And last, piggybacking off that, stress physiology, and allostatic load also plays a huge role. So chronic stress changes the body. And allostatic load refers to the wear and tear that builds up when the stress response systems are activated over and over again. So that eventually alters immune system function, increases inflammation, changes metabolism, and even changes how the body processes chemicals. So again, another factor that can make some people more biologically vulnerable to toxins during different stages of their life, or just over time if stress has accumulated over time. Okay, so that was a lot. We've covered a lot of ground here. And just as a reminder, I do have a companion guide to this episode and the rest of the episodes that are going to come out in this series that you can find on my website at drmaryellawood.com forward slash guides. So D-R-M-A-R-Y-E-L-L-A-W-O-O-D.com forward slash guides. So that includes a summary of everything we talked about today, more resources, links to the studies that we talked about. So go check it out if you're interested in this topic. But as we close here, this episode was probably one of my more scarier, depressing, darker episodes, just saying a bunch of facts that are kind of depressing. But I don't want this episode or this series to scare you. My intention is to just paint a more honest picture of how complex health really is. We don't need to be perfect when it comes to reducing exposures, and in reality, it actually would be impossible to eliminate all exposures. We also don't need perfect nutrition or a completely stress-free life. But I do think we need a broader and more thoughtful conversation about health, and a more evidence-based one. And I think when we really look at all these things together, I think it's actually more hopeful. So health is not determined just by one thing. It is shaped by patterns, by cumulative burden that we can modulate and change, which we will get into in the next episodes. And there are so many ways that we can support the body over time. So there's definitely room for agency here. There's ways that we can lower exposure when we can, ways to nourish the body to be more intentional, to support resilience, and to think about health in a more complete and compassionate way. So with that, in the next episode, we're going to shift away from understanding the problem to actually doing something about it. So the next part of this five-part series, we're going to talk about how to reduce exposures to toxins. So we'll start with small, easy steps that you can do right now today. We'll move throughout the home, throughout your life, and I'll provide a checklist of all the things that you can do, not necessarily everything that you need to do all at once, but we'll start looking at ways that you can start to reduce exposures over time. Then for the rest of the series, we'll also look at how to support the body, detox supplements and protocols, and end with digital detox and what that means. So thank you for listening to the first episode of this detox series. I'm pretty excited about it. And again, check out my website for the companion guide at drmaryallawood.com forward slash guides. That's D-R-M-A-R-Y-E-L-L-A-W-O-O-D.com forward slash guides. Thanks for listening to the trip lab. If you liked this episode, please subscribe and share so we can get the conversation started about integrative medicine and psychedelics to destigmatize it and fully explore what this could mean in the world.