Greenwashing Exposed: Simple Non-Toxic Swaps For A Healthier Home

Are you tired of feeling overwhelmed by non-toxic living and confused by the "natural" claims on your product labels? Today, we are breaking down the truth about greenwashing and giving you the exact non-toxic swaps you need to start cleaning up your home, pantry, and cosmetics immediately. 

Our guest for this episode is Amy Hartshorn. She is a nontoxic living educator, certified organic farmer, podcast host, and retreat leader based in Waitsfield, Vermont. She was the founding Executive Director of the Household Toxins Institute, created with the founder of Seventh Generation, and served as technical editor of Green Living for Dummies. If you are a conscious consumer ready to protect your family's health, this episode is essential listening.

You can read how to spot 12 toxic ingredients on food labels in this NNBL.Blog article.

New Normal Big Life streams free in audio and video on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Follow the show so the next episode finds you automatically.

Chapters

• 0:00 Labels Greenwashing And Spotting Fake Claims
• 3:30 Amy’s Non-Toxic Origin Story
• 6:24 Fragrance Antibacterials And Daily Exposures
• 9:40 Start With Priorities Not Perfection
• 14:24 Organic Shopping That Fits Real Life
• 17:18 Helping Kids Avoid Hidden Toxins
• 23:27 Glyphosate, gluten-sensitivity, Celiac disease, Wheat And Healing Paths

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Transcript

Labels Greenwashing And Who We Are

0:00

So when you look at a label on a product, one of the things to know is that whatever's on that front of the label is all marketing. There's nothing about those claims that's actually verifiable. And understanding which ones actually have meaning, which ones don't, and which ones are kind of useful, but not necessarily the best. And one of the things to look for is you want to find some sort of independent certifying agency that has said, yes, this is true. So for example, one of the big things that shocked me was I thought wild caught on a tuna can, that's caught out in the wilds of the ocean. It's not farm raised, which is good. But without a verifying independent agency that says, yes, this is in fact true, and we've inspected them or we're looking over their records to make sure that this is true, kind of like the certified organic label. That's one of the better labels than something that just says wild caught or just says organic. If it doesn't say certified organic with a little USDA label, you really don't know. And people think net the word natural on a food product means that it's the equivalent of organic. And it is nothing that because there's nothing that really defines what natural means. Or no antibiotics added to chicken. Well, they don't add antibiotics anyway, so that's kind of a meaningless label claim because it doesn't happen. So they're just putting something on there to make themselves sound good when it actually doesn't have any sort of meaning to it. Welcome to the New Normal Big Life Podcast. We bring you natural and integrative health information and stories about nature that we hope will inspire you to get outside an adventure, along with a step-by-step plan to help you practice what you've learned to create your own new normal and live the biggest life you can dream. I'm your host, Antoinette Berafato, the wellness warrior. Let's get into today's topic. Welcome to New Normal Big Life, Amy Hearts. I've been a Green Living Educator for over 30 years. I'm an organic farmer in Vermont, and I am have my own podcast, the Green Living Now Podcast, as you know, because you've been a guest. And my main goal is to help people, particularly health conscious women, figure out and navigate the whole world of clean living as far as the food that they're eating, the household products that they're using, and even the holistic health tools that they're using to stay healthy. And one of the things that I think makes me unique about that is that I'm teaching a framework of decision making. So not just here's the bad news and here's what you can do, but here are some ways to evaluate decisions so that you're not always second-guessing yourself and getting, you know, sent back to the beginning when there's a new study comes out or the company that you really love the products from was just bought out by a corporate entity. So that I think is kind of the new twist that I've been offering, and particularly in the a new course that I've just launched called the Your Non-Toxic Kitchen Reimagined. So that is a deep dive into what are you cooking with? What are you storing your food in? And how do you make these kinds of decisions so that you can be really confident that your kitchen is as healthy a place as possible? Well, I love this so much. I cannot wait to unpack all of it. So for wellness worries listening who may not be familiar with your work or they're discovering you for the first time, can you share how your own journey into green living began? And especially when you were expecting and you started paying attention to non-toxic ingredients, what was that like?

Amy’s Non-Toxic Origin Story

3:30

So my own journey is kind of an interesting pathway in the sense that I grew up in New York City, and here I am living in Vermont for 25 years and on an organic farm. My mom was really health conscious, and my stepfather was a chef. And so we didn't have junk food growing up. I mean, I had no fast food. The only time we really had sugar in the house was Halloween. And then I learned how to cook at the age of eight from scratch, which I've been doing ever since. And then my first summer job was working at a health food store. And so I became very aware of organic food and supplements and herbs and that sort of thing, but not so much about the household product piece until I was pregnant with my daughter and I found this little paperback book called The Non-Toxic Baby. And in it I learned that all these everyday household products, including body care and baby care, have toxic chemicals legally allowed. And nobody was talking about it back then, because this was 34 years ago. And really nobody was protecting us. And it hasn't changed all that much, other than we have more options and there's more awareness. But as far as the regulatory end of it, not a whole lot of that has changed. So I went down this rabbit hole of looking and learning about everything that I could, and then just cleared out my house and changed it up to everything non-toxic that I could find. And then I started sharing it with a community that I lived in at that time, which was Massachusetts, writing letters to the editor to a local newspaper, got this whole dialogue going with the community. Some of the better living through chemicals people were attacking, but the other people were like, oh wow, I didn't know about this. And then the state came out with this cancer study, they called it, and it showed that three types of cancer were above the state average in that town. And everybody freaked out. And so I started a cancer prevention project, nonprofit, and I did a big Earth Day event that kind of showcased what was possible. And then I moved to Vermont and I worked for a new nonprofit that was started by the founder of Seventh Generation, was called the Household Toxins Institute. So I was the founding executive director trying to get that off the ground and got this cool opportunity to be the tech editor for the Green Living for Dummies book and a whole bunch of other things, but I don't want to just run on about what other things. But the main thing now is that my work is focused on sharing the information through the podcast, through the courses that I have, through in-person tours and retreats on the farm, and really just cutting through the noise and the misinformation and the greenwashing and helping people make better choices. So, what were some of the biggest wake-up calls you had when you started learning more about how many everyday products contain ingredients that can affect our health?

Fragrance Antibacterials And Daily Exposures

6:24

And they are just endless. Oh gosh. So I would say one of the biggest ones, and one of the ones that I focus on first with people is fragrance. So whether it's one of those candles burning that I can't tolerate the smell of anymore, or plug-in, right? My sister-in-law always had plugins in the bathroom, and I would, I would actually pull them out when I was in there. So anything with fragrance. You did too? Oh, no kidding. I go to people's houses and blow out their candles and unplugged their fragrance. When I go to my sister's place, I put a, you know, even an unlit candle, I put like a plate over it just to keep it from effervescing. So yeah, so scented stuff, anything that has fragrance in it. So that's laundry products are a huge one. I can't stand it when somebody's just done their laundry, whether I'm walking my dogs outside and it's venting out of their their you know machines, or if I, you know, go and hug somebody and I can smell the detergent. And so I think that's such an important thing to realize because it's in everything, it's in cleaning products, it's in all of our body care shampoo, skin, skin cream, you know, soap, it's all over the place. Another one is that antibacterial ingredient, right? So triclosin, and it was a huge deal during the pandemic because everybody was disinfecting their hands. And it was overwhelming because how many times a day were people, you know, squirting that stuff on that had the antibacterial? And one of the reasons why that's so bad is because it makes the real bacteria that are troublesome much harder to treat because they become resistant. You know, they've learned that these antibacterial agents are out there and they're making them much less effective. So those are some of the top things that I was faced with. Wow. You've created a comprehensive toxic ingredients list, which is so valuable. What do you hope people will get from that list and how they might use it in their lives? Yeah, I think with that and anything that I do, I want people to kind of prioritize and also realize that it's not about perfection. You don't have to be completely toxin-free in your house. And it's actually impossible to live a completely toxic-free life these days. Because even if your house is perfect, if you go to the store or you go outdoors, there's a lot of air pollutants and depending upon where you live. So progress, not perfection, is one big piece. And also looking at the ones that have the most damage as far as our physical health and the ones that we're using frequently. So that's part of that whole framework thing. You know, it's one thing if you're exposed, let's say you go on a trip and you drink some chlorinated water. Doesn't taste great, but you know, once or twice here and there, it's not going to be horrendous. However, if you're drinking it every day, cooking with it every day, bathing in it every day, that's something to consider making a change. So I can imagine that wellness warriors who are listening to this right now are feeling pretty overwhelmed. And they probably feel pretty overwhelmed when they're looking at labels, if they're reading labels, which I suspect they are. Yes. But where do you suggest people start when they want to reduce their toxic load?

Start With Priorities Not Perfection

9:40

I think, like I said, the fragrance piece is huge. So if you're not ready to go with the really non-toxic natural soaps and detergents and all that stuff, at least go for fragrance free. And that as opposed to free and clear, because sometimes free and clear actually has chemicals in it that are masking your ability to smell stuff. It doesn't necessarily mean that it's truly free and clear. So fragrance free. And ultimately, food, I think, is one of the most important pieces to pay attention to because I honestly believe that we are what we eat. And so if we're eating fast processed foods and drinking a ton of soda or diet soda or, you know, just food that isn't a whole food, you know, ideally you want to get as much certified organic as possible. And even better is growing it yourself. Right. Even if you just put a basil plant on your sunny windowsill, you know, and and pick that off and put it into your whatever you're making that you like basil in. I think that goes a long way. But I think trying to eat foods in their whole form. So when you look at a label on a product, one of the things to know is that whatever's on that front of the label is all marketing. There's nothing about those claims that's actually verifiable. I did a whole ebook on comprehensive food labels and understanding which ones actually have meaning, which ones don't, and which ones are kind of useful, but not necessarily the best. And one of the things to look for is you want to find some sort of independent certifying agency that has said, yes, this is true. So for example, one of the big things that shocked me was I thought wild caught on a tunican, you know, especially when there was the little dolphin thing with a line through it. I was like, oh, great, that's, you know, caught out in the wilds of the ocean. It's not farm raised, which is good. Without a verifying independent agency that says, yes, this is in fact true, and we've inspected them or we're looking over their records to make sure that this is true, kind of like the certified organic label. That's one of the better labels than something that just says wild caught or just says organic. If it doesn't say certified organic with a little USDA label, you really don't know. So that's one of the very important things to think about. And people think net the word natural on a food product means that it's the equivalent of organic. And it is nothing like that because there's nothing that really defines what natural means. Or no antibiotics added to chicken. Well, they don't add antibiotics anyway. So that's kind of a meaningless label claim because it doesn't happen. So they're just putting something on there to make themselves sound good when it actually doesn't have any sort of meaning to it. So when we're thinking about okay, we have to remove all of the scented items, the the items that are not naturally scented, so they're not scented with essential oils, right, for example, and we need to take the RBST out of our dairy, and we're looking at pre-packaged food labels for genetically modified food ingredients and kerragenen and MSG and all of the things, and you're standing in your pantry. Are we telling people that they have to throw out everything and start over to live more cleanly? Okay, so that's a great question. So that kind of gets back to that whole framework idea. So, what are the things that you're eating on a regular basis? Are there, let's take milk, for example. And I think most commercial milk these days is usually RBS T-free. It'll have to say that on the label if that is in fact true. Something that you're using every day is something that you want to pay more attention to. Now, there's some caveats here. My preference, as I said, is certified organic. With the case of I love half and half in my organic coffee. Unfortunately, a lot of the certified organic half and half brands are also ultra-pasteurized. And so that takes the pasteurization process to yet another higher level, which means all the bacteria is killed. And so that is actually a useless dead food. I have cheesemaker friends in my area who say you can't make cheese out of ultra-pasteurized anything. And so that's one of the areas where I will buy a local Vermont brand, even if it's not organic, just because I know that, you know, most of the time the cows are getting access to this beautiful pasture and a lot of hay and not getting the milk ultra-pasteurized. So just to reinforce the answer to that question is look at the things that you're doing every day, because those are the things that build up as far as exposure is concerned, and those are the ones that you want to pay attention to first.

Organic Shopping That Fits Real Life

14:24

So, what are a few simple changes that people can make that make a big impact? Well, I think one of the things I uh usually recommend is to look on the Environmental Working Group's website, eWg.org, and find the dirty dozen and the clean 15 list. And so what that is, is it tells you which of those types of produce actually have been shown to have the highest level of pesticide residue. That would be the dirty dozen. And then the clean 15 are things like avocados, which are not as important to buy at organic because they don't tend to have a lot of pesticide residues, partly because of their thicker skin, sort of like pineapples as well. But things like strawberries and spinach is usually very high in pesticides. And so starting with that as part of your shopping list. And then things that are actually high fat are oftentimes going to store toxins more. So if you love cheese, maybe switch to the certified organic cheese versus the conventional one. You're going to pay a little bit more, but at least you're not going to be adding more toxins through that fatty cheese versus the conventional brands. And as much meat that you can find, especially if you have local access to, you know, grass-fed, grass-finished beef or any kind of organic poultry, wild-caught fish is excellent. I like to buy things on sale because then I can buy more of it. So if I see, oh wow, wild salmon's on sale at the market, well, I'll maybe get two or three pounds and freeze a couple. So that's one of the ways that you can approach this without being completely overwhelmed. I love it. This is such great information. Before we cover the next topic in this episode, I want to introduce you to the Adventure Sports Lifestyle with a micro story about an adventure that I've had. The Adventure Sports Lifestyle and my deep connection to nature is essential to my good health. So here's the story. When I was about eight years old, my older brother, who was 14 years older, brought me a series of books about the Mountain West. And I dreamed of riding horseback from Cheyenne, Wyoming to Denver, Colorado on railroad business, because that's what the books were about. And then when I moved to Colorado, where I lived for a few years, I learned to ride western dressage. So my eight-year-old imagination of doing this thing became a reality. And first I learned grooming, then groundwork, then riding trails in the foothills of Colorado's Rocky Mountains, and even riding from Loveland, Colorado to Cheyenne, Wyoming, and back, I did that. That's the power of giving a child a book, allowing them to imagine, and giving them the space to go realize their dreams. I hope this inspires you to get outside on an adventure alone with friends and family or the people you love most. Now back to the topic.

Helping Kids Avoid Hidden Toxins

17:18

So before we talk about toxic ingredients and foods, what are some of the everyday toxins that our kids might get exposed to at someone else's home that you really want to tell your kids to watch out for? So I know we've talked about asking people to turn to blow out their candles or unplugging their air fresheners, but I know when little ones stay over at someone else's house, I've had kids that come to our adventure camp who talk about this that I love going to my friend's house, but I feel sick every time I do because I talk about toxic food ingredients while they're at camp. Yeah. Well, and it's trickier, I'd say, for kids that are visiting somebody else's home because how do you say, no, I won't eat that, or I don't want to walk on the new carpet that you just had installed because it makes me sick, or you know, that there's a room that just got painted with some kind of regular conventional paint instead of no VOC. So it's it's tricky. I think I don't know how I would handle that these days because my daughter's much older. If you have a child, particularly if they have sensitivities, it's probably worth sending food with them when they go over to a friend's house. That might be one way of just saying, oh, Joey has a lot of food sensitivities. So just to make it easier, I'm just going to send, you know, a lunchbox with him so that you don't have to struggle to find out what he's not going to react to. That's a great idea. Yeah. So that would be one thing. And then a big one is actually pesticides. So I mean, hopefully people with children and pets aren't spraying pesticides on their lawns where the children and pets are playing. But it's good to teach kids that that sign, you know, it's usually yellow with the child and the dog in it with the circle and the line through it. That's a good thing to teach your children to look out for because even if it's not at a friend's house, it could be when they go to the supermarket with their friend's family and they don't think about it when they're walking across the grass and it's just been sprayed and then it's on their shoes and then they're tracking it into their home or who's, you know, any or indoor space. So that's probably a good one to teach. That's really great. So since foods are such a big part of the conversation, what are the most important things people should look for when they're trying to choose organic foods consistently? Is it finding the best location to buy it? Is it the finding the best brands? What are we looking for? If you if you aren't able to grow much on your own, because you don't have the land or you don't have the time or desire to grow your own food, I would go to a farmer's market or a local organic farm if you have one nearby. If those are not options, there's a lot more available even in mainstream supermarkets these days. You actually have to just be a little more informed to know how to navigate. That said, I will say that oftentimes, at least in my supermarket in town, the organic produce is usually in dreadful shape. It looks really old and, you know, just not anything I would want to spend money on. So one of the things you can do in that case is buy the frozen certified organic vegetables. And my feeling is that at least with those, they typically are frozen at the peak of freshness versus whatever is considered the fresh stuff, even if it looks good on the display shelf, it's likely a week old from the point where it was picked and then stored in some kind of a facility and then shipped across the country, in our case, from California to Vermont. So that's one of the things that I recommend is, you know, especially in the winter when you can't get fresh stuff at the farmer's market, buy certified organic frozen. I love this idea. A couple of the things that we do, even though I live in a cabin in the woods, and to get to any grocery store is, you know, a bit of a hike. But I shop at multiple grocery stores, and Aldi is my primary store that I shop for because the prices are cheaper and they have a larger selection of organic foods. And did I say the prices are cheaper? Because that's really important today. Well, that's like Costco. So actually, I go to Costco once a month, and I'm amazed how much organic stuff they have there. You know, I'll be able to get my Vermont organic coffee. It's about almost half the price of what I would pay in the local supermarket. I'll end up buying two jars of organic peanut butter, which will last months, and it'll be the same price as one in the in the other store. So, yes, I think there's a lot of ways you can save money buying organic if you just know what you're doing. And that's another ebook that I created actually. The frugal food. And how can people access your ebooks? So my website is the best place to go, which is greenlivingnow.com. Perfect. And what do you want more people to understand about the connection between food quality, ingredient awareness, and long-term wellness? So I look at it as an investment in my health. I, for a variety of reasons, try to stay away from Western medicine as much as possible. And one of the ways that I do that is because I'm eating high-quality food as well as taking some supplements, you know, like in the winter, I don't get enough vitamin D3. So I'm going to supplement for that. And I do a variety of different things actually to stay healthy, in addition to the food and obviously reducing my toxic load as much as I possibly can, the things that are within my control. And all of those things I feel are my investment in my health so that I'm preventing things down the line. And so if I start to feel a tickle in my throat, maybe I'll grab, you know, a drop of organic oregano oil and put that in my water and stir it up. Just one drop. And that's kind of like a natural antibiotic. Now that's what I do. I'm not gonna, I'm not a doctor, so I'm not gonna say, you know, recommend that everybody do that. But look it up. You know, do do some of your own research and figure out what makes sense for you. I love this idea of doing your research, figuring out what works best for you, not just what works best for Amy or Antoinette. And

Glyphosate Wheat And Healing Paths

23:27

you mentioned something else that I wanted to circle back on, which was when shopping at a farmer's market or a grocery store, when we tell people, I want you to stay away from pre-packaged foods because it usually has the worst ingredients. But there are some things that you can't avoid unless you want to stop eating it altogether, or you want to make it yourself. Right. And I personally have some trade-offs. So for example, I am very careful about wheat because glyphosates make me very sick. And so I try to avoid them, which is really easy for me to do in the country because there are all these places that make fresh bread with non-genetically modified foods, ingredients, and and really good flowers. But I also have gone to the extreme of buying wheat berries, grinding them up, making flour, making bread and ensuring that I know from seed to loaf of bread, I can follow that ingredient. Yeah. Are there other things that people can do besides making it yourself to ensure that if I want some pasta and I don't have time to make it myself, how can I look at a package and know that this is a good choice for pasta? Yeah, I I would say that again, it's looking for that certified organic USDA label. And just so folks know, USDA is sort of the umbrella organization that all these what used to be formally independent certifiers operate under. So for example, our certified organic farm is under the Vermont Organic Farmers Entity. And so we have somebody from VOF, Vermont Organic Farmers, comes to our farm every year to do the inspection. So I think for a pasta, like you can find, at least in the Costco that I go to, there is at least two different brands of certified organic pasta that are quite good. And so that's a great way of the saving the money, but also finding a good brand. I love that you're making the bread. I actually want to get that. I had wheat berries, I just don't have the grinder yet to turn it into flour. I want to highlight something though that you mentioned about glyphosate. So that's kind of the main ingredient, or not so much these days as it used to be, but the main ingredient in Roundup, that pesticide, right? But one of the reasons why it's so much more of a problem is that in addition to spraying the wheat, the soy, the corn, 90% of our corn is GMO, but genetically modified, right? Sprayed with glyphosate because that corn kernel was designed to resist that glyphosate so that it doesn't affect it. But they're also spraying the wheat and the oats right before harvest to make it dry faster. So that's a second dose of this toxic chemical that has caused non-Hodgkin's lymphoma in people. And so a lot of the gluten allergies that people are experiencing are often reactions to the glyphosate. So when they go to Europe and they eat bread there, they're like, oh my gosh, why is this so different? And there's a specific kind of wheat that I think is really good called eincorn. It's an ancient wheat, and it's what wheat used to be way back when in our grandparents and you know, before them era. And what I've understood is that even people with gluten allergies are much less reactive to eincorn. And you can even find eincorn pasta. E-I-N-K-O-R-N. There's a brand called Jovial. The woman that created Jovial, her daughter was severely gluten intolerant. And so she discovered this eincorn wheat, and her daughter was able to eat things with it. And so she's made this whole line of this eincorn organic product. So, you know, doctors are starting to realize exactly what you said is that it's not really the wheat sensitivity, it's that you're sensitive to the glyphosate. And so I was diagnosed as being gluten sensitive. My husband was diagnosed as having celiac disease. And a new doctor that he had said, I want you to do the gluten challenge. I want you to eat good quality wheat products, and I want you to eat just, you know, junk food for a couple of weeks to just see how you do, make some notes. And what he noticed was when he ate good quality wheat with no glyphosates, no genetically bio-engineered ingredients, no other toxic ingredients, he had zero reaction and neither did I. Wow. And then when we ate some junk, and I think it was, I don't know if I should mention the brand, but Little Debbie's. Wow. You know, when you were a kid and you had that and you thought, oh my gosh, it was amazing. We took a couple of bites and we're like, I can't even eat this. But it was part of the challenge. You had to eat something bad. You know, you proved that it was actually Yeah, you proved that it was actually not really a gluten intolerance, it was a pesticide intolerance. Right. So my understanding of glyphosate is that it is similar to a chemical that an insect makes, that in most people, when it hits your digestive system, the digestive enzymes in our stomach will neutralize it. Well, I know from testing that I don't make an adequate amount of digestive enzymes. So if my digestive enzymes are supposed to neutralize the glyphosate, that would not work on a person like me. And I suspect maybe other people who've been diagnosed with a wheat sensitivity, it's probably a very similar reaction, although it could be something else, yeah, is what they're having a reaction to. And so now I use King Arthur's flour when I'm not grinding my own wheat and I don't have a reaction. My husband, who is diagnosed with Celex, doesn't have a reaction either. That's amazing. So that that opened back up a world to us that we couldn't eat, you know, things before. You know, King Arthur's is a Vermont company. A lot of good things come out of Vermont. Yes, thank you. That's awesome. And then the other thing that's been really helpful, and I kind of knew this already, but I heard Mel Gibson say that he's been in Italy for several months, and he can eat wheat, and he's like, I'm eating pasta at every meal just about, and I'm eating tons of it. I'm not gaining weight. I feel great, I don't feel overly full later. And he's asking himself, what's the difference? So I already knew that Italian pasta was very different. And now I found at Aldi's they have two brands of Italian pasta, pasta that comes directly from Italy. It's cheaper than other brands of pasta, and the same thing, you don't get the overly full feeling, you don't have any sensitivities to the wheat, and it's been a great find for us. Oh, that's wonderful. You know, it's just amazing. I don't remember any kids in school that I went to school with having peanut allergies or gluten allergies. I mean, that wasn't even discussed back in those days. Yeah. And now it's constantly everywhere. Right. I remember snack time. Parents were responsible for bringing in snack, and we'd have our milk and snack that a parent brought in. Most of the time, parents brought in homemade treats, and we had no idea what was in the ingredients. And no one ever had an allergic reaction or sensitivity or got sick from it. Right. Well, what more do you want to leave listeners with? Well, I think I want to reiterate the idea that this is not about perfection and that it's just important to take one step and choose that whatever that step is, like I was saying, on something that you use on a regular basis because that's where the bigger exposure is going to come from. Focusing on food is especially important, like we've talked about, getting rid of the fragrances in your products. I want to give people hope. I guess that's part of it. I want people to understand that there is a path forward. It doesn't have to be overwhelming. You don't have to feel like everything causes cancer, so why bother? Because there really is a way to live in this pretty toxic world. And that goes even beyond just what the products and the foods and all that that we're exposing ourselves to. You know, the whole topic of pharmaceuticals is another area to look at. You know, how many pharmaceuticals are your people taking each day? And I know that there are some that are absolutely required for certain conditions, and that's fine. However, I also know that a lot of people over 60 tend to be on six different things. And one of the things I heard recently, in fact, again, was the fact that statins, I guess the studies show that they only get something like two weeks extra life expectancy by being on statins. Incredible. But there are a lot of side effects that some people can experience. So yeah, really looking at things top to bottom, what you're eating, what you're, you know, the things you have control over, things that you're bringing into your house, you know, paint that you're using, trying to get rid of synthetic stuff as much as possible. And, you know, pesticide use, try to get rid of that. And look at your healthcare. Are you popping a Tylenol the minute you start to feel a little bit of an ache? Or maybe there's a homeopathic remedy you could consider using instead. And yeah, so there's there's different ways to look at it, different trade-offs to make, but again, focusing on the things that you're exposing yourself to every day first. Amy, this has been so insightful and wellness warriors. I hope you really take to heart what Amy is saying, because if you listen to me often, just in case you haven't heard me say this, I was once on 22-0, 20 medications at one time. And I have a medical background. I asked my doctors and specialists, are you sure it's okay to take specifically these six medications together? Because they all have the potential to cause dysfunction in your kidney. And they all assured me, I'm the ND, I know better, and I trusted them until my kidney started to fail. And then my doctor said, You will probably have kidney disease, if not cancer, in your future. And just kind of prepare yourself for that, and there's no way to reverse it. And of course, I did not listen to them, and I reversed it. How did I reverse it? With a daily lemon water detox. Squeeze half a lemon into eight ounces of water, add a pinch or two of sea salt to make it an electrolyte drink. Now, after talking to board-certified neurologist Ryan Williamson, who was previously on the show, he told me to further heal my brain injury and prevent dementia, cognitive decline, and Alzheimer's. Add five grams of creatine monohydrate to that lemon water. And I add that to my lemon water in the morning and the evening. And I have noticed my word recall has improved, my energy has improved, I don't feel exhausted after one interview anymore. And so I can feel it healing my brain. So the lemon water detox not only caused me to lose 4040 pounds in three months. Wow. In how long three months. It reversed my kidney disease. My lab work is perfect. In fact, my last lab test in November said that all of my lab work is like an 18-year-old and I am 58 years old. Holy smokes. And I remember from interviewing you on my podcast that you told us the story of how you were on death's door essentially, and have been able to heal yourself. That is just remarkable. So just the lemon water with the salt. That was the main thing. So the lemon water in eight ounces of water. Now I add the creatine and I also add methylene blue, which and so the creatine monohydrate and the methylene blue both cross the blood brain barrier. Now, typically you don't want something to cross the blood brain barrier because that can injure your brain, but the creatine heals your brain. It helps you to recover in your muscles. So, like from a workout or just some hard housework. It also builds bone and helps with cognition and preventing the cognitive decline. So I, and then adding the methylene blue. And I have a video of me taking methylene blue, waiting 30 minutes. And so before the methylene blue, I'm sort of talking like this, trying to remember the words I was going to say. After the methylene blue, I'm talking like this. Oh my gosh, that's and it's not because I'm amped up by caffeine like feeling. It's not that. It's that my brain was processing information so quickly. Right. So all the neurals pathways were really sinking. Exactly. What? So the creatine, is that a powder that you mix in or a drop? Yes, it's powder. It's uh it comes with a scoop, and I bought mine at Costco. Oh wow. It's it's I think called orgain, O-R-G-A-I-N, and it's a little scoop of five grams of creatine, and I do that once in the morning, once at night. Wow. And if you listen to my podcast, you will hear the change in my brain because my video editor pointed it out that he goes, I can tell you the date you started taking first methylene blue. Wow. And he heard the difference. And then he said, I can also pinpoint the date when you started taking the creatine because my brain started to recover initially, and then the creatine just took it to the next level. And it's been a game changer. And for listeners, I am a brain injury survivor. In 2014, I could not even have a conversation. I could not make new memories. So I've come a very, very long way. I take zero medications and I have done all of this naturally. Incredible. Thank you so much for joining me, Amy. Remind

Where To Find Amy And Disclaimer

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us again how we can connect with you. So the best place is greenlivingnow.com website. I'm also on social media, on Facebook, um, LinkedIn, Instagram, and YouTube. My podcast is on all the podcast platforms, but I tend to promote the one on YouTube the most. Oh, and I wanted to mention that if people are interested in doing a free quiz and a kitchen assessment to see where they're at as far as their kitchen, that's on my website too. That I would highly recommend. I will drop links to all of your connections in the show description and on your website for this episode. Thank you so much for joining me, Amy. I hope you come back soon. Thank you so much. The information in this podcast is not medical advice and should not be treated as such. Always consult your physician or healthcare professional before pursuing any health related procedure or activity.