Day 4 of IHS Conference
Part 1- Toxins
Last days of conferences can be rough.
It gets old sleeping in a different bed.
It gets old not having your home comforts around you.
Luckily I don’t drink coffee so that is not an issue for me to get going in the morning.
It gets old living out of a suitcase.
It gets old sharing one bathroom with two other people.
It gets old having to plan out food/meals knowing you can not control the ingredients nor cooking methods.
Let’s just say it gets old.
I prefer either a home cooked meal or one from one of favorite Asian restaurants, Tres Yan and Wu on Rte 38 in Mt Laurel, that I ordered take out from last night after a train ride back from NYC.
As you can see I took the food out of the plastic container and put it into a glass bowl to eat. More on why later in this stack. The meal was Shrimp and Chicken with peppers, onions and a small bit of squash in a Thai Chili sauce.
#Delicious
If you have not tried Tres Yan and Wu, you should.
Back to NYC Conference.
Knowing you have to check out of your room with all your belongings by Noon, yet the conference does not end til 5PM, and you need to store all your luggage in the hotel luggage storage room, and pay another sum for that service, but still carry your backpack and winter jacket with you in case you go for a walk outside at lunch break, and write all this in one long breath, well, sometimes it is nice to be home.
But it still all in all was a good conference and I did learn a few things, came back with some new pearls from the wisdom of others, definitely had some good dinners,
and hopefully I can share a piece of what I learned with you when I next see you.
But for today, I will give a small recap of Day 4, Saturday Feb 25, 2023.
Actually I think I will just stick to Toxins today and get to other parts later as there was so much to think about on this topic.
The presentation was about toxins. This was a three way tag team of presenters, discussing mostly about a few common toxins we are exposed to every day. There is no way to totally avoid toxins, but we should do our best. They briefly touched on Arsenic, Lead, BPA and Dioxans as well as a short question and answer session in the Exhibit Hall at lunch break on the recent burning of toxic chemicals in Ohio a few weeks back. This talk while helpful was almost like an advertisement to enroll in their paid educational certification program. So if anyone wants me to take that course, you can donate to the “Take the Toxin Certification Course” by upgrading to a paid subscription to Common Sense Health and Wellness. It is only $5/month or $50/year and does provide you also with a 25% discount on nutritional supplements through my office via the Wellevate/Fullscript nutritional supplement online distribution program.
Until then though, here are a few nuggets for y’all to detox.
Arsenic can raise your risk of Gout, Prostate Cancer, Pancreatic Cancer, Diabetes and Bladder Cancer. The main sources of Arsenic come from water, rice, chicken, tobacco and treated wood. Generally if we have good natural bodily detoxification we can clear out the Arsenic in a few days. Detox occurs in the liver via methylation as well as with glutathione.
Lead can be implicated in up to 35% of heart attacks. They didn’t talk much more about lead. But 35% is a big number that I was not aware of. Lead may be less of an issue now due to the use of unleaded gasoline as well as the removal of lead from paints. But we do live in a toxic soup so ya never truly know.
BPA and Plastics - WOW, the amount of microplastics in the world is ridiculous. They said during autopsies microplastics can be found in almost every organ in everyone! Plastics can be endocrine (hormone) disruptors, increase the risk of Autoimmune illness, and can be toxic to your kidneys. Probably NOW would be a good time to stop drinking water from plastic bottles and definitely stop storing and reheating food cooked/wrapped/stored in plastic. This is why even though I really enjoy cooking, I will NOT use the Sous-Vide method that cooks food inside plastic. Instead of plastic perhaps use glass or stainless steel. I know they may have issues as well, but probably not to the degree of plastics. You may not have known this but the thermal paper receipts you get from the stores are a boatload of BPA/Plastic that gets right onto your skin and absorbed. When able perhaps ask for receipts to be emailed or have them put the receipt in the bag for you. Of course they may not provide you a bag since in NJ plastic bags are mostly illegal and getting paper bags is like going on a scavenger hunt.
So we live in a toxic soup.
Check ewg.org to learn more about all the different types of toxins we are dealing with.
Many attendees asked what we can do to protect ourselves and detox. Here were the answers given.
The absolute #1 Rule of Toxicology is AVOIDANCE.
After that we need to make sure our detox pathways are functioning well.
Here are some methods you use to detox every day and you probably never thought about it in this way.
Peeing (urinating, going number one, take a leak, piddle, wee wee, make water, take a whiz, puddles, and for our overseas friends- go to the loo.) - the kidneys make urine by filtering out unwanted materials/toxins from blood.
Burping (belching, eructating, retch, keck, bubbling, burbling, an upper fart) - This is really just a way for our body to clear/detoxify excess gas from our upper digestive (GI) tract.
Pooping (defecating, going number two, poo poo, take a dump, soiling) - This is our Gut clearing out unwanted materials/toxins so they do not get reabsorbed back into the body. Did you know that diarrhea is usually the body’s purposeful reaction to more quickly remove toxins from your lower Gut? Well if you did not, then now you do. But seriously, diarrhea is a symptom of some other issue, so unless you are dehydrated you may not always want to stop the diarrhea. Sometimes it is best to allow the body to let loose and do its thing.
Farting (tooting, flatulence, breaking wind, pass gas, bottom burp, let one slip, and one I have not heard- a California barking spider?) - Whatever you call it, this helps you clear excess gas from your GI tract, otherwise you could blow up like a balloon with some toxic gas.
Can you imagine if everyone blew up like a balloon instead of passing gas? Our Air Force would get pretty busy trying to decide whether to shoot us out of the air?? Perhaps that would be a new definition of UFO.
Unidentified Flatulent Object ???
breathing out (exhale, puff, blow out, respire, sigh) - Lungs blow out excess carbon dioxide and probably other inhaled particles we do not want.
perspiring (sweating, be damp, be wet, bake, roast, ooze, drip, melt, stew, exude) - this helps to keep our body temp regulated as well as helps clear out toxins that are close to your skin. Exercise increases our blood flow to our muscles and organs and pretty much everywhere. Exercise uses more energy which creates more waste/toxins which can be excreted via sweat.
Hey did you know that animals sweat, men perspire, but women glow??
coughing (hack, bark, wheeze, spit, expectorate, clear throat, pant, breathe noisily, whoop, blow the gaff, squawk, and I have not heard this one before- Go public on? ) Well whatever you call it you are clearing debris from your airways.
blowing our nose (pick one’s nose, clear one's nose with a finger, remove a booger, remove snot, picking a winner) - This is just like coughing but instead you are removing waste/toxins from your upper airway (nose/sinuses).
crying/blinking (wink, twinkle, flirt, nictitation??- I never heard of that one??) - this is just cleaning/detoxifying our eyes.
vomiting- Yep, I may have saved the best for last (puking, regurgitating, barfing, spewing, retching, politicians talking/promising, upchucking, erupting, wet heaving, cradling/hugging the porcelain throne) Whatever you want to call it, this is needed to remove toxins from stomach so the rest of our Gut does not have to deal with it later.
Have I left any natural well known detox pathways out??
Are there any other pseudo-names I have left out that you would like to share?
No, cleaning wax out of your ears is NOT detoxing.
Let me say this again.
The absolute #1 Rule of Toxicology is AVOIDANCE.
OK, let’s see if I can get back on target here.
How else besides by the natural mechanisms above can we improve our detox capabilities?
We can stay hydrated to dilute out toxins. Drink enough non-caloric fluids so your urine is not too concentrated. Generally that would mean your urine should be clear with a tinge of yellow other than first in the morning when it can be darker.
We should not overload our liver. We can do this by avoiding excess amounts of alcohol and sugar.
We can sweat every day by either exercise, hot tubs or saunas. I use a portable home sauna that I am happy with. If you are interested in a home sauna let me know.
We can get tested to see if we are Methylating properly. Methylation is one way we biochemically detox.
We can avoid eating to excess which just stresses all of the above systems and can overload our ability to detoxify.
We can get our Gut health in order so our Gut works for us instead of against us.
We can try and improve our Gut biome so the trillions of bacteria that live within us work for us instead of against us.
We can avoid using too many prescription medications that treat a symptom instead of a cause of disease. Putting a band aid on that does not fix the problem BUT that then may cause the body to have to ramp up further its detoxification processes, can overload the system.
This one is key. Do not get constipated?? We detox every day via our bowel movements. At least we should. If we do not then we have a greater chance of reabsorbing waste/toxins from our stools back into our blood. Just visualize that for a moment. OK, maybe don’t do that as it is kind of gross.
If you do not have a bowel movement every day, perhaps you should chat with your healthcare professional. But taking pharmaceuticals to have a daily bowel movement could increase the amount of toxic chemicals you are putting in to your body, so beware.
Getting proper sleep helps clear out toxins from the brain via the Glymphatic system.
Consider getting a good HEPA air filter for your home.
Consider getting a reverse osmosis water filter for your home.
OK, I think that is enough fun for one day.
There was so much more to the Toxin presentations at conference but way too much to share here. I hope this overview gave you something to think about.
Oh BTW- Did you know that most cosmetics have lots and lots of harmful toxic ingredients? Here is a list of some of the harmful ingredients in most cosmetics. Did you know that putting these potentially toxic ingredients on your skin is the same or worse than actually eating them, in terms of how much toxin is getting absorbed? There are some less or nontoxic cosmetics available that I learned about at the conference. Take a look and perhaps give them a try. You can look pretty without getting toxic.
The above company ingredient list is Certified Organic, Gluten Free, Non-GMO, Toxin free, Cruelty free and Made in the USA.
OK, enough of helping to make you less toxic and even more beautiful!
Hopefully more from the conference coming up this week.
As always comments and questions encouraged.
Very informative article… Thank you very much!
Great info and thank you for sharing. I’d like to have the name of the portable sauna you use. There’s also a lot of talk about the use of infrared for detoxing. Though I wonder about skin cancer.