Chemical Free Living

So you've decided to migrate to a chemical free lifestyle, maybe for health reasons, possibly to be a better steward of the earth, or any of the other numerous beneficial reasons to switch; either way it can be an overwhelming change at first at-least it was for me. The year is 2011 I've been working out for religiously for nine months now and I've decided to take it to the next level and start eating smarter - fueling my body with the nutrients it had been craving. I started reading every article and book I could get my hands on noticed a reoccurring topic in many of these articles discussing the effects of chemicals in every day products and the negative impact on our bodies over time from daily exposure. There are tons of side affects from these chemicals with the scientific evidence and research linking them to cancer and neurological diseases, both of these issues hitting home as both cancer and Alzheimer disease are prevalent in my family. With statistics like nine out of every ten males will develop prostate cancer and one out of every two females develop xyz cancer that was enough for a light bulb to go off in my head and make the decision to attempt to live a chemical free lifestyle; especially when these articles discussed how these diseases were far and few between a century ago when we didn't rely on these harsh chemicals in our cleaning products.

The decisions been made you've decided to take the less traveled road and improve your health and the environment you live in, now the daunting task of where do I find these chemical free products and which ones actually work begins. This was definitely a challenge at first for me and overwhelming one at that so I created a plan to face this transition that makes it a little more manageable. Obviously you can't just go through every cleaning product and health care product out the window in one day unless you want to smell like Shrek but what you can do is start to migrate chemical free products in and throw away the old toxic concoctions out "hopefully in an environmentally friendly way these are toxic after all". That is how I approached the task and set myself a goal to have a completely chemical free house in a month, this may be a little aggressive however if you have a household occupancy higher than my one. So lets get to the good information on where do I find these products and find them cheap.

Where to shop to get chemical free products at low costs:
These sights below are some of my favorite sites to get low cost products and research new products I'm considering.

• Amazon - Become a prime member and you receive free two day shipping on most orders.
• Vitacost - Order over $49 and you receive shipping is free. 
• Skindeep - You cant exactly purchase products of this site but is the best resource I have found to research products before I purchase them.

However sometimes you get in a pinch and need a product before 3-5 business days of shipping this is when I run to one of the following:

• Target - has a limited selection currently but continues to grow 
• Wholefoods - surprisingly some of their products are priced competitively with online stores
• Or do a Google search for a health food store, these places usually carry personally and cleaning products and likely the people working there are using them so you can real life feedback on how the product works

Now that we know where to get these products which ones actually work?

For household cleaning I have been using mainly Seventh Generation Products and a few other brands that get the work done and I don't feel like I just returned from a chemical lab after I've used them. 

To the left you will Seventh Generation's disinfecting wipes, I love these wipes that come in both scented and non scented - both get the job done but I prefer the scented. I rarely use my dishwasher but seventh generations powder detergent works great leaving no water spots, their hand soap works just as well for both dishes and cleaning around the kitchen without drying out your skin. For my laundry I have tired many different detergents and have landed on ECOS as it does what it supposed to and is inexpensive.




Personal Care was definitely a challenge especially when it came to finding a deodorant that actually worked, after many trials and smelly days I've landed on Alvera all Natural Roll on Deodorant. For personal hygiene I use Doctoer Bonners soap which comes in a variety of scents my favorite being Hemp Almond. I use Jason's PowerSmile for oral hygiene and leaves my word dispenser minty fresh. There are tons of so called chemical free personal care products out there, I just recommend checking them out first on Skindeep before purchasing them.







I hope this list of products you find helpful in your transition to chemical free living. Please feel free to leave comments or recommendations of products that you have used.