Girls, let's go on a diet!
I don't believe in diets (sorry!) but I do believe, based on what I've read, that each and one of us should do some dieting when it comes to the amount of perfume we consume every day.
Just look around you! I bet there's perfume in everything you use during a day, from your hand soap to your detergent.
It feels fresh and sexy to smell good but unfortunately it comes with a price.
The truth is that perfume causes allergies. Allergies might not sound so frightening when you compare it to the other things chemicals can do to your body but according to the book Badskum by document filmmaker and environmental journalist Katarina Johansson, the synthetically produced fragnances or scents found in most household products also contain phalates and artificial musks.
Phalates, the infamous plastic chemical, help fragnances last longer but are incredibly damaging to our bodies, and especially the bodies of fetuses and children whose nervous and reproductive systems need the good stuff, aka natural things, to grow and develop as they should (read more about phalates here).
Artificial musks have a clean, smooth and sweet scent and form the basis of most perfumes you buy. The only problem is that these substances accummulate in fat tissue - in our own and the fish we eat, and what that do to our bodies no one really knows. There is, however, one way to get rid of them, according to Johansson, and that is by breastfeeding your baby. What a nice gift to give to your offspring!
Fortunately, there are better ways to avoid these baddies, and that is by buying fragnance-free products.
Detergent
Since my first son was born seven years ago, we've been using Neutral's detergent which is free from perfume and dyes. You can get their products at any grocery store in Sweden. I order mine through MatHem.
Hand soap
With one child at school and another at daycare washing of hands is a regular activity in our household, and that's why it's nice to know that there is no perfume and coloring agents in the Såklart Handtvål (hand soap) from Garant. You can buy the soap at any grocery store in Sweden. The product has even been climate compensated. Go Garant!
Dishwasher tablets
The other day I had to run to the store and buy some much-needed dishwasher tablets. Instead of getting the one I normally buy from Finish I found a smaller package without fragnance and coloring from Coop's organic series, Änglamark. What's great about this product is that the plastic around the tablets dissolves in water which means I don't have to remove any packaging and get chemicals on my skin or, worse, my children's skin. It also means less plastic in landfills or, in our case, in our usually overloaded recycling bin. You can get a similar kind from Garant. The only minus is that you get a lot less tablets for the price you pay.
Diapers
Recently, I got hold of Naty's chlorine and fragnance free diapers on MatHem. The online grocery store has drastically expanded its organic range, which means I can finally buy these normally hard-to-find Swedish diapers with a click of a button. What I noticed straight away when I opened my first bag was that the diapers didn't smell of chemicals like Libero's diapers do, despite the latter being awarded the Nordic green label, Svanen. But more on diapers later.
Washing up liquid and body products
Our washing up liquid and body products such as shampoo and bodycream are all organic but unfortunately they include perfume. Although the scents derive from organic farming, they are, according to Johansson, no better than the ones produced in labs which means they too can cause allergies. But as far as I understand they don't include phalates and artificial musks.
So, in conclusion:
Just look around you! I bet there's perfume in everything you use during a day, from your hand soap to your detergent.
It feels fresh and sexy to smell good but unfortunately it comes with a price.
The truth is that perfume causes allergies. Allergies might not sound so frightening when you compare it to the other things chemicals can do to your body but according to the book Badskum by document filmmaker and environmental journalist Katarina Johansson, the synthetically produced fragnances or scents found in most household products also contain phalates and artificial musks.
Phalates, the infamous plastic chemical, help fragnances last longer but are incredibly damaging to our bodies, and especially the bodies of fetuses and children whose nervous and reproductive systems need the good stuff, aka natural things, to grow and develop as they should (read more about phalates here).
Artificial musks have a clean, smooth and sweet scent and form the basis of most perfumes you buy. The only problem is that these substances accummulate in fat tissue - in our own and the fish we eat, and what that do to our bodies no one really knows. There is, however, one way to get rid of them, according to Johansson, and that is by breastfeeding your baby. What a nice gift to give to your offspring!
Fortunately, there are better ways to avoid these baddies, and that is by buying fragnance-free products.
Detergent
Since my first son was born seven years ago, we've been using Neutral's detergent which is free from perfume and dyes. You can get their products at any grocery store in Sweden. I order mine through MatHem.
Hand soap
With one child at school and another at daycare washing of hands is a regular activity in our household, and that's why it's nice to know that there is no perfume and coloring agents in the Såklart Handtvål (hand soap) from Garant. You can buy the soap at any grocery store in Sweden. The product has even been climate compensated. Go Garant!
Dishwasher tablets
The other day I had to run to the store and buy some much-needed dishwasher tablets. Instead of getting the one I normally buy from Finish I found a smaller package without fragnance and coloring from Coop's organic series, Änglamark. What's great about this product is that the plastic around the tablets dissolves in water which means I don't have to remove any packaging and get chemicals on my skin or, worse, my children's skin. It also means less plastic in landfills or, in our case, in our usually overloaded recycling bin. You can get a similar kind from Garant. The only minus is that you get a lot less tablets for the price you pay.
Diapers
Recently, I got hold of Naty's chlorine and fragnance free diapers on MatHem. The online grocery store has drastically expanded its organic range, which means I can finally buy these normally hard-to-find Swedish diapers with a click of a button. What I noticed straight away when I opened my first bag was that the diapers didn't smell of chemicals like Libero's diapers do, despite the latter being awarded the Nordic green label, Svanen. But more on diapers later.
Washing up liquid and body products
Our washing up liquid and body products such as shampoo and bodycream are all organic but unfortunately they include perfume. Although the scents derive from organic farming, they are, according to Johansson, no better than the ones produced in labs which means they too can cause allergies. But as far as I understand they don't include phalates and artificial musks.
So, in conclusion:
- Use fragnance-free products as much as you can and go 100 percent fragnance-free when you're pregnant and breastfeeding. Stay away from nailpolish and deodorants too during this cricital period of your baby's life. I more or less haven't used nailpolish and perfume in seven years. I do however use a deodorant from Weleda once in awhile.
- If you want some fragnance in your life, I'd go with organic products that get their scents from nature but make sure the ingredient list is pretty short. The shorter, the healthier the product is for your skin.
- There are about 2,500 different fragnance ingredients used in perfumes and perfumed consumer goods, and 100 of them are known to cause allergies when applied to the skin.
- It takes about 350 substances to create the scent of strawberries
- A company doesn't need to list what ingredients go into making one particular scent. It's enough to write "perfume".
- However, 26 of the most allergy prone substances have to be listed if they exceed a certain amount ( 0.001% in stay-on products (creams and perfumes) and 0.01% in rinse-off products (shampoos and gels).
- Among the 26 substances are limonene and linalool (I'm sure that you find these two ingredients at the back of your body products). For the full list, click here.
- The EU is considering extending this list to include "all known and likely fragrance allergens in cosmetic products and not only the 26 currently listed."
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