By Rachel Gibson
Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families
I have a toxic relationship with everything around me!! Not a few minutes pass each day before my thoughts turn to the many ways I might be exposing myself or my family to toxic chemicals. Here’s just a five-minute snapshot of my toxic troubles:
Done with my gum, I stick my hand in the trash can to grab the gum wrapper I threw in there moments ago. Then I realize the trash can is full of the BPA-laden receipts I’d rid myself of days before. So I go wash my hands. Back at my computer, I decide to take a break from working to grab a snack.
Surely toxic flame retardants are spewing out of my computer, happily taking up residence on my fingertips. So I head to the bathroom to wash my hands. I’ve finished my snack, so I start up the stairs back to my home office. I glance in the bathroom as I do so, noticing the toothbrushes sitting on the counter. I think about the cleaning chemicals (labeled as “green” but who really knows!?) used earlier that morning to clean the mirror above our counter. The chemicals were sprayed. The spray got on the toothbrushes, no doubt. I run the toothbrushes under hot water because I know I’ll forget to do it before my three-year-old goes to brush at bedtime.
My hands are dry and chapped by this point, so I reach for my lotion. Toxic? I’m told by the manufacturer that it doesn’t have parabens or phthalates, but what about the rest of the untested ingredients listed on the back? Maybe I’ll wash my hands again. I walk past my son’s room on the way to my office and notice his sippy cup sitting near the open window. Surely something toxic is blowing in from the street below and landing on the spout.
Back to the sink in the bathroom to wash it off. As I’m drying the sippy cup, I look down and notice a small ball of dust resting alongside the trash can. I pick it up to get rid of it, knowing that household dust contains a toxic web of chemicals. Pieces of the dust ball having stuck to my fingers, I go back to the sink to wash my hands. I’m hoping to help save the world, but I can’t get any work done because every move leads me back to the sink! Never mind the fact that it’s freezing in my house because all of the windows are open upstairs so that the indoor air can flow out of my house — it being a likely significant source of chemical contamination. All this in just FIVE MINUTES!
The only way to get out of this toxic relationship is for Congress to pass comprehensive legislation overhauling the way chemicals are regulated in the United States. The fact is that I know too much while also knowing too little. I know too much about potential sources of chemical exposure, but I know too little about what chemicals I might be getting exposed to and what kind of impact they might have on my life and that of my family. So, I need help. (Maybe I need a therapist to deal with my obsessive behavior, but the extensive evidence in mainstream medical and scientific journals showing harm from exposure to a wide range of common household chemicals supports my crazy inclinations.) Congress, I need you to pass a law that better protects me and my family from harmful chemicals so I can just use my computer, eat a snack, walk through my house, do all the things we all do every day without freaking out about it. Is that so much to ask?
