Revolution

READ LABELS

Get familiar with the ingredients that are linked to breast cancer and endocrine disruption and avoid them.

NTR has compiled the BEST websites to see exactly what is in your favorite cosmetic and beauty products and how these ingredients can affect your health. Blow the whistle on companies claiming to be organic. Click here for more info.

EAT RIGHT TO AVOID AGING

Ingredients in anti-aging creams have been known to lead to cancer, reproductive and non-reproductive toxicity, neurotoxicity, endocrine disruption, cell damage and more. With the age of over botoxed and airbrushed celebrities the pressure to look young has never been this huge. Stay healthy and look younger longer by eating right, staying out of the sun and avoiding creams with lactic, glycolic, AHA and BHA acids, which can damage the skin.

When you go outside protect yourself from the sun using hats, sunglasses and avoid sunscreen with harmful chemicals as these are key ways to avoid skin damage in the first place. Eating right will also help your skin avoid premature aging and damage. Foods rich in selenium and powerful antioxidants such as Vitamins C and E (i.e. sunflower seeds, avocados, almonds, cucumbers, apples and lemons) can delay the effects of aging, improve our skin elasticity, stave off wrinkles and get rid of bad skin problems.

Greenlink Charcoal
Lazzari

VERIFY YOUR HAIR DYE

Getting the perfect hair takes work but you don’t have to heighten your risk for cancer while doing so. Many products used for hair contain cancer-causing compounds. Hair coloring involves the use of chemicals capable of removing, replacing and/or covering up pigments naturally found inside the hair shaft. Many of these chemicals have been linked cancer. There are companies out there that have organic and naturally derived compounds in their dyes. When choosing salon dyes and DIY color kits, try to avoid dark, permanent hair dyes and these toxic ingredients:

P-PHENYLENEDIAMINE
M-PHENYLENEDIAMINE
RESORCINOL
METHYLPARABEN
O-AMINOPHENOL
P-AMINOPHENOL
FRAGRANCE

ORGANIC MATTERS

Skin is your largest organ (bigger than your heart and liver). If you apply chemicals to your skin, especially body parts you shave, pluck or wax, the toxins may enter your bloodstream. It is just as important to use organic body care products, as it is to eat healthy, pesticide-free foods.

Buy certified organic products, and simplify your beauty routine. Invest in a few great pieces that will last you in the long run and make sure they are certified as safe. Certifications really vary but USDA organic certification is the best in America, many others can be considered quite misleading, as in some cases only 10% of ingredients need to be organic to be labeled “organic”.

Using natural and clean body-care products may cost more, but you get more of the good stuff that you are wanting in the first place without all the cheap chemical fillers. So in the end you are actually saving yourself money and reducing your risk of cancer. Sounds like a good deal to us.

LEARN TO MAKE YOUR OWN PRODUCTS

Simplifying your beauty routine by using fewer products means automatically exposing yourself to fewer chemicals. The best way to know what’s in your body care products is by making them yourself. We have compiled some awesome DIY body care prooducts out of organic ingredients that you can make at home.

Click through to the DIY section.

USE PARABEN FREE PRODUCTS

Parabens can be found as preservatives in food, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics products, including underarm deodorants, eye shadows, sunscreens and mascara. Where else can you find parabens? High levels of parabens have been detected in breast tumors with one UK-based study finding high concentrations of parabens in eighteen out of twenty samples of breast tumors. These findings, along with the demonstrated ability of parabens to mimic estrogen, a hormone known to play a role in the development of breast cancers, have caused many companies to make paraben free products.

Check your labels and demand paraben free from your favorite companies.

Farmers Markets

TAKE THE METAL OUT OF YOUR PITS

Antiperspirants contain chemicals and toxins that are absorbed into your body and this concentration of toxins can lead to cell mutations. These compounds form a temporary plug within the sweat duct that stops the flow of sweat to the skin’s surface. Steer clear of antiperspirant products with aluminum.

Fun Fact: The color blue is extremely rare in nature. Not even blueberries are truly blue – they’re purple! When companies want a product to look blue, or deep red they often use a colorant labeled as “lake”. Lake is a term used for pigments or dyes that are precipitated with metal salts such as aluminum, calcium, barium, or others.

INFILTRATE YOUR FRAGRANCES

The fragrance industry is self regulated and due to trade-secret laws companies do not have to list ingredients on their labels. Any substance labeled “fragrance” in the US can be comprised of many substances that are toxic. The problem with fragrance is that it often contains phthalates, which are used to keep the scent lingering for a long time. After you worry about Phthalates that have been linked to various cancers there are lab tests showing that perfumes have tens to hundreds of neurotoxins, synthetics linked to cancer and even animal secretions. Eww..

OVERUSE OF HARMFUL SOAP

Did you know while some bacteria are harmful, other bacteria is actually beneficial and helps balance out the toxins in our bodies and our environment? Anti-bacterial soaps kill both forms of bacteria, with the help of Triclosan, which is a major ingredient in most of these products. Effects of this ingredient include skin irritation, allergy susceptibility, bacterial and compounded antibiotic resistance and the destruction of our fragile aquatic ecosystems. So use antibacterial soap, but do so sparingly or find alternatives.

NAIL POLISH CAN BE TOXIC

Avoid nail polish and removers with formaldehyde, DBP or toluene as they can cause serious damage to your nervous system, kidneys, liver and more. DBP is a toxic phthalate that enters the bloodstream and can cause reproductive disorders in newborn boys. DBP was banned in Europe but it is still sold in the U.S. – Why American’s haven’t caught on we’re not sure but until they do look for DBP free polishes.