Do you really know what you are putting on your skin?

Did you know that your skin is the biggest organ in the body? It has the ability to excrete waste products as well as absorb substances you put on your skin. Think about nicotine and drug patches which are applied to the skin so that they can be absorbed into the blood stream. The same is true for any product you put on your skin; perfume, body lotion, soap, bubble bath, makeup etc.

Many of the ingredients used in beauty products now-a-days are derived from the petrochemical industry. The type of chemicals used in popular beauty and household products include 1,4-dioxane, acrylates, benzophenone, butylated compounds, formaldehyde, diethanolamine to name a few. These chemicals have been shown to be carcinogenic and hormone disrupting. The laws governing cosmetics and personal care products legally allow limited use of these products. Unfortunately the amount of beauty and household products you may use on a daily basis bombards your body with these chemicals and can be damaging to your health. You wouldn’t willingly eat these products so why put them on your skin?

The best alternative is to use beauty and household products which have been derived from natural sources. Generally you can only buy natural skin products from health shops or online health websites, however, some supermarkets are now wakening up and starting to stock natural beauty and household products.

Popular natural beauty products which are reasonably priced include Lavera, Faith in Nature, Tropic, Jason, Kingfisher, Sukin, Neal’s Yard and Burt’s Bees. Natural household products include brands such as Ecover, Bio, Method, Faith in Nature.