7: These Shocking Things Are Exposing You to Toxins

Michael Kummer: You're listening to the Primal Shift Podcast. I'm your host Michael Kummer, and my goal is to help you achieve optimal health by bridging the gap between ancestral living and the demands of modern society. Get ready to unlock the transformative power of nature as the ultimate biohack, revolutionizing your health and reconnecting you with your primal self.

One thing I'd like to mention is that I have a fairly comprehensive list that you can download of the my favorite non toxic personal care and household products, clothing, kitchen appliances, and everything in between. So check out the show notes for a link to that free PDF that you can download today.

Hey guys, welcome back to another episode of the Primal Shift podcast. In today's episode, we're going to talk about a topic that has been proven most frustrating for both me and my wife. And I'm talking about environmental toxins, including Cenoestrogens, endocrine disrupting chemicals. PFAS, forever chemicals, and anything in between.

And the reason why those environmental toxins have been so frustrating for us was because we never fully understood the extent of our exposure. And once we started really digging through all the available scientific evidence and figuring out in what products, be it personal care, clothing, furniture, etc.,

we find those chemicals, we quickly realized that they're everywhere and it was so frustrating to try to understand how can we possibly limit our exposure. You can't get away from them. You know, that's right off the bat. There is no way of avoiding them completely. You can only mitigate. And so in this episode, I want to talk about specifically a about the common types of environmental toxins, where you can find them, you know, I mean, I already said everywhere, but to be more specific in what products you can find those chemicals in foods, uh, for example, how they impact your health potentially, why they are so sneaky, you know, the negative impact of those chemicals might not show up immediately.

might show up years later, even decades later sometimes. And most importantly, tips and tricks you can use to reduce your exposure significantly, depending on the state of health you're in. If you're super healthy, likely you can handle more exposure than someone who's already metabolically impaired or has, you know, cancer or some other type of issue, maybe autoimmune.

So those are really, you know, at the end, the top tips that I can give you to start reducing your exposure immediately and to hopefully live a healthier life. Now, before we get started and into the nitty gritty, please share, subscribe, follow, rate to help other people find this podcast as well. Alright, so let's talk about, just very briefly, the types of, it's not an extensive list, but the most common types of environmental toxins.

Heavy metals, and obviously, I'm sure you're aware, lead, arsenic, and a lot of other heavy metals that you might be exposed to. Through drinking water, as we've seen in the past, over the last couple of years, plant based products, you know, they get absorbed from the soil, end up in produce, and so you might ingest them.

There are obviously different types of plants have different types of or different amounts of exposure, and anything in between. Even sometimes in stainless steel products, you know, you can find lead or other heavy metals. that are used, you know, for a coating or maybe for the print on it. You know, we have some glassware that has, you know, print on it, like measuring cups that have, um, you know, heavy metals in there.

And we didn't know about that. Uh, there are fluorinated chemicals, like also known as PFAS or forever chemicals. The problem with those is, as the name already implies, they stay forever where they are, you know, in your body, in the soil, in the water. And it's very difficult, if not impossible. to get rid of them.

And so you definitely want to limit your exposure to those because once they're there, they're not going anywhere. Carcinogens, obviously, stuff that causes cancer. And at this point I should maybe say that, you know, there are certain chemicals that fall into various categories. So there are chemicals that are both endocrine disrupting.

as well as carcinogenic. And so they might not always be in only one category, they might span multiple of those categories. Pesticides and that includes both synthetic pesticides. So if you buy non organic produce, for example, you might get exposed to pesticides that the farmers used to keep bugs off the produce, but also natural pesticides.

Every plant. to various degrees has pesticides to deter bugs and insects from consuming the vital parts of the plant, the leaves, the stems, the seeds, et cetera. So if you consume plants, you always consume pesticides. And there are some studies out there that actually suggest most of the pesticides we consume are in the plant that are natural plant pesticides and not the ones we use, the synthetic ones we add on top.

So that's something to consider depending on the type of diet you're on. Herbicides such as atrazine or glyphosate, you know, highly carcinogenic and they are very prevalent. You can find them almost in every source of drinking water unless you filter it. There is, you know, sources of residue of glyphosate and some of those other endocrine disruptors and carcinogenic compounds that are used in agriculture.

VOC is volatile organic compounds, you know, from paint, from glues, from stains, et cetera, from furniture, you know, or parts of the furniture might off gas VOCs that you then inhale and that can cause issues. Mold and mildew, obviously. Mold is a huge problem in many homes. Often, you know, inhabitants are unaware that there are mold issues and then they wonder, you know, why do I have, you know, certain, you know, brain fog or You know, other types of issues that are simply the result of long term mouth exposure.

So those are some of the types. Now, where can you find them? Well, I already said they are everywhere. So, but let's be a little bit more specific so we can kind of, you know, make our way down to trying to mitigate and remediate some of those issues. Cookware is a source of those. toxins that you're likely exposed to every single day, even, you know, by cooking at home or by eating out, um, nonstick cookware in particular has a lot of, you know, has microplastics, has sometimes those PFAS and has a lot of those endocrine disruptors.

And so be aware of, you know, what utensils, what pots and pans you use. We're going to talk about that in some of the ones that I recommend. But those are a huge source of those environmental toxins. Well, personal care products, another thing that we expose ourselves to every single day, and maybe more so women, you know, with makeup and some of, you know, face lotions, etc.

But also men, you know, deodorant, face creams, hand soap, sanitizers, you know, all of those things. Most of those things, most of those products you can find in the store. have endocrine disrupting properties, meaning they mimic the sex hormone estrogen, they connect to those receptors, because every cell in your body has estrogen receptors, they connect and mimic the function of the hormone estrogen.

And as you can imagine, in particular for men, too much estrogen. probably not a good thing, but even for women, you know, too much estrogen can be problematic. And so person care products, a huge source of those endocrine disruptors. Clothing. You know, it turns out that all of the fancy clothing that we wear, you know, from brands like Lululemon and stuff, they contain forever chemicals.

And, you know, especially if you wear them directly on your skin, in some cases, you know, I did not know that either, but I heard that many women wear, you know, those yoga. Pants and leggings and stuff without underwear, so your genitals are directly exposed to those forever chemicals, not a good thing. But same with men, you know, underwear, t shirts, you know, pants, socks, a lot of those products have unfortunately toxins that get absorbed through the skin.

Birth control pill. By definition, it's estrogenic. You know, a hormone based birth control pill, at least that is. That is, by definition, estrogenic, so it mimics, again, it has either estrogen or it has chemicals that mimic estrogen. And those have a lot of issues that we'll talk a little bit about more in this podcast.

Tap water. Another thing, you know, the water that you get from your local water authority is not free of chemicals. It's not free of toxins. Some of those chemicals are actually added in, uh, to sanitize the water, like chlorine, and then it's metabolites when it reacts with certain organic compounds in the water.

But there are a lot of things that the water authority doesn't filter for, or take out, and birth control hormones are one of those things. So from all the, you know, the, the urine of, uh, women that use birth control, all of that goes into the drinking water, into the sewer system, and then it gets recycled back into our drinking water, and it That usually does not get filtered out, but that's just one of the issues in tap water.

Food storage containers, plastic food storage containers to be more precise, are another huge source of endocrine disruptors that can leach into liquid foods, or salty foods, or acidic foods, uh, at room temperature or above. So another huge, uh, issue, hand sanitizers, you know, I have triclosan and endocrine disruptor, you know, and the problem is, and the same goes with, you know, hand soaps, etc.

And if you think, well, but I'm gonna wash my hands, then the water, you know, takes care of that. No, it doesn't, because most of those, you know, chemicals are attracted to lipids, to fat, so they stick on your skin, uh, because your skin is a little bit fatty, and doesn't wash away with water because it doesn't bond with water very well.

Um, another huge source. Produce, you know, fruits and veggies, obviously. And even if you buy organic, you get the natural pesticides. So there's another huge source of those environmental toxins. Tea bags and coffee. Coffee is one of the most, one of those plants where farmers use a lot of pesticides and herbicides.

So it's the most bombarded kind of produce you can find, and then the hot water obviously, you know, makes it leach all of that into your coffee and that's what you drink every day. The same goes with tea bags, you know, that most tea bags are made out of plastic, microplastics that leach into the water, you drink it and they stay in your body almost forever.

And then the air that we breathe, you know, unfortunately the air at home in most houses or in most homes is not incredibly clean and it's polluted by VOCs, uh, from furniture, from paint, from, you know, maybe mold, from, you know, your gas stove or appliance, etc. So another source, you know, it's something that we breathe all the time.

So we are constantly exposed to those things. So I know this all sounds very gloomy. And that was really one of the reasons why we got so frustrated early on. I'm like, you know, there is just no way you can escape that. And no, there isn't, you know, right off the bat, but there are ways you can significantly reduce your exposure.

But before we get to that, let's talk about how those toxins potentially impact your health. You know, the carcinogens cause cancer, or at least significantly reduce your risk of developing cancer if you're exposed to those things long term. They can cause inflammation, they can cause metabolic dysfunction and organ issues, like low thyroid levels, or low thyroid hormone levels, if your thyroid gland isn't working properly.

microbiome in your gut, which, you know, the gut is like the center of your, or a key component of your immune system and other functions in your body. If your gut is not healthy. Your immune system is likely not healthy, and that leads to a host of downstream issues, be it autoimmunity, be it, you know, your likelihood to get sick increases, and a lot of other things that you don't want to deal with.

Pure immune health, you know, I already mentioned, and that often goes back to poor gut health, unfortunately. Weight gain or lack or inability to lose weight, especially fat, those endocrine disruptors and specifically the ones that mimic the sex hormone estrogen. Estrogen is a fattening hormone, so it makes your body store fat.

The more estrogen you have, the less likely you lose weight in the form of body fat. Early puberty in girls, you know, that's especially an issue with young females. Who are exposed to endocrine disruptors and some of those other chemicals early in their life. It's a huge issue that leads to, you know, girls getting into puberty early and earlier.

Uh, and that's not good, uh, for their health overall. Low testosterone in men, kind of the counterpart. Infertility. I don't know how many, you know, couples we know that have either issues getting pregnant preterm labor. I mean, my wife actually gave birth. birth to Lucas, our, our son, who is now seven and fortunately very healthy, but he was born at 30 weeks and six days, um, way early and fortunate everything went well.

But that's again, you know, how many couples we know now that have issues with just giving birth, something that should come so naturally or have, you know, preterm labor or, you know, have to abort, um, even though they don't want to, you know, the baby, unfortunately, sometimes, you know, Diarrhoea is significant issues during pregnancy, um, erratic menstrual cycle, you know, um, low sperm count, etc, etc.

So there's so many issues that all go back to the exposure of those environmental toxins. So now that we know how bad it is and where they are and what kind of issues they can cause, let's talk about what you can do to significantly reduce your risk and mitigate some of those issues. Because getting away is not possible, they are everywhere.

So the only thing you can do is to look at the lowest hanging fruit, your greatest exposure, and try to mitigate that or reduce it at least significantly. And one of the easiest way you can do today is to filter your drinking water, filter the tap water, and to avoid purchasing water in plastic containers.

Because again, plastic leaches endocrine disruptors. Almost every single type of plastic. There are only a few examples where we haven't seen endocrine disrupting activity yet. but most of it. Doesn't matter if it's BPA free or if it has BPA, because usually when a brand says it doesn't have BPA, then it's BPS or some other, you know, bisphenol, doesn't have to be bisphenol A, or something else that is also or equally endocrine disrupting.

So filter your tap water. and avoid drinking out of plastic, you know, and even though, and that's important to understand, most of the endocrine leaching activity occurs at room temperature or above, but that doesn't mean if you get a bottle of water in the grocery store from, from the fridge. that it has always been refrigerated.

Might have been in a warehouse at high temperatures on a delivery truck or whatever and you know all of the endocrine disrupting chemicals already are in the water and then it doesn't help if you refrigerate it then or if you buy it refrigerated in the store. So, no plastic. bottles, no unfiltered tap water.

Charcoal filter, a simple charcoal filter is enough to get out most of those chemicals. I mean, if you really want to go the extra mile and do it really well, get in a reverse osmosis filtration system. I have, we have actually two filtration systems in our home. One is a whole house filtration system that filters the water of the entire house.

It takes out all the chlorine, all of the, you know, chemicals. Everything that's, you know, is important or that can potentially be endocrine disrupting or, or cause issues, it filters out. So we have clean water out of every tap in the house, but then we have an addition reverse osmosis filtration system under the sink that remineralizes the water because I would not recommend drinking pure RO water because it's void of anything, and that's not a good thing because typically water tries to.

maintain in a certain state with a certain set of minerals. And if the water is so stripped of everything, then it might leach those minerals from, you know, the food you eat or from your surrounding tissue. And that could potentially cause mineral deficiencies. So we have a reverse osmosis system and a whole house filtration system from a company we really like.

I'm going to link it down below in the description and show notes. So check that out. We have a review and a YouTube video on that as well. So you can check that out. But that's really one of the easiest way. But if you have nothing else, you know, a filter in your freezer or your fridge or just a screw on filter or a printer filter, you know, is enough to filter your drinking water.

I highly recommend that. Avoid plastic food storage containers, period. You know, replace them with glass, with stainless steel, with maybe silicon. So we have silicon bags that replace Ziploc bags. We have Glass storage containers for the stuff that goes in the fridge, for leftovers, etc. We have glass storage containers for all of our, you know, powders we have in the pantry.

Um, for, you know, any, any food that comes in contact with the container, we try to use glass or stainless steel or silicon if it goes in the freezer or maybe, you know, if we take it, uh, with us. Remove plastic. Plastic can lead to endocrine disruptors into the food, especially if it's hot, warm. salty, acidic, etc.

In the freezer, it's less of an issue. So if you use regular Ziploc bags in your freezer, that's okay. But as soon as you take it out and it's in the fridge, you know, I recommend removing the Ziploc bag and putting it into glass or stainless steel. Personal care products. Most deodorants. lotions, soaps, sanitizers, makeup, they all have endocrine disruptors.

Fortunately, there are now brands out there, I'm going to link down some in the show notes, that we use, that don't have any of those endocrine disruptors. Specifically look for anything, for stuff that's free of fragrances, fragrances, candles, etc. Huge source of Phthalates, which are an endocrine disrupting chemical, anything that has Benz or Phen in the word of the ingredient.

I don't use sunscreen personally, because most of those are either full of endocrine disruptors or they turn carcinogenic. Even the mineral based ones we've learned are not so good for you. We're gonna have a separate episode on sun exposure, sunburns, and what you can do to avoid and mitigate that.

We're not going to talk too much about sunscreen, usually a big issue, deodorant, sanitizers, lotions, creams, etc. Make sure you buy clean products that are free of phthalates, fragrances, and any of the other endocrine disruptors. Non stick cookware. Replace it with either stainless steel, cast iron, I mean, those are really the two top choices, that they are non stick as well, at least uh, the cast iron, if you season it properly and we season it at home with tallow, then it doesn't stick and it doesn't have any of the endocrine disrupting issues.

The only thing it might leach into the food is iron, but that's usually not a bad thing, because a lot of people are iron deficient anyway, so. That really helps there. In terms of clothing, use natural fibers as much as possible. Merino wool is one that I really like. Cotton, obviously, depending on the type of clothing, but if it's like underwear or socks, I typically stick with merino wool.

Otherwise, organic cotton is a great choice. You know, any natural fiber basically is good. Anything synthetic, you know, stretched, you know, some of the performance wear, especially from brands like, you know, I have to say it again, Lululemon and stuff. Follow Forever Chemicals. Especially if you sweat, as your pores open, they go right into your body and they stay there and won't go away anytime soon.

So avoid those as much as you can. With plant foods, it's the same, you know, buy organic if you can, because then at least you avoid most of the synthetic chemicals. Now, organic does not mean free of pesticides and herbicides. There is a list of approved. Chemicals farmers can use that comply with the organic label and those are not always good for your health either but definitely better than non organic.

If you can't afford organic then stick to the um, if you look for the 30 dozens or so you find those that have the most chemicals typically those that would avoid if you buy conventionally grown. Um, like grapes, for example, are, I would not buy non organic because they are usually, they have a lot of those chemicals on there.

But there are other things where farmers typically use fewer chemicals, even if conventionally grown. So you can look that up and, but buy, you know, organic if you must, and be aware that there are plants that have, many plants have natural defense. chemicals, like pesticides. And I have a video on that, I'm probably going to do an episode on that, uh, that talks about some of those, the most problematic ones, but basically, you know, your leafy greens, your legumes, root vegetables and tubers, etc, nightshades, those are all typically have more toxins than what you want to have in your body, whereas sweet fruits and squashes.

You know, like zucchini, for example, if you remove the seeds and the skin, then there have typically fewer chemicals and you should be, do fairly well on them. In terms of furniture, that's really a big one because non toxic, truly non toxic furniture is super expensive. And one way to kind of bypass that issue is to either buy used furniture that has already off gassed in someone else's home.

Or you really find, you know, clean, non toxic furniture, they are typically very expensive. We just looked at couches the other day and there was like, I think that one of the cheaper ones we found was like 10 or 15 grand for, you know, a couch. I'm like, come on guys, you know, but that's unfortunately what it is.

So buying used is probably your best bet. And if you can't do that, you know, then buy something that has maybe fewer issues, like a leather couch might have. There was tan with vegetable oils might be less problematic. That's maybe the only reason or the only area where you want to consider even using or exposing yourself to vegetable oils.

But you know, those are usually less of an issue than fabric couches that have been, you know, treated with, you know, stainless or non stain kind of coatings, et cetera, that off gas significantly more. If you can't. You know, do non toxic furniture if you just, you know, have to deal with what you have. One way to mitigate that, and it also goes then into improving your air quality at home, is to use a bipolar ionization.

It's basically a small device you can attach to your central AC unit. If you have one, or even you can plug, get plug in ones or, you know, like standalone ones, we use HypoAir is the brand that we use. We have a whole house ionization system, bipolar ionization system that emits. ions that get distributed by the HVAC system in the entire home and those ions, they destroy pathogens, including VOCs.

So they destroy bacteria, viruses on surfaces, in the air, as well as VOCs. So with that, you can mitigate it. You can also get standalone units if, um, we have one in the, in the bedroom to, you know, improve the air quality even more. And we have, you know, smaller plugin ones that they call it the air angel, for example, that we have in certain areas, like in our unfinished basement where there's a higher likelihood of mold growing because of the humidity, et cetera.

So that's one way to mitigate not all, not only your air problems and furniture and paint and whatever you have in your house already that you cannot easily change, but also, you know, many other things that are more difficult to approach in a systemic level. Another thing that's very easy, very low hanging fruit, just getting rid of your plastic cutting boards, you know, whenever you cut and you, you know, carve into the plastic, you know, you get little tiny, sometimes microscopic pieces of plastic, then attached to your food and, and, you know, get into your body.

So by just using wooden. Cutting boards, you know, ideally color code them, so use one type of wooden board for meat, the other one for produce maybe, so you don't mix and match, you know, and potentially cross contaminate, so that's a good idea. If you're into coffee or tea, you know, buy products that have been tested for toxins, that are organic, and in the case of tea, you know, that come in, in bags that are made from natural fibers and not plastic, you know, or just buy, you know, the, The pure tea basically without the bag and then use a stainless steel mesh, you know, cup or whatever to make your tea.

And then the last thing that is Maybe the, potentially the most irritating, especially within the, the female audience here is birth control, you know, birth control by definition, hormonal birth control is endocrine disrupting. That's what it's meant to do. The problem with that is, I mean, if you've ever, you know, looked at, you know, the piece of paper that if you extend is probably three feet long or even longer.

With all of the potential side effects, those are not theoretical side effects. Birth control significantly and negatively impacts your body. It causes a ton of potential issues, some you might not see immediately, but over time. And the best advice I can give you is to not use birth control. And I know, you know, we just had the very discussion.

With my brother in law, you know, and his girlfriend. I'm like, so what are we gonna do? Well, you know, I'm not a ultra conservative, you know, kind of guy who's as well, you know, You shouldn't have, you know, intercourse unless it's, you know, to make children. No, you know, I don't have a hard stance on, on, on any of that, you know, do whatever you must, whatever you like, whatever, you know, makes you happy, but know that hormonal birth control is Messes with your health in so many different ways that the best thing you can do is to remove it and find other ways You know, you can you you know control measure your temperature I mean there are only you know So many days in a month if you live a somewhat healthy lifestyle, you should have a regularly You know, stable cycle, regular cycle.

And so, you know, roughly based on other tools that you can use, there's not even with the aura ring or even, you know, with, with WHOOP, et cetera, with some of those trackers, you can tell when you're getting into your fertile days, you can measure your temperature, there are a whole lot of things that you can do to kind of, you know, figure out and very often just based on the feedback I've seen from women who do exactly that.

It's just as accurate. I mean, your risk of an unwanted pregnancy is just as low as doing some of the other things. But again, you know, it's ultimately up to you, but just be aware. Birth control, by definition, very much estrogenic and has all of, can cause all of those issues that I've mentioned before.

Now, I'd like to hear from you though, is, you know, what are some of those areas that you struggle most with? Because this is such a huge topic. And even though, you know, I've given you like 13 or so tips on how you can address and mitigate those issues, every single one warrants really its own episode and its own discussion, because there is a lot of nuance.

There is a lot of complexity, you know, even with. You know, the plant based word, what plants to avoid, etc. What personal care products to avoid, which ones are safe. I mean, we can dive into any of those in much more detail, but I'd like to hear from you, which are the ones that you think you are struggling most with so we can address those first and then talk about some of the others.

In the future. And with that, we're going to wrap it up. I hope you liked this episode. Again, send me your questions via social media, via my blog, you know, any of the channels that you find me on, send me your, your feedback, let me know what do you want to hear next? What do you want to dive into next? And, uh, we'll do that.

And with that, we're going to wrap it up. Thanks for listening and I'll hear you in the next episode.

Don't forget about the list you can download that contains all of my favorite non toxic personal care and household products, kitchen appliances, clothing, bedding, and everything in between. So check the show notes for a download link and download that list today.