Nourishing ourselves through our skin

Hello Plant Lovers!I'm writing today because I want to share a couple of links and some information with everyone. I mentioned in the August Newsletter that I'm collaborating with 2 new teachers to the UHS for some great workshops coming up in just a couple of weeks. My prep work has lead me into some research and to be quite honest, I'm astonished at some of what I've found.I'm a guy and, while being rather sensitive, more nurturing than most and being into herbs, I confess that I don't use body care products very much (only slightly more with my homemade ones). Don't worry, that's not the astonishing part.What's really blown me away is this idea that I got from Alison Brown (body care specialist), of what goes ONTO our body actually is going INTO our body. This is actually really profound to me! in a completely new way. Using poultices (mashed up plant bits) directly on the skin and on wounds is very effective and I use them a lot. And when I make salves, the whole idea is that the skin is able to absorb all that delicious healing medicine.BUT, it's never really hit home for me before. (Bing! Light goes on) It's not just the good healing parts that absorb through the skin, it's whatever is IN the cream or lotion.Click here to read Alison's 1st ever blog post about just this topic - knowing what's in our body care products, what we want and what to avoid. Her passion for healthy, homemade body care really inspires me. it's a huge area of herbalism that is still moderately unknown to me. But I ask myself, 'why wait and try to treat exposure to chemicals once they've made people sick? why not put reduce and elliminate expose to these things now?!'

“Laboratory tests reveal adolescent girls across America are contaminated with chemicals commonly used in cosmetics and body care products. Environmental Working Group (EWG) detected 16 chemicals ... in blood and urine samples from 20 teen girls aged 14-19. Studies link these chemicals to potential health effects including cancer and hormone disruption. These tests feature first-ever exposure data for parabens in teens, and indicate that young women are widely exposed to this common class of cosmetic preservatives”

– Rebecca Sutton, Ph.D., EWG Staff Scientist, September 2008 - click here to read the full article

 

And if you're a List Lover, you'll be interested in this Cosmetic Chemicals Watch-List - click hereOne last thing that I want to highlight around this body care topic. "Many body care products (sunscreens, lotions, lipsticks, deodorants, perfumes and shampoos) are manufactured in staggerinly huge quantities; often equaling or surpassing Agro-chemicals in tonnage." (Lost Language of Plants, Stephen Buhner)It's actually a whole can of worms from start to finish. There's huge quantities of waste from the manufacturing process and then when it goes on our skin, we either absorb it or it washes off in the shower and goes into the water waste stream. All these paths lead back to the "environment", either the living world within us or the living world around us.There's much more that could be said, but I don't want to veer down the overwhelming path of the 'doomsday scenario'. No, for me, having this awareness helps me to connect with how extremely important it is to me that we treat ourselves with gentleness and a nourishing hand.I hope this has been helpful on it's own, but i'd also like to invite you all to come play with creams...

You're all welcome to join Alison & Garliq for 2 great workshops making Face & Body Creams

Creams for Beginners

Sept 22

6-9 pm

Advanced Creams

Sept 29

6-9 pm