Speaker 1: Episode three ninety two, Living a Low Talks Life Frugally
Speaker 1: with Alex Stewart.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast, where you'll learn to
Speaker 2: save money, embrace simplicity, and live a life here your
Speaker 2: hosts Jen and Jill.
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast. My name is Jen,
Speaker 1: my name is Jill, and today we are having a
Speaker 1: really fun conversation with a really fun woman.
Speaker 3: Alex is phenomenal. She had us on her show, which
Speaker 3: I think is going to come out after this podcast episode,
Speaker 3: but we just got to get a sense of how
Speaker 3: approachable and kind and helpful and informative she is on this,
Speaker 3: especially for someone just beginning to dabble with the idea
Speaker 3: of low talks. So we love reducing barriers to entry
Speaker 3: on especially things that can save us money. Absolutely like this.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and there's so many benefits to reducing quote unquote
Speaker 1: toxins or whatever or just living a little more naturally,
Speaker 1: and we cover some of the financial benefits. We also
Speaker 1: have a little tangent during the episode, but it's definitely
Speaker 1: one of those radical middle type episodes. It's take what
Speaker 1: works for you, leave what doesn't uh, but try new
Speaker 1: things to get new results.
Speaker 3: But first, this episode is brought to you by Granola,
Speaker 3: Granola bars, granola and yogurt being granola. When all of
Speaker 3: our country ways catch up to us and lead us
Speaker 3: to low spend, let's put that extra bits of savings
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Speaker 3: high old savings account. If you don't have one, please please,
Speaker 3: I beg of you. Even if it's not with CIIT.
Speaker 3: Just get a high old savings account. But also frugal
Speaker 3: friendspodcast dot com, slash c.
Speaker 1: Yes, it's a savings account, not a checking account. Maybe
Speaker 1: we'll do an episode on the difference.
Speaker 3: What as I say, Oh, I'm sorry.
Speaker 1: It's fine. It's fine. They'll realize when they try to
Speaker 1: write their first check from it. So if you're interested
Speaker 1: in stuff like this, then we have several kind of
Speaker 1: eco friendly episodes in our archives. Two of our favorites
Speaker 1: not ego friendly, but but one of our favorites, Episode
Speaker 1: three seventy nine how to get affordable quality versus cheap quantity.
Speaker 1: And that's some of some of the talk about reducing
Speaker 1: some of the toxins in our life, right is just
Speaker 1: choosing maybe more it's more affordable and it's more quality.
Speaker 1: So just kind of looking out for those things. And
Speaker 1: then also episode two forty six Frugal Home Cleaning Tips,
Speaker 1: we talk a lot about home stuff sense and stuff
Speaker 1: like that, and so I mean, honestly, there are so
Speaker 1: many ways that if you're just trying to do this
Speaker 1: to save money, Like so much of the talk about
Speaker 1: low Tals life is kind of veiled as you know
Speaker 1: Crunchy or Granola's, but so much of it is about
Speaker 1: saving money for us. And it's one of the reasons
Speaker 1: we were so excited. We were so excited to have this
Speaker 1: conversation with Alex. She's an educator, activist, change agent. She
Speaker 1: runs Low Talks Life. She is a columnist for Well
Speaker 1: Being magazine and a sought after speaker and consultant to
Speaker 1: businesses committing to change for good. And she's just accessible
Speaker 1: and relatable and she we fine, this is not in
Speaker 1: her bio. She is also a like master bartender, so
Speaker 1: if you need a good cocktail. Maybe she's also your girl. Yeah,
Speaker 1: she's also your girl. So let's get into it and
Speaker 1: chat after.
Speaker 3: Mmm.
Speaker 1: Alex, Welcome to Frugal Friends. We are both super excited
Speaker 1: to have you on for this episode. It's just a delight.
Speaker 1: I'm so excited. Thank you for being here.
Speaker 4: Me too, And I know we've chatted on my show,
Speaker 4: and I feel like it is so lovely to connect
Speaker 4: with communities who seem to be doing quite different things
Speaker 4: and yet as humans talk more to each other. You
Speaker 4: really how many beautiful overlaps there are in the things
Speaker 4: that you care for. So it's it's awesome to be
Speaker 4: here today.
Speaker 3: It's so true. I'm glad to have you. It was
Speaker 3: an honor to be on your podcast, and I'm so
Speaker 3: excited to share your wealth of wisdom. You've been doing
Speaker 3: this work for far longer than us Brugal Friends over here,
Speaker 3: which is really amazing to come across someone who has
Speaker 3: been in the space for so long talking about low talks,
Speaker 3: So thanks for being here.
Speaker 5: Welcome.
Speaker 1: All right, So let's start out what do you define
Speaker 1: as low talks? Because I actually mentioned that we're interested in, like,
Speaker 1: you know, reducing chemicals, and you were like, well, you don't.
Speaker 1: You actually probably don't want to do that, And I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 1: my mind's already been blown. Wait let's record. So like,
Speaker 1: define for us what you see as a low TALS
Speaker 1: life and how you see it benefiting your life.
Speaker 4: So to do that, I'm going to try and give
Speaker 4: you the shortest backs story possible for how the whole
Speaker 4: thing came about. Because I was just a regular person
Speaker 4: who was on the antibiotic merry Go round of tonsaliitis
Speaker 4: two three, four times a year, and you take the
Speaker 4: pills and you get better for a bit and you think,
Speaker 4: oh great, it's done, and then it's back, and then
Speaker 4: I became antibiotic resistance. So I had to look outside
Speaker 4: the box, which was quite terrifying because I'd grown up
Speaker 4: super conventional, very normal, convenience driven eighties city family, right.
Speaker 4: And I remember a girlfriend of mine was visiting me
Speaker 4: bring me some soup, bless her when I was really sick,
Speaker 4: like the pills weren't working, and she said, if you
Speaker 4: thought about seeing a naturopath. I was like, what's that.
Speaker 4: You guys call them nature pathic physicians for here, they're
Speaker 4: not doctor qualified. It's just a completely different health science.
Speaker 4: And while doing essentially the same thing, and so I
Speaker 4: said no, but I found one because she really thought
Speaker 4: that she could help, and she did. She gave me
Speaker 4: this vaulting tasting herbal potion, which I've now come to love,
Speaker 4: and vitamin C, zinc and a couple of other things
Speaker 4: that are good for the immune system, and within three
Speaker 4: days I was all better. And I was like, how
Speaker 4: did you do that? I didn't even take medicine. It's
Speaker 4: like you did. It's just the kind of medicine that
Speaker 4: fortifies the body to take care of itself. And look,
Speaker 4: I am a huge fan of how incredibly advanced our
Speaker 4: crisis care system is for when the poop, it's the
Speaker 4: fan and you've got to save lives. I'm definitely not
Speaker 4: going to my natural path if my arm falls off.
Speaker 4: But there is so much to be said for that
Speaker 4: side of healthcare where we are actually addressing things that
Speaker 4: might be missing in the body that are making it
Speaker 4: not operate well. And if we look at the food,
Speaker 4: the SAD diet, standard American diet, or we could swap
Speaker 4: that with standard Australian diet, it's pretty much the same,
Speaker 4: a lot missing. So it stands to reason that over
Speaker 4: time our body gets less and less of what it
Speaker 4: needs to operate functionally and let alone optimally, and we
Speaker 4: get sick. So that whole journey took me down, starting
Speaker 4: to look at packets and ingredient lists, and she said,
Speaker 4: you know, be really interesting, there's some research on non
Speaker 4: celiac gluten sensitivity. Because I'd ruled out celiac and strep
Speaker 4: bugs overgrowing, so maybe try eliminating the gluten twenty years ago.
Speaker 4: That was an incredibly difficult exercise. You couldn't just swap
Speaker 4: everything that you did to gluten free versions because they
Speaker 4: didn't exist. You had to ditch packets. And that was
Speaker 4: a gift that I had no idea was a gift
Speaker 4: at the time. I was like, oh my gosh, I've
Speaker 4: got to cook everything from scratch.
Speaker 5: This is so awful.
Speaker 4: Everything has gluten in it. You know the special up
Speaker 4: and go popper that I used to have like a
Speaker 4: protein kind of shaky oat thing for breakfast. I was
Speaker 4: a bartender, you know, I'm in my mid twenties at
Speaker 4: this point, and it was just insane. So the gift
Speaker 4: was I had to learn how to cook. Then I realized,
Speaker 4: oh my gosh, everything tastes so bland. I got to
Speaker 4: figure out how to do this better.
Speaker 5: So I did.
Speaker 4: And then I thought, well, I'm not going to miss
Speaker 4: out on cake at birthdays. I'm going to figure out
Speaker 4: how to make one. I was very creative.
Speaker 5: I was winning all.
Speaker 4: The bartender competitions for cocktails and working with chefs and
Speaker 4: winning awards and being flown around. I mean, it was
Speaker 4: a crazy life. Well but it did give me creativity
Speaker 4: and creative license. So I just brought that over to food.
Speaker 4: And what that taught me was, oh my gosh, I'm
Speaker 4: not alone here. I was talking to friends and they're like, Wow,
Speaker 4: how do you just magic up these things?
Speaker 5: It's amazing.
Speaker 4: This tastes incredible, And I realized none of my friends
Speaker 4: knew how.
Speaker 5: To cook me.
Speaker 4: We knew how to appropriately heat a chicken until it
Speaker 4: was safe to eat, and steam veggies until they were
Speaker 4: kind of gray, but we didn't know how to cook,
Speaker 4: you know. And it was it turned out to me
Speaker 4: an incredibly exciting time. Demystifying these packets also made me realize, well, crap, like,
Speaker 4: I know that's the gluten, but what is all this
Speaker 4: other stuff? And then snowballs the education on our food
Speaker 4: system and realizing how disconnected we are from where our
Speaker 4: food comes from, and how bizarre it is that we
Speaker 4: are eating all these things in packages? How does that
Speaker 4: make sense? And then of course the personal care piece.
Speaker 4: I'm pregnant with a giant baby and it's my ba
Speaker 4: it's my baby shower, and all the friends, you know,
Speaker 4: they give you those gifts and it's lovely. And I
Speaker 4: was like, oh, I'm pretty good at food packets. Let's
Speaker 4: have a look at what's on these. I didn't do
Speaker 4: that in front of my friends, of course, but in
Speaker 4: a time later, and I was horrified. I found these
Speaker 4: chemicals that kept coming up in the research around either
Speaker 4: endocrine disruption so fiddling with our natural hormone signaling, or
Speaker 4: potential carcinogenic contamination. And I was like, this is babies.
Speaker 4: And then I thought, well, if it's bad for babies,
Speaker 4: isn't it bad for us too? Like we tend to
Speaker 4: like coddle little babies. And then oh, you're old enough
Speaker 4: to use the toxic stuff. Now I'm in where is
Speaker 4: it the logic in that? So I had always been
Speaker 4: a teacher and trainer in hospitality. I was always training
Speaker 4: huge groups of bartenders. I worked for a very large
Speaker 4: hospitality group Before that, I was in cosmetics, always teacher, trainer, motivator,
Speaker 4: ran a whole team, and so it felt really natural
Speaker 4: to think, well, can I help you? Like, could I
Speaker 4: do something? And it was the real nascence of the
Speaker 4: blog blogger sphere two thousand and nine, and I just
Speaker 4: decided to start writing and sharing some simple swaps that
Speaker 4: I'd made and resources people could find, and it built community,
Speaker 4: eventually a Facebook page and then books, podcasts and all
Speaker 4: the things that came after that. And so low Tox
Speaker 4: for me, was a name that I came up with.
Speaker 4: Being an exgenna, you were obsessed with original ideas when
Speaker 4: the yeah, that had to not exist anywhere on the internet.
Speaker 4: But I thought about my values as well, and I
Speaker 4: thought about growing up as the Oprah generation, Like you know,
Speaker 4: you'd watch Oprah if you were sick from school or
Speaker 4: on holidays, and there'd be the next celebrity protocol that
Speaker 4: you would try and ultimately fail. And I saw my
Speaker 4: mom try and fail a whole bunch of diets, and
Speaker 4: I just never wanted anyone on my watch to feel
Speaker 4: like they were trying and failing and had this shame
Speaker 4: spiral going on trying to be perfect according to someone
Speaker 4: on the internet, just did not want to add to
Speaker 4: the stress of you know, living our best lives and
Speaker 4: actually living our best lives, not pretending to, and so
Speaker 4: low tox me made space for people to define that
Speaker 4: as what you want to do, where you're at, how
Speaker 4: it looks for you. I didn't want to be, oh,
Speaker 4: you have to di Wiatt like do it yourself or
Speaker 4: you know you're not doing low tos. Conversely, I didn't
Speaker 4: want it to always have to be about buying brands,
Speaker 4: because a lot of people do want to make things
Speaker 4: and love that creativity. So I wanted a lot of
Speaker 4: flexibility and the realization that no toks doesn't exist, and
Speaker 4: you know, it's just I felt like progress rather than
Speaker 4: perfection was my real goal. So that's that's he was
Speaker 4: all born beautiful.
Speaker 3: I can commiserate with what you're describing in different aspects
Speaker 3: of your journey, what had led you to that and
Speaker 3: be looking at the ingredients of things and demystifying. I
Speaker 3: think that word in particular stands out to me. It's
Speaker 3: been also a part of my journey in being better
Speaker 3: in the kitchen is just kind of demystifying what's in condiments,
Speaker 3: what are some of the basics of cooking and to realize, oh,
Speaker 3: I don't have to get all of the salad dressings
Speaker 3: and mayo and spreads in bottled plastic form, like I
Speaker 3: can make it myself and every single time it's tasted
Speaker 3: better than what's coming in the bottle, which then is
Speaker 3: leading to understanding of these different products that are used
Speaker 3: to keep it shelf stable that I don't totally need
Speaker 3: and it's not going to be that great for my body.
Speaker 3: But in all of this, something that I've realized is
Speaker 3: it feels like so much to have to learn and
Speaker 3: educate myself on, Like I've become more interested in tea
Speaker 3: and herbs and the benefits that can have and things
Speaker 3: that I can do when I'm sick just to help
Speaker 3: my immune system. But it also feels like I'm opening
Speaker 3: Pandora's box into this world of it. What can I
Speaker 3: what's believable, what is true and right? How much do
Speaker 3: I actually have to know what's going to be right
Speaker 3: for me? And so with all of this, what would
Speaker 3: you say to somebody, either from your own journey or
Speaker 3: what you've come to understand now, like steps to take
Speaker 3: in understanding your own journey? Of load talks and are
Speaker 3: there things you might have done differently? Like what could
Speaker 3: someone benefit from your expertise? And this feels overwhelming, but
Speaker 3: I'm interested.
Speaker 4: I think I can do it. Okay, so funny story.
Speaker 4: Of course, I had been researching things since I had
Speaker 4: to go gluten free, which was what two thousand and seven,
Speaker 4: So that's a while ago, now, can I have been
Speaker 4: Yeah around then, and I therefore got to do everything
Speaker 4: bit by bit. I therefore got to just bring in
Speaker 4: a little thing, try another thing, research another thing. Ooh
Speaker 4: tooth loss teflun coded a shocker. Let's see if there's
Speaker 4: one that isn't. Oh, there isn't.
Speaker 5: There is.
Speaker 4: There's actually four brands brilliant and you know, formulating that
Speaker 4: into a blog. And then once I'd gotten that habit
Speaker 4: underway and changed it, moved on to the next thing.
Speaker 4: So my advice is do the same. Do not make this,
Speaker 4: do not make the mistake as I did when I
Speaker 4: launched go lootox, which is our signature program of calling it.
Speaker 4: And I'm still ashamed to this day that I called
Speaker 4: this program this thirty days to your low tox life.
Speaker 5: It's not thirty days.
Speaker 4: I realized how important as an educator. Positive psychology was
Speaker 4: in that round because people legitimately thought that they were
Speaker 4: going to have to do it all in thirty days,
Speaker 4: and we had to have like a team meeting, an
Speaker 4: emergency meeting, me and three hundred and sixty women to say, please,
Speaker 4: this is thirty days to receiving all the information you need.
Speaker 4: The actual building of a lotok's life is probably more
Speaker 4: you're looking at a decade.
Speaker 5: Relax.
Speaker 4: You know, if you just bought your new mattress last
Speaker 4: year and right now you've discovered that it's you know,
Speaker 4: a spring mattress or it's got petroleum memory foam or what,
Speaker 4: that doesn't mean Oh my gosh, we're going to die.
Speaker 4: I need to swap the mattress today.
Speaker 5: What a waste.
Speaker 4: There's always something you can do. And in that example,
Speaker 4: just in case anyone is actually in that boat right
Speaker 4: now and is thinking, is my mattress trying to kill me?
Speaker 4: It's what you sleep against that's really important. So could
Speaker 4: you get a cotton mattress protector and then you're sleeping again,
Speaker 4: it's a natural fiber. Could you get a cotton mattress
Speaker 4: topper or a wool or latex and then you're sleeping
Speaker 4: against something much cheaper than the mattress replacement, but it's
Speaker 4: a beautiful natural fiber. Just as an example. There's always
Speaker 4: different levels of making swaps in this game, so as
Speaker 4: we relax into what that then looks like on an
Speaker 4: individual level, it becomes much easier. And I will also
Speaker 4: say you're thinking about your makeup, your skincare, your cleaning products,
Speaker 4: your laundry products, your bedroom products, linens, clothes, I mean,
Speaker 4: on and on we could go. There's twenty two topics
Speaker 4: in that course, never mind EMFs molds like bigger deal
Speaker 4: things around your home. And so the question is what
Speaker 4: are you excited to work on? What do you want
Speaker 4: and really need to work on. Perhaps stop there and
Speaker 4: absolutely forget every other category exists, don't worry about it.
Speaker 4: You have to start where you want to stop and
Speaker 4: where you feel naturally like you want to prioritize, rather
Speaker 4: than playing to someone else's rules, because you're always going
Speaker 4: to feel like a failure playing someone else's rules.
Speaker 3: That's so helpful. I'm also hearing that your reason for
Speaker 3: entry and interest in load talks is valuable too, and
Speaker 3: I don't maybe necessarily need to know all the things
Speaker 3: about load talks that you do, Alex, depending on my
Speaker 3: lifestyle and the things that I'm going through and experiencing
Speaker 3: finding answers that are unique to my situation. I will
Speaker 3: say for me, some of my interest in this topic
Speaker 3: is first beginning with money saving. To be honest, it's
Speaker 3: oh my goodness, I do not want to spend another
Speaker 3: twenty two dollars on laundry detergent because I always buy
Speaker 3: the big one, and yet it's so expensive. And I
Speaker 3: also really hate waste. I hate food waste, and I
Speaker 3: just hate all other kinds of waste too, and so
Speaker 3: I'm hating to throw out this big, bulky plastic thing
Speaker 3: that I know I'm not going to be able to
Speaker 3: really recycle well because it's still full of such dense soap.
Speaker 3: This is such a long example, but this is what
Speaker 3: led me to why can't I make my own? Why
Speaker 3: can't I demystify laundry detergent? It can't be that complicated?
Speaker 3: And turns out it's not. And here I am diying
Speaker 3: my laundry detergent, which then led me to diy my
Speaker 3: dishwashing detergent. DIY What else am I diying? So many things?
Speaker 3: But it's because it was primarily because of money. I
Speaker 3: just don't want to spend the money, and then I
Speaker 3: don't want to be throwing away the plastic. And now
Speaker 3: I'm realizing, oh, and there's also like some benefits to
Speaker 3: me as well here that I'm not engaging in some
Speaker 3: of these chemicals and or in toxins that I don't
Speaker 3: want to be having that I don't need to have
Speaker 3: on my clothes and in my home.
Speaker 4: One hundred percent. It doesn't always mean you have to
Speaker 4: swap a purchased thing for a purchased thing. It's kind
Speaker 4: of like when you go gluten free, right, or you
Speaker 4: go organic. Let's just say people who think, yeah, I
Speaker 4: really want to do this. And if you go from
Speaker 4: the regular oreos because that's what you eat for snacks,
Speaker 4: not ideal, but if that's where you're at, and then
Speaker 4: you switch to the organic oreos, which is crazy that
Speaker 4: the world has organic oreos, but I do, it's going
Speaker 4: to be more expensive. If you switch from the packet
Speaker 4: cheesy puffs and you get the gluten free cheesy puffs,
Speaker 4: it's going to be more expensive. There's a tax on
Speaker 4: gluten free. On organic in processed food, there's way less
Speaker 4: of attacks on switching from processed food to produce and
Speaker 4: starting to actually eat less snacks that never fill us
Speaker 4: up anyway, and actually investing that money into meals. You know,
Speaker 4: like I laughed when you guys were on my show
Speaker 4: about giving my son chili kon carne on toast for breakfast,
Speaker 4: because that's what there was and it needed eating. But
Speaker 4: the reality is is he's had this fantastic high fiber,
Speaker 4: high protein, healthy fats breakfast. He had some avocado on
Speaker 4: top that is going to carry him through to lunch.
Speaker 4: He does not get recess food because he doesn't need it.
Speaker 4: He feels great right through. If it wasn't going to
Speaker 4: be the chilling conkhne, it was going to be the
Speaker 4: three eggs, And like a lot of people think, gosh,
Speaker 4: how can you eat that much at breakfast, It's like, well,
Speaker 4: it's way cheaper than then providing two different packets and
Speaker 4: a think of crudetes and all the extra stuff that
Speaker 4: would take to fill him up till lunchtime otherwise. So
Speaker 4: when it comes to things like personal care and cleaning
Speaker 4: products and home products, people think, oh, you know, I
Speaker 4: have to swe which my air freshener and my scented
Speaker 4: candles and my fabric softna for the organic or the
Speaker 4: essential oil based solutions. Actually you could here's a crazy idea,
Speaker 4: but you could actually just stop using all of that stuff.
Speaker 5: Don't even need to swell.
Speaker 3: I know, I know when you're when you listen and
Speaker 3: I'm like, I just don't even use that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, like that. You know people are using like
Speaker 6: the little toilet duck thing that you hook into your
Speaker 6: toilet because we can't handle natural smells in our modern
Speaker 6: world anymore. Well, if someone's done a poop and you
Speaker 6: use that thing, you can still tell there's been a poop.
Speaker 4: Lately, it's just covered up with a fake fragrance, Like,
Speaker 4: just let it happen. It'll be gone in ten minutes.
Speaker 4: It's fine. We're not gonna die people poop. I just
Speaker 4: think we we have created so many so called solutions
Speaker 4: for problems we actually never had. And when it comes
Speaker 4: to the low tox game, it is about identifying those
Speaker 4: and actually letting go of a lot of stuff that
Speaker 4: we used to buy. And who needs a fifty dollars
Speaker 4: cented candle? How do they get the apple and cinnamon
Speaker 4: into the candle? Ask yourself? By crushing apples and minding cinnamon.
Speaker 4: It's not it's very very processed and those chemicals are
Speaker 4: hormone disruptive to us.
Speaker 1: So Saygabye, Oh, I okay, I want to stay on
Speaker 1: this topic of what are the like financial benefits you've
Speaker 1: seen by switching to a low tech flight. So we
Speaker 1: covered a little bit about you know, the groceries, the
Speaker 1: food was we could always go more there, the home
Speaker 1: cleaning products just buy just totally eliminating like stuff. Let's
Speaker 1: go like, what other financial like money saving benefits you've
Speaker 1: seen directly, but also have you seen any indirectly?
Speaker 4: Ooh interesting? Well, obviously going low talks one tends to
Speaker 4: have less hormone problems. From what I can see, I
Speaker 4: have seen people's fertility challenges disappear. Now I'm not promising
Speaker 4: that I can't, of course, but I can't tell you
Speaker 4: the amount of people who've signed up to Preconception Ninja
Speaker 4: or go low Talks thinking oh, I've just got to
Speaker 4: try something, I've got to feel like I'm doing something.
Speaker 5: Here.
Speaker 4: A dietitian I met in a conference, I just had
Speaker 4: this gut feel she had this sadness about her that
Speaker 4: she was just going to stop trying with her husband.
Speaker 4: They've done three rounds of IVF, and I said, look,
Speaker 4: I have this course. I feel really drawn to just
Speaker 4: give it to you, like, just let me just give
Speaker 4: you a log in and password, just try because I
Speaker 4: feel like there's a sadness around this ending for you
Speaker 4: rather than a I've made the decision and it's happening.
Speaker 4: And so if there's a sadness, there's still a desire
Speaker 4: and if there's a stone unturned, maybe I can help you.
Speaker 5: She goes off. She does it.
Speaker 4: She pops up in the Facebook group about six months later,
Speaker 4: and she's pregnant and it was a natural pregnancy. And
Speaker 4: there was one household item she was using that she
Speaker 4: was really really addicted to, and they had in their home.
Speaker 4: It was one of those fresh air systems. They had
Speaker 4: a dog, and she's the smell of dog in like
Speaker 4: wet seasons. Just couldn't handle it. She got rid of that.
Speaker 4: And then there was one thiroid test that her doctor
Speaker 4: hadn't run for her, a more advanced kind of panel
Speaker 4: from one of the doctors in the program. And those
Speaker 4: two things she attributes to just being the two pieces
Speaker 4: that were stressing her body out to the point where
Speaker 4: it didn't feel safe to fall pregnant, so it just
Speaker 4: kept rejecting pregnancy. The founder of the College of Environmental
Speaker 4: Sciences here had ten miscarriages, realized it was actually the
Speaker 4: smart meter that was on the other side of her
Speaker 4: bedroom wall that she slept near, and then removed the
Speaker 4: smart meter and felt pregnant and kept the baby to term.
Speaker 4: So there are just so many environmental pieces that have
Speaker 4: crazy benefits when you think about like our life goals,
Speaker 4: Like if you want to be a parent, Not everybody
Speaker 4: has to want that, That's not what I'm saying, but
Speaker 4: if you did, and if it was freaking expensive going
Speaker 4: through and the heartache of going through those rounds, and
Speaker 4: did it take And like I'm not saying it would
Speaker 4: work for everybody, but I have been invited to baby's
Speaker 4: birthday parties as the lady who got them pregnant. I mean,
Speaker 4: I'm just a health coach. I bring together a lot
Speaker 4: of scientists and doctors, but I just help people make
Speaker 4: some pretty basic changes and get the information they need.
Speaker 4: That is my job. And like, imagine just ditching all
Speaker 4: the things that stress your body out. Synthetic fragrance is
Speaker 4: a huge environmental stress in our homes, and what does
Speaker 4: that look like. It's the fabric softna, the scented candles,
Speaker 4: the fresh air systems we're told we need when we
Speaker 4: could actually open the window.
Speaker 1: The.
Speaker 4: Reeds, all the things, the perfume right there on our
Speaker 4: throats and wrists. I could go on. What if we
Speaker 4: just decided, I'm aston try and do without that. And
Speaker 4: my favorite experiment is you box it all up and
Speaker 4: you check it in your garage. You don't need to
Speaker 4: throw it out. Just try and live for two weeks
Speaker 4: without those things, and just use a plain bar soap
Speaker 4: in your shower and for washing your hands. Most people, then,
Speaker 4: when I issue them the challenge to bring it all
Speaker 4: back and use it all back on the same day,
Speaker 4: end up with headaches and asthma attack, just feeling awful
Speaker 4: and a bit nauseous and feeling like they can't breathe well.
Speaker 4: And it's because you've finally taken all of that stuff
Speaker 4: out of your environment. You've never known an environment without it,
Speaker 4: so your body's never really noticed that it was toxic,
Speaker 4: and you bring it all back in and you.
Speaker 5: Go, WHOA, this is a lot.
Speaker 4: I can really notice it now, And then you become
Speaker 4: that person who notices it at your friend's house when
Speaker 4: they're running the dryer and the cuddly spring fresh kind
Speaker 4: of fabric softness smell is permeating. I mean, it's estimated
Speaker 4: that that represents a huge percentage of indoor air pollution
Speaker 4: just the fabric softer alone. So I think you would
Speaker 4: be saving twenty thirty bucks a month by not using
Speaker 4: all that kind of stuff at least, and then that's
Speaker 4: something you can reinvest as you ladies both put it
Speaker 4: so well into something you really love, and then the
Speaker 4: unintended beneficial consequences could be consequent. You didn't even realize,
Speaker 4: like could your kid have less severe asthma attacks? Could
Speaker 4: you know you end up not having a migraine problem
Speaker 4: and needing ensides and other forms of medical care to
Speaker 4: address that. So there are a lot of things that
Speaker 4: are stressing our bodies out that when you remove them, yeah,
Speaker 4: it helps your hip pocket, but it could end up
Speaker 4: helping you in ways you didn't even sign up for.
Speaker 4: Initially you could, you thought, yeah, let's save some money.
Speaker 4: It was like, hold them, I don't get headaches anymore.
Speaker 4: I remember I left the cosmetics industry because I had
Speaker 4: this sense of feeling allergic to it at the time.
Speaker 4: That's the only way I could describe it. But it
Speaker 4: was more about being there and moving into a more
Speaker 4: senior role, and administration is so not my bag. So
Speaker 4: I left. And when I left that industry, in retrospect,
Speaker 4: I left the world of headaches and migraines and buying
Speaker 4: a full packet of painkillers every single month to address that, which,
Speaker 4: never mind the effects on your liver and your hormones
Speaker 4: and all that jazz. So the benefits are worth being
Speaker 4: curious about how it might look for you, That's what
Speaker 4: I can say.
Speaker 3: Knowing the landscape of just people's understanding and willingness to
Speaker 3: try different things or certain things sounding like they're going
Speaker 3: to go in a certain direction, I imagine that this
Speaker 3: could kind of stir up this what's being said. We
Speaker 3: have such this binary between science and kind of anything else,
Speaker 3: anything else that you want to try and pursue and
Speaker 3: try out. And it's reminding me in so my background
Speaker 3: is in social work, and we would a lot of
Speaker 3: times talk about and within texts the medical model, and
Speaker 3: not trying to make any sort of like political or
Speaker 3: otherwise statement about it. They were just describing the medical
Speaker 3: model views humans in this way, and it's somebody comes
Speaker 3: with a singular problem and we treat that singular problem,
Speaker 3: and yet it kind of is to the exclusion of
Speaker 3: the whole person. And so yes, there's gonna be lots
Speaker 3: of different opinions on that, but I'm certainly tracking with
Speaker 3: you on this idea that it doesn't have to be either,
Speaker 3: or it can be both, and there can be all
Speaker 3: of this whole person taken into consideration about environment and
Speaker 3: experiences and circumstances, medicines and herbs, and to recognize that
Speaker 3: many medicines are herbs or based off of our understanding
Speaker 3: of herbs, like we only came upon the type of
Speaker 3: medication that we have now within the past fifty to
Speaker 3: one hundred years, and before it what you can find
Speaker 3: from the earth.
Speaker 4: And I have an interesting story on that. Can I
Speaker 4: share it quickly because it speaks to exactly what you've
Speaker 4: just said about most medicines being to write.
Speaker 5: So we went on.
Speaker 4: I'm really passionate about if you get to live somewhere
Speaker 4: that was once an indigenous place, you need to learn
Speaker 4: that culture and respect it, like that is a given
Speaker 4: for me. If you are on ancestral lands, and we
Speaker 4: are here in Australia. You guys are too, And I
Speaker 4: know different people have different feelings. People get triggered because
Speaker 4: of the way they brought They were brought up in
Speaker 4: a certain way, and I get that, but at least
Speaker 4: paying respects and learning about that culture, I think is
Speaker 4: a really nice. Well, we can all say that that
Speaker 4: would be a lovely thing to do.
Speaker 5: So we go with this.
Speaker 4: Aboriginal guide and we're walking along the coastline and he's
Speaker 4: pointing out different plants and I'm a nerd. I'm a
Speaker 4: science nerd. I literally interviewed doctors every week. I love it.
Speaker 4: And so I was asking. I was that question person
Speaker 4: in the group who was like, so why and then
Speaker 4: what do you like? What is it in the plant?
Speaker 4: He's like, unfortunately, I can't actually say. And I was like,
Speaker 4: why can't you say? And he said, because we found
Speaker 4: that pharmaceutical companies were sending research agents to our indigenous
Speaker 4: tools to try and find out what we were using
Speaker 4: and why to then take back into being able to
Speaker 4: turn it into chemical forms. And I was like, WHOA, Okay,
Speaker 4: Now he had no need to tell me that there
Speaker 4: was no financial benefit to him, explaining that but he
Speaker 4: felt really compelled to just share what he could as
Speaker 4: to why he couldn't be more generous with his information.
Speaker 4: And I was incredibly sad about that. And I think
Speaker 4: it's just the reality of the well we live in.
Speaker 4: And so, you know, I love modern medicine. I love
Speaker 4: how we can save people's lives, and I think there's
Speaker 4: just so much incredible science there. And there's also so
Speaker 4: much incredible science in other areas of science that bizarrely
Speaker 4: get we get told a non science like that's just
Speaker 4: weird to me. I really love the world where we
Speaker 4: can just recognize the awesomeness of all of it for
Speaker 4: what it is.
Speaker 1: There is a radical middle and in another life, Yes,
Speaker 1: I was an acupuncturist.
Speaker 3: Oh that is what my degree is in.
Speaker 1: And I'm considered going to naturopathic medical school.
Speaker 3: So, like I, our listeners are learning just how hippy
Speaker 3: dippy we are. I know, I know it all.
Speaker 4: I feel like my bartender days. People just kind of
Speaker 4: tell me everything everything.
Speaker 1: I love it. But like even when I was practicing acupuncture,
Speaker 1: we always look to hold the tension. It was never
Speaker 1: just where practice like herbal medicine and acupuncture was the
Speaker 1: way It's always about holding the tension between what can
Speaker 1: Western medicine give me and what can it not? And
Speaker 1: what can other types of you know, health care give
Speaker 1: me and what can they not? And we say the
Speaker 1: same thing about spending. So it's just opening up and
Speaker 1: finding the boundaries and you know, the benefits to all
Speaker 1: of these things.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and with that, I think I can appreciate your
Speaker 3: pregnancy example, because there are certainly people who have diagnosable,
Speaker 3: visible reasons that the parts aren't there, the parts aren't working,
Speaker 3: they're not going to work, and that's s But if
Speaker 3: you know this is happening and there's no real reason
Speaker 3: that can be pinpointed, you know, even the medical community
Speaker 3: will say that your stress levels, your sleep, what your
Speaker 3: eating are going to play into your chances of pregnancy.
Speaker 3: So then also why not potentially the things that are
Speaker 3: in the environment as well, and what else can be
Speaker 3: considered in all of this that, for some reason or
Speaker 3: another has been so shielded from us but also has
Speaker 3: been sold to us as safe ingest it, breathe it,
Speaker 3: wear it. And only now are we kind of like, okay,
Speaker 3: but are the things that worked in the fifties still
Speaker 3: what we really are now? We want to well, it's
Speaker 3: a good point.
Speaker 5: Yes, it's such a good point.
Speaker 4: And when I give talks, my question to a parent
Speaker 4: audience is often, okay, put your hands up. If you
Speaker 4: remember when you were a kid more than one kid
Speaker 4: in your class who had allergies exomas, risis, dermatitis, hives, asthma,
Speaker 4: and like one hand, two hands might go up. And
Speaker 4: this is like parents who let's say around forty, so
Speaker 4: they were at school in the nineties. And then I say, now,
Speaker 4: think of now and your kids now and organizing a
Speaker 4: birthday party, and how many kids do you now know
Speaker 4: who have allergies, asthmasteria, systematized hives, food allergies, And all
Speaker 4: the room's hands go up. And so that's just a
Speaker 4: twenty thirty year difference, and we have to look at
Speaker 4: what we've changed in twenty thirty years. Like when I
Speaker 4: was a kid and I went to McDonald's on the weekend,
Speaker 4: my fries were fried in beef tallow until about nineteen
Speaker 4: eighty four, my kid if they wanted to go to McDonald's,
Speaker 4: which I'm sincerely try and avoid, but I have a
Speaker 4: you know, we do what we do most of the time,
Speaker 4: so we can go with the flow summ of the
Speaker 4: time philosophy, which is that social cohesion overlap often where
Speaker 4: you're just like, if you're at a friend's house and
Speaker 4: that's what they're doing, don't panic. You know, the bookends
Speaker 4: of what we're doing are really good at home, like
Speaker 4: it's okay. But the reality is that fry has up
Speaker 4: to nineteen ingredients in it. That fry represents potatoes that
Speaker 4: are sprayed with a herbicide so potent that the farmers
Speaker 4: have to stay inside their house for days before they
Speaker 4: can come out and it's safe to breathe the air again.
Speaker 4: So it's a very different world that we are in today.
Speaker 4: Our microbiomes are kind of a bit stuffed, and that's
Speaker 4: what we pass on to our kids, and so it
Speaker 4: stands to reason that we need to then start tending
Speaker 4: to what humans need to feel healthy and they need
Speaker 4: to not be so stressed out. And that includes not
Speaker 4: just our thoughts and how much we're trying to pack
Speaker 4: in a day and all of that stuff, which of
Speaker 4: course is really valid, but it also includes the things
Speaker 4: in our environment and the thing we're putting in our
Speaker 4: mouths that are really confusing our biology and stressing it out.
Speaker 4: So For me, it's really just about like thinking, Okay,
Speaker 4: where do I feel comfortable starting, what do I want
Speaker 4: to remove?
Speaker 5: What am I.
Speaker 4: Excited about looking into? It doesn't have to be doom
Speaker 4: and gloom. It's actually an incredibly exciting journey if you
Speaker 4: start where you're excited to start, Like if you love makeup,
Speaker 4: start there and go, oh, I wonder what I can find,
Speaker 4: and I wonder what might be different out there, And
Speaker 4: I wonder if I went to like I know, when
Speaker 4: I went to La there was this beautiful store called Credo,
Speaker 4: I think, and I think they're online as well, giving
Speaker 4: them a shout out or cat Beauty. There's some beautiful
Speaker 4: US places. But even now low tox is quite accessible.
Speaker 4: You'll probably find some great natural brands in Target. It's
Speaker 4: really not what it once was in terms of like
Speaker 4: either super super hippie or super alchemist expensive potions. There's
Speaker 4: like a ton of stuff in between now. It's quite exciting.
Speaker 3: I appreciate your approach to this, Alex, especially because you've
Speaker 3: been in it so long. It can be easy, probably
Speaker 3: for someone like yourself to kind of forget the common person.
Speaker 3: But I don't get that sense from you, and there's
Speaker 3: not this message of fear. Either there's a recognition of Okay,
Speaker 3: here's what's going to happen if I eat these McDonald's fries.
Speaker 3: But you're also not so fearful about what might be
Speaker 3: out there trying to get you. Your mattress is trying
Speaker 3: to kill you, Like that's not what you're saying.
Speaker 4: Like stress will kill you faster than any like environmental toxin.
Speaker 4: It really meant yeah, And so we have to approach
Speaker 4: this with joy and curiosity. Maybe you have a really
Speaker 4: pressing health challenge that is quite stressful. I've had mold
Speaker 4: toxicity and illness, for example. I would never wish that
Speaker 4: on the person I like the least in the world,
Speaker 4: and I don't really hate people, but if I did,
Speaker 4: I would never wish it on them. And I think
Speaker 4: it's there's that balance of Okay, you really need to
Speaker 4: do some very urgent work to get better or to
Speaker 4: get out of your house or whatever. Or you're the
Speaker 4: person who's recognized that this stuff doesn't make sense to
Speaker 4: use in the quantities and ways that we're using them,
Speaker 4: and you're excited to see what you might phase out
Speaker 4: and change. And both groups are completely valid situations and
Speaker 4: recognizing and honoring where you're at is really important, and
Speaker 4: then start with what you're excited about. I can't say
Speaker 4: it enough, and I can't say enough what I said
Speaker 4: just earlier, which is we do what we do most
Speaker 4: of the time to go with the flow. Some of
Speaker 4: the time, leave a part where you just throw caution
Speaker 4: to the wind and go with the moment the fish
Speaker 4: and chips, and don't worry about the vegetable oil because
Speaker 4: you're with your friends on the beach and it's summer
Speaker 4: and it's such a special moment, you know, don't worry
Speaker 4: about why that ice cream is so blue that your
Speaker 4: kid is eating acrossing you with them at the party
Speaker 4: if they're otherwise healthy, like obviously if you have a
Speaker 4: kid with a neurodivergence or an allergy, you need to
Speaker 4: be more mindful. There are also a lot of kids
Speaker 4: who can handle the odd knock if they're having a good,
Speaker 4: healthy breakfast and dinner and it's okay. And I think
Speaker 4: as soon as we relax into that, you know, our
Speaker 4: body is a pretty amazing detoxifying machines. It's just that
Speaker 4: we're giving the onslaught of crap twenty four seven right
Speaker 4: now and that's what we need to address, and then
Speaker 4: that looks different for everybody based on what your curiosity
Speaker 4: and interests.
Speaker 3: Are beautiful and well said and speaking of starting with
Speaker 3: what excites here and leaning into it that.
Speaker 1: This is so healthy and so pure.
Speaker 3: The bill of.
Speaker 7: The week, that's right, it's time for the best minute
Speaker 7: of your entire week. Maybe a baby was born and
Speaker 7: his name is Williams. Maybe you've paid off your mortgage.
Speaker 2: Maybe your car died and you're happy to not have
Speaker 2: to pay that bill anymore.
Speaker 7: Duck bills, bffalo bills, Bill Clinton, this is the bill
Speaker 7: of the week.
Speaker 4: I'm excited.
Speaker 5: I've heard about this.
Speaker 1: Oh gosh. Every week we yell at our guests to
Speaker 1: share with us their bill of the week, and we
Speaker 1: leave it vague because we really want you to be
Speaker 1: able to flex your creativity. And it's like a bartending champion.
Speaker 3: I am.
Speaker 4: It's quite a check a post, I've got to say.
Speaker 5: But everyone's got a story, right.
Speaker 3: I love it.
Speaker 1: We would love to hear your bill for the week.
Speaker 4: My bill of the week was my son his godmother
Speaker 4: who's my bestie, and I went and saw a show
Speaker 4: and we saw and Juliet, which is out in Australia.
Speaker 4: Now they're doing a production and apparently it's won like
Speaker 4: Tony Awards. It's totally cleaned up in the Broadway world
Speaker 4: over your side of the world.
Speaker 5: And I love musical theater.
Speaker 4: And this is kind of like this mash up between
Speaker 4: Shakespeare and pop music, Max Martin's pop music, and so
Speaker 4: it's a rework of what happened after Romeo committed suicide
Speaker 4: and then like what Juliet does to move through that
Speaker 4: grief and become like her best girl champion. Like it's
Speaker 4: super modern and fun. And then every time a pop
Speaker 4: music's lyrics accurately fit into the story, they break out
Speaker 4: into that song and sing it. It's so weird and
Speaker 4: excellent and just fun and joyful. I think we need
Speaker 4: a whole lot more of that, just total escapist joy
Speaker 4: for joy's sake. And I got the play bill. That's
Speaker 4: my bill of the week. You get to look, you know,
Speaker 4: and they've put in the extra for that character tonight.
Speaker 4: Oh wow, they were in this that's my bill of
Speaker 4: the week.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh. Well, I think there's an extra Billa
Speaker 1: in there that it's uh, you know, off of like
Speaker 1: a Billy Shakespeare h story.
Speaker 3: Right, I love it and you don't mind paying for buying.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Wow, there's so much here and you are our first
Speaker 3: to weave in a play bill and I especially like
Speaker 3: you as what a jen? What exo? You love? What
Speaker 3: is it? What is it?
Speaker 4: I'm definitely ex.
Speaker 3: Oh, well well done. You were original. You gave us
Speaker 3: the first.
Speaker 1: Day you did it.
Speaker 3: And if any of you listening have a bill you
Speaker 3: want to submit, even though it probably won't be original,
Speaker 3: somebody else has done it. Okay, but what hasn't been
Speaker 3: done before is a person named Bill calling us, so
Speaker 3: please do that, but also any other bill that you
Speaker 3: want to talk about Fribal Friends podcast dot com slash Bill.
Speaker 3: We are so looking forward to hearing it. And now
Speaker 3: it's time for the lightning round.
Speaker 1: That was totally organic sound effects.
Speaker 5: I didn't think it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's yeah, all natural right there. So for our
Speaker 1: lightning round question, we will all answer this one. Your
Speaker 1: simple and low cost strategy for a low TALX home.
Speaker 1: So something home related, Alex, what's replace?
Speaker 4: Yeah, okay, yeah, I've got it.
Speaker 5: I've got it.
Speaker 4: Replace your dishwashing liquid, hand washing liquid in the kitchen,
Speaker 4: hand washing liquid in the bathroom.
Speaker 5: Body gel with bar soap.
Speaker 4: Mmm, and for the dish washing liquid. People who go,
Speaker 4: I ain't gonna get one of those little cages and
Speaker 4: the scrubby thing, And that's not me. I'm not a homemaker.
Speaker 4: I'm not a crunchy mom like that whole thing. If
Speaker 4: you've just rejected that idea straight up, you can actually
Speaker 4: cube up your bar soap, let it sit in water
Speaker 4: for about four hours and then just put it on
Speaker 4: a gentle blend and it makes a soap cream and
Speaker 4: you can.
Speaker 5: Use that to wash your dishes.
Speaker 4: Whoa, yeah a big Lisa Brona taught me that one
Speaker 4: from Doctor brown Yeah.
Speaker 3: Oh so g I gotta imagine it's not just any
Speaker 3: kind of bar soap, right Like Dr bren is a.
Speaker 4: Good brand, okay, a good olive oil soap. Like if
Speaker 4: you go to a farmer's market, there's always a stallholder
Speaker 4: who makes natural soaps in there in their little home
Speaker 4: shared and then they come to the market's Like you
Speaker 4: can support someone uber local like that. But yeah, if
Speaker 4: you were buying a commercial one from say a Whole
Speaker 4: Foods or your health shop or organic grosser, then Dr
Speaker 4: Browns is everywhere.
Speaker 5: Uh.
Speaker 3: You did not ask for this, and I did not
Speaker 3: prepare you for this, but since it's the one you
Speaker 3: chose for your lightning round, I do have a follow
Speaker 3: up question from follow up light Lightning Striking twice Sope. Yeah,
Speaker 3: well ton, he can't stand soap that doesn't sud and
Speaker 3: that's his number one complaint of these low talks soap
Speaker 3: solutions is that it doesn't SuDS up.
Speaker 4: Does the husband have any skin issues?
Speaker 5: Has his skin?
Speaker 3: Are it fine?
Speaker 4: It's fine? No, it never gets x MEO dermatitis. It's
Speaker 4: nothing like that. So I would make the soap cream
Speaker 4: because that subs up.
Speaker 3: Okay, just add that water situation.
Speaker 4: Yeah, cube up like once one think of like you know,
Speaker 4: the rectangle and in half and then in whatever to
Speaker 4: make eight little cubes, and then put it in a
Speaker 4: jar of water, say like half liter, and then put
Speaker 4: that in a blender on low after because it really
Speaker 4: will just either like it will overflow otherwise, and put
Speaker 4: that in a little pump bottle and see how you go.
Speaker 4: But that should be that gives you that like really
Speaker 4: clean kind of buff gel vibe minus all the ingredients
Speaker 4: that in the end can cause things like ex amount
Speaker 4: dermatitis oriasis, which can hin you like if you're just
Speaker 4: in a stressful period and you're using those sorts of chemicals.
Speaker 4: It can just be the thing that snaps because that
Speaker 4: system in the body is weaker at that time. So, yeah,
Speaker 4: you don't want to put the thing that creates the
Speaker 4: SuDS is sodium laurel sulfate. Really good for cleaning clothes
Speaker 4: and dishes, not good for putting on your skin.
Speaker 5: That's good to know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, thank you, Jill.
Speaker 1: I want you to go next.
Speaker 3: I am I've been catapulted into this journey because I
Speaker 3: don't want to stun money, not necessarily on things that
Speaker 3: just don't feel super valuable to me. And I love
Speaker 3: a good DIY, So for me, I don't buy candles, fraquances.
Speaker 3: I DIY my cleaners. Now I started to which I'm
Speaker 3: realizing can cross over into everything, so it's not money
Speaker 3: wasted to be buying baking soda because it's what I
Speaker 3: can also clean the glass in my shower with. And
Speaker 3: then as far as like what I consume, beginning to
Speaker 3: buy more local produce where I can kind of understand
Speaker 3: the practices of the farm and that kind of thing.
Speaker 3: But I am that person who I can't even walk
Speaker 3: down the laundry detergent aisle at the grocery store, like
Speaker 3: it's so overwhelming to me. And you were talking about perfumes, like,
Speaker 3: I don't wear perfumes. It's hard for me to be
Speaker 3: around fragrances, which does stink, because I also am one
Speaker 3: who is allergic to cats and dogs. So it just
Speaker 3: precludes me from being able to go to anybody's house ever,
Speaker 3: like if they're doing laundry, if they're burning a candle,
Speaker 3: if they have thats I'm just like, yeah, I'm the
Speaker 3: one who.
Speaker 4: Yeah, let's can't do the rest an outdoor table, that's
Speaker 4: that's always good for the sensitive papes.
Speaker 1: Yes, for me, it's definitely fragrance, like body fragrances. But
Speaker 1: I didn't do that by choice. Actually, my husband hates them,
Speaker 1: and so I stopped wearing them and then found then
Speaker 1: after so long of not wearing them, found that they
Speaker 1: bothered me. We actually went to somebody's house. I don't
Speaker 1: know if you were there, but they were. They had
Speaker 1: like some kind of oil, some kind of diffuser going
Speaker 1: and it just by the end of the night gave
Speaker 1: me a headache. And so we don't have like anything
Speaker 1: any sense going off in our home either, just because
Speaker 1: again it's a money thing. Honestly, I just don't like
Speaker 1: want to spend money on them. I do love candles, though,
Speaker 1: candles well, I love I don't burn them off it.
Speaker 4: Whitch to beeswax and just keepe them sparing for when
Speaker 4: you really love that vibe.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And I don't know if you'll agree with this, Alex,
Speaker 3: but I something I have done is just kind of
Speaker 3: like boil different things that I want their aromas, like.
Speaker 4: Yeah, loves or that's what the grandmas did, all the
Speaker 4: different spices, yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and then cook the food, yeah, the brown but
Speaker 1: I hate cooking. My favorite is my all purpose cleaner
Speaker 1: is just and I know this isn't like totally low tox,
Speaker 1: but there is no tox, but like a teaspoon of
Speaker 1: dish soap with water and I clean literally.
Speaker 4: So your thing could then be like what could be
Speaker 4: the low tox version of the dish So could you
Speaker 4: get a castile soap that kind of thing.
Speaker 1: That's also an ungion.
Speaker 4: I mean with my bottle of castile soap, I clean
Speaker 4: the floor with one teaspoon and water. The countertox multipurpose
Speaker 4: spray the bathroom, I think I use castile soap for
Speaker 4: most things, it's it's pretty versatile. And then just to
Speaker 4: give everybody the but like, what is it with the fragrance?
Speaker 4: Can I give them the nerdy reason we really want
Speaker 4: to ditch these, you go for it, just I know
Speaker 4: we're nearly done. But it is the thallates p h
Speaker 4: t h A la tees for the nerds who are
Speaker 4: going to want to go and research it. Like me,
Speaker 4: I'm totally that person. And thalates are a sticky plasticizer
Speaker 4: compound that make things stick. So in fragrance technology, it
Speaker 4: makes that fragrance last and last. And so it's why
Speaker 4: you give your friend a hug after the yoga glass,
Speaker 4: you have coffee, and then you go off and do
Speaker 4: your day and then your hair like kind of goes
Speaker 4: in the wind and you smell there deodorant or perfume again,
Speaker 4: like but eight hours later. So that's stickiness. And this
Speaker 4: endocrine disruptive activity that these valates have can actually they've
Speaker 4: been shown to block or mimic natural estrogen signaling in
Speaker 4: the body. And I don't know a lady who doesn't
Speaker 4: find it hard enough to balance their hormones on the
Speaker 4: best day of the month. Let alone, having other stuff
Speaker 4: coming in trying to confuse the show.
Speaker 5: So if you know you're.
Speaker 4: Always thinking, got period problems and this is wrong and
Speaker 4: headaches and like try the fragrance ditching.
Speaker 5: I mean, what have we got to lose? Right?
Speaker 4: And it can be quite low.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's low risk, it's it's.
Speaker 4: Money, it's money saving.
Speaker 1: Yes, and you know if it doesn't work, just you
Speaker 1: can always add it back in. So man, Alex, thank
Speaker 1: you so so so much for this conversation. And if
Speaker 1: people are interested in more low talx life, where can
Speaker 1: they find you?
Speaker 4: Funny, it's called Low Talx Life everything, So because I
Speaker 4: did it first, everything that's low tox life. Those three
Speaker 4: words like that, it's me. So the podcast is called
Speaker 4: lowtox Life. The website lowtoxlife dot com and then from
Speaker 4: the website you'll find everything books both on Amazon.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yay, well done, and thanks for being with us, Alex.
Speaker 4: Such a pleasure chatting with you both.
Speaker 3: What a good one.
Speaker 1: Yes, I'm glad. So that was a long, long one.
Speaker 3: It's hard to direct we had.
Speaker 1: I mean I think we just it was for us
Speaker 1: such like a fun conversation to have, and so we
Speaker 1: hope that you left encouraged to find the one thing
Speaker 1: you love and see if there's a way that you
Speaker 1: can simplify it by taking out some of the ingredients.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we even talk about that being a benefit of
Speaker 3: load talks, but the simplification that can happen as a result,
Speaker 3: Like I don't have tons of cleaning products, I have
Speaker 3: too now because it works in a variety of different ways.
Speaker 3: So there's just there's so many benefits and you kind
Speaker 3: of start with an area that excites you or excites
Speaker 3: you to solve a problem and who knows where it
Speaker 3: can develop from there and no matter how you're entering
Speaker 3: into that journey. So yeah, really grateful for that combo, yes.
Speaker 1: Or a place that you feel overwhelmed. Cleaning products honestly
Speaker 1: are a place I feel overwhelmed, and that's where I
Speaker 1: will be going next. So thank you so much for listening.
Speaker 1: We love, love, love reading your kind reviews, and we
Speaker 1: especially love this one from a juick fix.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 1: They say love this happens to be five stars and
Speaker 1: they say, thanks ladies for being the best frugal friends
Speaker 1: I have. Glad to be it.
Speaker 3: It's written in a way that might seem to indicate
Speaker 3: we're the only frugal friends you have, and that's you
Speaker 3: know where I'm here for it. Here for the five stars.
Speaker 3: The best, Okay should be the best. Well, we appreciate
Speaker 3: you listening. We appreciate that review. If any of you
Speaker 3: who are currently enjoying this show also want to take
Speaker 3: a minute to leave us a kind review telling us
Speaker 3: that we're the best friends that you ever had, we'd
Speaker 3: love that. But truly it does help other people find
Speaker 3: this podcast know if it's right for them. So we
Speaker 3: do appreciate every single writing and review we get that
Speaker 3: are good. We love the good one.
Speaker 1: Men's see you next time. Google Friends is produced by
Speaker 1: Eric Sirianni.
Speaker 3: Well, Jen, what's your first step?
Speaker 1: Well, it'll definitely be the cleaning products. I have dabbled
Speaker 1: in natural cleaning solutions, but I always I go back
Speaker 1: and forth, like I'm not a great cleaner, so I
Speaker 1: think that the chemical will help me, and then they don't.
Speaker 1: They just reiterate you are bad at this.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so I've bought tools.
Speaker 1: I've bought a Oh I forgot to mention this, but
Speaker 1: I bought a steam cleaner. I was just going to
Speaker 1: say that has actually made me feel alive again. Okay,
Speaker 1: it works like it's natural and it works. It makes
Speaker 1: me feel like I know how to clean.
Speaker 3: That's so funny because I was just going to reference
Speaker 3: a steam cleaner being my low tox fail. I just
Speaker 3: did buy a steam cleaner for on Clearance, thinking oh, yeah,
Speaker 3: this is going to get me the clean I want
Speaker 3: and it's not going to require any chemicals. And it
Speaker 3: just didn't do a dang thing, and I had to
Speaker 3: go back and reclean. I know, I know, Am I
Speaker 3: doing it wrong? I don't know, but I already boxed
Speaker 3: it up and I'm going to return it. I won't
Speaker 3: get my money back. Okay, even though it was clearance
Speaker 3: as you should, as you should, so glad it's working
Speaker 3: for you.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, our standards of clean might also be different,
Speaker 1: so I take my successes with a grain of salt.
Speaker 3: I will say. Also, the steam really stressed Eric out.
Speaker 3: He was like, this is way too much moisture to
Speaker 3: be putting into the house. We can't be having this.
Speaker 3: I'm going to turn on the dehumidifiers and all of
Speaker 3: the mini splits like this can really cause damage to
Speaker 3: the life of our base boards and blah blah blah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I kept it in the bathroom, though I actually did.
Speaker 1: I kept it on tile so that maybe, yeah, we'll see, Okay,
Speaker 1: we'll see.
Speaker 3: We're on a journey were to fail. Yeah, more often
Speaker 3: than not, we do. We do.
Speaker 1: It is more often than not