Monthly Archives: December 2014

How to Have Company (or Repairmen) In Your Home When You Have MCS/ES

Even when people try to be fragrance (and other chemical) free, they can have 2nd and 3rd hand residues from personal care, cleaning, and laundry products all over them. Air “fresheners” and scented candles are other items that leave residues on everything. It can take weeks to get it out of skin and pores, and longer to get it out of clothing and bedding, all the while re-contaminating the body and anything else that has contact with the fragranced surfaces or air.

rigmarole

Fragrance (and other toxic) chemicals are just all-pervasive now. Unless people are completely fragrance-free and stay out of fragrance filled places, they will have some degree of fragrance saturation in their clothes, skin, and hair. Some of the residues are also impossible to remove no matter how hard one tries, because of chemicals that are designed to penetrate and remain active for long periods of time (think of the  laundry commercials where they boast you can smell the fresh scent days later – except some of us can be affected years later, because that’s how permanent those chemicals are).

If people who use those products come to visit, not only can they leave us gasping for air (or worse) during their visit, they can leave chemical residues that will keep off-gassing from the couch and anyplace else they touched for days or weeks to come.

fragrance around a sofa

Depending on how severe one’s MCS/ES is,there are different things that can be done.

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MCS: A Life Altering Condition (Video)

 

Multiple Chemical Sensitivity: A Life Altering Condition

Produced and Directed by Alison Johnson
1:09:28 minutes

Note from Alison Johnson:

“Since 1998, I have made three long documentaries and three short ones. During this fifteen-year period, I have gained a much deeper understanding of multiple chemical sensitivity and its great impact upon so many lives. This new composite film contains the best and most effective sections of my six earlier films. I have chosen carefully which experts and patients to use from my earlier films so that this new film will be an effective way of helping people to understand multiple chemical sensitivity. The film contains footage of interviews with four members of Congress as well as with many important physicians.”

More info and a list of physicians appearing in the film:
http://www.alisonjohnsonmcs.com/multiple-chemical-sensitivity-a-life-altering-condition-dvd.html

Transcript:
http://chemicalsensitivityfoundation.org/multiple-chemical-sensitivities-life-altering-condition-transcript.html

mcs-a-life-altering-condition

Much gratitude to Alison Johnson for all of her work over the years.

MCS/ES Accommodation Resources

When people develop MCS/ES, it can be extremely challenging maintaining access to jobs, housing, or other services due to the prevalence of indoor air pollution and pollutants, fragrance chemicals being a huge factor. When MCS/ES becomes disabling, it becomes a human rights issue requiring accommodation under the law in many places around the world.

Here then are some accessibility tools:

In the presentation from ADA Audio Conferencing – A program of the ADA National Network

One important point made was this:

MCS ES fragrance free policy

For people with EHS, a wireless-free policy is required, as well as other accommodations mentioned in the presentation.

Here are a few of the slides from Accommodating Persons with Environmental Sensitivities: Challenges and Solutions (which is available to download from the link below):

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If Chemicals Behave Like Drugs, Why Aren’t They Regulated Like Drugs?

 Good question!

Penelope Jagessar Chaffer TEDxBrussels 1

It’s a question I have asked many, many times, especially when dealing with fragrance chemicals and scent marketing.

Penelope Jagessar Chaffer wasn’t referring specifically to fragrance chemicals when she asked that question, but one set of the chemicals that she discusses in the following TEDX talk are often found in fragrances, laundry, and personal care products (but are never on the labels), and they have been implicated in many different adverse health effects, including the deformities of the penis that she elaborates on in this new video:

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A (Virtual) Gift Bag for You

I recently received a virtual gift from a friend and wanted to make my own version to share with you, because I know how difficult life can get, especially when we are isolated and facing challenges most people cannot relate with.

Here then is the gift bag I created for you!

For YOU

Even though I am totally housebound, with no family at home, with little to no ability to visit with them or friends, either here or anywhere, due to my severe MCS/ES, I found this article from Toni Bernhard to have some lovely, helpful coping ideas. I’m sharing it with you  in case you find yourself alone, or having to bow out of gatherings, if you find yourself in need of more tools to try out, whether or not it’s the holiday season:

How to Ease the Pain of Isolation During the Holidays
Three simple practices can help you feel less alone during the holidays.

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Fragrance Emitting Devices

What happens when you walk through a place that has fragrance chemicals in the air?

fragrance chemicals in the airThe chemicals attach to hair, skin, and clothing just like smoke does!

2nd hand smoke and fragrance

Some people can pass out after being forced to breathe fragrance chemicals.

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Are Everyday Products Safe?

Sadly, too many of us have found out, with a loss of health or life, that they aren’t.

Here’s another short film about the problems with chemicals in everyday products and materials

UNSAFE: The truth behind everyday chemicals

Want to know where petrochemicals are hiding?

2012 petrochemical chart headerThere’s more:

petrochemical chart_2012 PDF download

 Please keep on informing yourself, then share what you learn with those around you.

In this day and age, we can’t depend on regulations and public policy to protect us.

It’s up to us to learn, and then demand better from manufacturers and regulators.

Be Fragrance-Free, Especially for the Children

It’s also good for you and good for me.

Being fragrance-free is especially good for children and fetuses, who are vulnerable to suffering developmental harms from chemical pollutants.

Very few fragrances these days are made from flowers and plants. Most are synthetic, petroleum based concoctions, including ingredients known to cause health harm, and  many more that have never been tested for health effects.

Fragrance is ubiquitous in indoor air, more prevalent than smoke ever was, and like smoke, fragrance also does not respect arbitrary boundaries. Remember smoking sections and how well those worked? Fragrance-free “areas” are just as ineffective. The volatile ingredients move throughout the air, everywhere and anywhere. They also cause second and third hand chemical contamination and health problems, just like smoke. This means that airborne fragrances settle into anything in the spaces they are found, and the residues from those items, your hands, hair,  or clothing, can also rub off on anything they come in contact with.

Breathing is not optional.

No-one should have to breathe toxic chemicals 24/7, especially children.

choose to be fragrance-free 3

or a stronger message

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It’s Not You. It’s The Wireless.

Just like toxic chemicals aren’t adequately regulated to protect public health, neither are the levels of microwave radiation that we are all subjected to on a 24/7 basis, whether or not we want to be. And none of us have been asked if we consent to any this.

They (we?) are still raising awareness about smoking, breast cancer, asbestos, lead, and many other things they/we already know enough about to take action and stop the causes of adverse health effects from multiplying. Sadly, these days the toxic economy is more important than public health. So, we have to learn how to protect ourselves as best we can while working to change the system to one that values health and life more than money.

Here then are some photo memes and resources to raise awareness about the dangers of wireless (seeing as raising awareness is all we can do some days).

It s not you It s the wireless 3

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It’s Not Personal, It’s The Chemicals #2

The images in the 1st It’s Not Personal, It’s The Chemicals  were so popular, I decided to make more while my brain was functioning in this mode. Here are a couple that were very well received on facebook, plus a few new ones featuring children and office workers, as they too are being impacted by what we choose to use and put in the air.

It s not you 16

It s not you children

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