Category Archives: Accessibility

Laundry Woes Six Years Later

6 years

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Fragrance Free Environments and No Fragrance Spaces

Someone shared a very good PDF handout with me the other day, one that I had never seen before. It gently explains to people why there is a problem with fragrance, why people may need to avoid fragrances, that it is not the smell, it’s not personal, and a few other bits of helpful information  The resource links are old and could be updated (somehow), but it’s otherwise a great tool to share with people who don’t understand.

I can’t find a link to share it from elsewhere, so I am posting it here to make it easily available.

Fragrance-Free Environments and No-Fragrance Spaces (PDF)

Fragrance Free Environments and No Fragrance Spaces

The text image is copied below.

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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/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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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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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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Random Thoughts About Having a Socially Inconvenient Disability

“I just love having a socially inconvenient disability”
~ said no-one ever

socially inconvenient 1said no one ever 2

 

 

 

 

 

 

“Having a disability that faces systemic barriers to access is so much fun.”
~said no-one ever

Larger versions follow:

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Support the Ontario Centre of Excellence in Environmental Health (OCEEH)

The Myalgic Encephalomyelitis Association of Ontario (MEAO), along with others, has been working on a plan to get proper health care and supports established for the hundreds of thousands of people in Ontario who are affected by the “often overlapping, commonly disabling and sometimes life-threatening conditions of ES/MCS (Environmental Sensitivities/Multiple Chemical Sensitivity), ME/CFS (Myalgic Encepahlomyelitis/ Chronic Fatigue Syndrome) and FM (Fibromyalgia).”

A quick, easy summary document of the features and benefits of the OCEEH  business case proposal for a comprehensive network of care and support has been sent to every MPP in Ontario. Here it is for you too (copied from the PDF 2014 OCEEH IN A NUTSHELL), so you can encourage your local elected representatives to support it in Ontario, and to support similar plans everywhere else in the world:

ONTARIO CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH (OCEEH)
‘IN A NUTSHELL’

“Five percent of Ontario’s population is affected by the often overlapping, commonly disabling and sometimes life-threatening conditions of ES/MCS (Environmental Sensitivities/Multiple Chemical Sensitivity), ME/CFS (Myalgic Encepahlomyelitis/ Chronic Fatigue Syndrome) and FM (Fibromyalgia).

As of 2010, over 568,000 Ontarians had been diagnosed with one or more of these conditions. This number grew from 439,000 in 2005, as reported in Statistics Canada’s Canadian Community Health Survey. It demonstrates prevalence comparable to diabetes, heart disease, cancer and effects of a stroke. These are very widespread conditions, and the 2010 figures are likely underestimates.

Recognition, diagnosis and treatment of these serious conditions are absent from Ontario’s health care system at present. Even though a commission of enquiry recommended services be put into place for ES/MCS as long ago as 1985, exclusion, discrimination and stigmatization of those living with these conditions have been the rule; and Ontario has lost physicians seeking to help these groups.

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Home Dental Extraction SUCCESS (#1)!

This is just a brief post to rejoice about the successful home extraction of a rear molar that was causing me unbearable problems.

The dentist who did this takes seriously his oath to “do no harm” and did not use it as an excuse to do nothing, like most dentists and doctors are prone to doing when they don’t want to change the way they do things to accommodate someone with disabilities.

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