Mimi from Ontario, Canada has this to say to us:
I wish that you could accept that this is real and that your habits make me ill.
I wish you could understand how switching to fragrance-free products is such a small act that means a world of difference to me – literally.
It means being able to have a clear mind in order to work effectively and support myself, it means being able to receive hugs, it means not suffering every day.
♥
Posted in Accessibility, Disability, Education, Fragrance, MCS/ES, Multiple Chemical Sensitivities, Support
Tagged fragrance-free, hugs, MCS, Products, think clearly, work
For people with MCS/ES, assistive devices can allow us to remain functional, independent, and able when we can’t control everything in our environments.
Slide with a few options from New MCS/ES Accommodation Resource
In addition to fragrance, chemical, and wireless free policies, these and other devices can help reduce or eliminate exposures to the pollutants that can otherwise completely disable people with MCS/ES. They can make the difference for people to remain employed when provided early enough, effectively minimizing the effects of MCS/ES.
Posted in Accessibility, Disability, Environmental Health, Health, Human Rights
Tagged air cleaners, air quality, assistive devices, assistive technology, disability tax credits, EHS, environmental sensitivities, Human Rights, insurance, MCS, MCS/ES, multiple chemical sensitivities, oxygen, petrochemicals, sensitive to pollution, systemic discrimination, wireless
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Wendy is NOT a widget. Widgets can go anywhere. Wendy can’t.
“Widget” is used in texts and speech, especially in the context of accounting, to indicate a hypothetical “any-product”. Companies in such texts will frequently be given names such as “ABC Widgets” or “Acme Widget Corp.” to indicate that the particular business of the hypothetical company is not relevant to the topic of discussion.
(Widget economics – wikipedia)
“Economists often use the term widget to refer to an abstract unit of production.”
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Wendy is NOT a widget as her local housing authority seems to believe. They have a capacity problem, but instead of addressing the need for improved (and accessible) capacity, they want to re-arrange people’s lives as if they were widgets, with little to no regard or understanding of the consequences.
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INVESTOPEDIA EXPLAINS ‘Capacity’
“The widget manufacturer may be able to produce 150,000 widgets in a month. However, due to downtime because of equipment maintenance and worker illness, only about 130,000 widgets can actually be produced per month. Over the long run, a business can increase its capacity and output by acquiring more factors of productions. For example, if market demand for widgets spikes, the widget manufacturer can buy more equipment and hire more workers, and thus increase its capacity to 175,000 widgets per month.”
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Wendy is not a widget. She is a living, breathing, human being, a human being with a complex, chronic environmentally linked condition and disability related needs, needs that widgets don’t have.
Wendy Kearly photo by ADAM MACINNIS – THE NEWS
The housing authority from which Wendy rents her safe home has deemed her over-housed, and are in the process of evicting her, despite the fact that Wendy has no other option for medically required, safe housing available, and no safe access to any of the other places most people take for granted (see below).
In the following audio interview with Wendy, among other things, she talks about the process her grown children take to detox themselves enough to be able to safely visit with her, so that she is able to safely hug them when they come to town.
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“This study found 156 different VOCs emitted from the 37 products, with an average of 15 VOCs per product. Of these 156 VOCs, 42 VOCs are classified as toxic or hazardous under US federal laws, and each product emitted at least one of these chemicals. Emissions of carcinogenic hazardous air pollutants (HAPs) from green fragranced products were not significantly different from regular fragranced products.”
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Indeed, most indoor environments (and everything in them) are now polluted with these VOCs due to the pervasive nature of these products and chemical compounds.
From the research article:
Posted in Accessibility, Air Quality, Chemicals, Disability, Environmental Health, Fragrance, Health, Products, Research
Tagged 156 VOCs, allergies, asthma, autism, cancer, Chemicals, cleaning, environmental sensitivities, EOs, essential oils, everyday products, green cleaning, hazardous air pollutants, health, indoor air quality, labels, laundry, MCS, MCS/ES, personal care, petrochemicals, toxic, toxic trespass
What if you had the chance to say one thing about your life with MCS/ES, and how it would change your life if it was understood?
May is MCS/ES Awareness Month (yet again… maybe some year we won’t need it to be, but this year, we still do), and this year, I would like to share some of your stories and insights.
If you could tell the world ONE thing about your life with MCS/ES (or any other invisible disability that has MCS/ES as a symptom), what would it be?
How has this one thing affected your life?
If this one thing were changed, how would your life be different?
You could think of it as a conversation with someone you love, someone who loves you (or even a kind stranger), someone who wants to understand, and who is willing to do something for you, and/or to change the way they do things, in order to include you in life, and to help you with what you need or want to accomplish in life (for example).
This is your time to tell them this one thing, and how this change will impact your life for the better.
Here’s what I am asking for with your submissions: Continue reading
Posted in Accessibility, Action, Change, Disability, Environmental Health, Environmental Sensitivities, MCS/ES, Multiple Chemical Sensitivities, Support
Tagged accessibility, advocacy, allergies, autism, communication, community, education, family, fibromyalgia, friends, heart to heart, invisible disabilities, MCS, MCS/ES, ME/CFS, sensitivities, writing
(not just those of us who are adversely affected before others)
“Global experts in this field concluded that infertility and male reproductive dysfunctions, birth defects, obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and neurobehavioral and learning disorders were among the conditions than can be attributed in part to exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs).”
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New research estimates the cost in Europe alone to be in the billions of dollars. As these endocrine disrupting chemicals have been inflicted on the global population, and are found in countless everyday products and materials, the costs to society are huge (and the profits to the chemical and pharmaceutical companies are equally huge).
“The overwhelming majority of the reported costs were from “lost cognitive potential”
Dr Leonardo Trasande
I’ve posted about EDCs a few times, including here:
Endocrine Disruption… Huh? Why Should We Care?
Many of us have no idea what “those people” are talking about when they mention endocrine disruptors. Sounds like something foreign and insignificant, or at least it did to me, until something caught my attention a few years ago. …
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Here are links to some of the news articles and how you can avoid some EDCs:
Posted in Chemicals, Disability, Environmental Health, Fragrance and Cosmetics, Health, Neurotoxicity, Pesticides, Policy, Public Health
Tagged air "fresheners", avoid endocrine disruptors, endocrine disrupting chemicals, endocrine disruption, fragrance chemicals, Hormone-Disrupting Chemicals, pesticides, phthalates, Research, toxic trespass
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:
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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):
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).
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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.
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Posted in Accessibility, Brain, Disability, Fragrance, Indoor Air Quality, Public Health
Tagged allergies, asthma, be fragrance-free, brain fog, fragrance-free, hazardous air pollutants, headaches, health, images, It's not personal, It's not you, it's the chemicals, MCS, MCS/ES, migraines, petrochemicals, phthalates, poor concentration, toxic chemicals, toxic trespass
 | linda @ Seriously "S… on MCS/ES |
| linda @ Seriously "S… on The CDC and MCS |
 | Tabatha Schnorr on MCS/ES |
| Tabatha Schnorr on The CDC and MCS |
| linda @ Seriously "S… on MCS and Housing |
| linda @ Seriously "S… on Hospital Protocols for People… |
Seriously "Sensitive" to Pollution 