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“I just love having a socially inconvenient disability”
~ said no-one ever
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“Having a disability that faces systemic barriers to access is so much fun.”
~said no-one ever
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Larger versions follow:
Have you ever noticed how some people get offended when we are disabled by, or get sick from something in the products they’ve used?
What’s up with that?
???
What about those who feign disbelief that we could be harmed by something they are using? Or that they could be using something that is harmful?
While I am not up to delving into the psychological and emotional intricacies of those responses here, or how industry pays big money to create them, I did come up with a few simple images with variations of the following text:
It’s not you! It’s not personal! It’s the chemicals!
Fragrances, personal care, and laundry products
contain toxic chemicals that make it impossible
for some people to be around those who use them.
Posted in Chemicals, Disability, Fragrance, Health, Human Rights, Public Health
Tagged Fragrance, indoor air quality, It's not personal, It's not you, laundry products, MCS/ES, multiple chemical sensitivities, multiple chemical sensitivity, personal care, personal care products, petrochemicals, sensitive to pollution, toxic trespass
Dr. John Molot is a doctor who sees patients with complex, chronic, environmentally linked, and often disabling, health conditions. Although he is retiring from private practice, he is still a staff physician in the Environmental Health Clinic at Women’s College Hospital in Toronto.
He recently released a book, “12,000 Canaries Can’t Be Wrong“, wrote a report in support of the Ontario Centre of Excellence in Environmental Health (OCEEH), and appears in a video presentation about the health effects of common chemical exposures (see below).
Check these out:
12,000 Canaries Can’t be Wrong
What’s making you sick & what can you do about it
Posted in Chemicals, Disability, Environmental Health, Fragrance, Health, MCS/ES, Pollution
Tagged allergies, autism, canaries, cancer, chronic illness, Dr. Molot, environment, fibromyalgia, health care access for people with MCS/ES, Human Rights, indoor air quality, MCS/ES, multiple chemical sensitivities, OCEEH, petrochemicals, sensitivities, toxic chemicals
Here’s a good three minute PSA from Frederick Community College about going fragrance-free:
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More resources:
Fragrance chemical pollution is as harmful as smoke, and has serious short and long term impacts on health and productivity.
The following sound-video is 6 1/2 minutes long and adds some detail to one of the health challenges described in
A Story That Needs To Be Heard: Part 1
(please listen to Part 1 first, if you can)
Here is Part 2
Posted in Brain, Disability, EMF, Environmental Sensitivities, Health, Wireless
Tagged disability, discrimination., EHS, EMF, frequencies, Housing, Lyme Disease, MCS, MCS/ES, multiple chemical sensitivities, new products, noise, sensitivity, sound, wireless, wireless dangers
I invite you to take 25 minutes of your life to listen to this audio documentary.
Posted in Air Quality, Child Health, Disability, Environmental Health, Environmental Sensitivities, Health, Human Rights
Tagged challenges, chronic conditions, discrimination., EHS, environment, health, Housing, immune dysfunction, Lyme Disease, MCS/ES, multiple chemical sensitivities, pain, surviving, Sylvain, systemic, toxic chemicals, toxic trespass
Many of us have to breathe to stay alive. Okay, all of us have to breathe to stay alive. Some of us just need cleaner air than others, or our ability to think and function is severely impaired from inhaling common pollutants found in both outdoor and indoor air.
This is where air purifiers and filtration devices come in.
Here are links to a few good documents and websites to read before you spend any money, that discuss what to look for and what to avoid:
Posted in Air Quality, Disability, Environmental Health, Human Rights, MCS/ES, Pollution
Tagged air cleaners, air filters, air purifiers, hazardous air pollutants, indoor air quality, multiple chemical sensitivities, petrochemicals, right to a healthy environment, sensitive to pollution, toxic trespass
There are days that I am not as peaceful as I would like to be… This is one of them…
Despite most of my fantasies being about a world where we all have clean air, clean water, healthy food, safe shelter and clothing, and care about each others well-being, I admit to occasionally entertaining various “revenge” fantasies regarding those who allow toxic chemicals into everyday products and materials, especially those in the fragrance industry…
I have had different fantasies over the years, despite in my heart of hearts, not wanting anyone to suffer…Today another revenge fantasy emerged (since some people just don’t understand the harm their actions cause others, unless they personally experience the same or similar harm):
The people who allow toxic chemicals to be used in colognes and other fragranced products deserve to be locked into a room with no ventilation, to inhale the fumes from 20 opened bottles and packages of those products (like soaps, laundry, personal care and cleaning products) for 24 hours, no matter what happens to them while they are in there.
With their families and friends watching via live-stream somewhere else…
Ok, I’ll be a little considerate…maybe when they go unconscious or delirious, they could be taken to a hospital, to a room filled with toxic sanitizers, PVC/vinyl fumes, perfumed and cologned doctors and nurses… only to be told that their symptoms were all in their head.
Why, you might ask, would I wish such a thing on someone today?
Colleen and her friend Beth discuss statistics and friendship challenges and benefits in another revealing post for Invisible Illness week…
Just like Colleen waited for years to get officially diagnosed with MCS, so did I, and for mainly the same reasons.
I knew that the doctors at the time knew nothing about it (or they would have given me a clue as to what the early signs were years ago).
Eventually I came to realize that statistics ARE important (to decision makers), and if we don’t make the effort to get an official dx (I say effort, because many people go from uneducated doctor to uneducated doctor for years… see my post about good news for Ontario to understand what a major deal the announcement of training 2 doctors in environmental health is) then in the eyes of decision makers, we do not exist.
That means that services for us continue to not exist also…
But when we speak up, things change.
I love how Colleen is speaking up, and how her friends are too!
Life in the City with a Future
For day 5 of Invisible Illness Awareness Week, my buddy Beth has agreed to give her perspective of what it is like having a friend disabled from MCS. In a Canadian study, in 2010, over 800,000 people were diagnosed with MCS (Multiple Chemical Sensitivities) an 31% increase in 5 years. Those during the same time period with one or more of Chronic Fatigue, Fibromyalgia, and MCS were 1,415,000 (a 25% increase). This study excluded children with MCS and focused mostly on people with MCS diagnosed by a doctor. I personally went undiagnosed for decades. I avoided the triggers of perfume as much as I could. I figured there was nothing a doctor could do for me anyway and why be just another statistic. I now understand how important it is for our governments to have accurate statistics. The more people who give MCS a voice — the more likely we…
View original post 1,076 more words
Posted in Change, Chemicals, Disability, Education, Environmental Health, Fragrance, Friendship, MCS/ES
Tagged community, MCS, statistics
A mother’s thoughts on having a daughter with disabling MCS
Life in the City with a Future
I asked my mom for the ultimate act of love this week. I asked her tell about her journey having a daughter who is disabled with MCS. Mom asked me for questions for her to answer. These are her words:
1. What did you first think when I told you I was disabled with MCS and you would have to eliminate all toxic chemicals from your life if you wanted to physically see me?
I thought, God. How do we do that — chemicals are everywhere? How bad is this going to get for my poor daughter? And of course, I thought about myself also. I have lived for so long doing everything using all kinds of awful stuff and not even paying attention until you get an awful wake up call and have to hope and pray it is not too late.
2. Two years after my disability from…
View original post 1,027 more words
Posted in Child Health, Disability, Environmental Health, Health, MCS/ES, Multiple Chemical Sensitivities
Tagged change, family, fragranced products, MCS