By: Matthew Fantazzi
Your Endocrine system is a group of glands and organs that are involved in hormone production, and transmission throughout the body.
Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals or EDC's, are chemicals that impact the way your body engages with your hormones, some mimic hormones tricking your body into thinking they are hormones, others block your body's ability to utilize or break down the hormones, and others that can affect hormone levels in the body. Hormone disruption can lead to so many different health conditions that can be quite serious, but also some others that are less obvious but over time can be leading us to problems on a societal and civilization level. I'm going to go over some of the common EDC's, their sources, health effects, ways to avoid them, and how to determine your level of exposure and how to address their affects.
Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals and Their Sources
These are probably the most common sources, however there are new ones that arise because one chemical is banned, they will often find another one to use that causes similar or all new problems for human health. The scary thing is how ubiquitous they have become, in everything from our food and water, cleaners, fertilizers, cookware, and personal care products. It can be overwhelming but the important thing to remember is your body is incredible and can deal with quite a bit of toxic exposure, so eliminating them entirely is unrealistic and not necessary for most people if your body is functioning optimally or close to it these chemicals can be dealt with in small amounts.
The best defense you have is informing yourself and reading labels of all your products, unfortunately things like make-up and other personal care products are not very well regulated and allow for things like parabens, phthalates, and PCB's which are estrogen mimicking chemicals that cause problems for men and women alike. Our building materials are another source of harmful chemicals, things like carpet and furniture are sprayed with flame retardant chemicals that will off-gas for years and decades. Off-gassing is the release of these chemicals over time and is increased by things like light and heat. Most carpets will off-gas formaldehyde for up to 30 years. Luckily there is an incredible resource that tests products for toxicity and grades them, www.ewg.org is definitely a site to bookmark. A company that provides non-toxic building materials is Building for Health - Green Design Center - Non Toxic Building (thegreendesigncenter.com).
Health Problems that EDC's Cause
As the use of these chemicals has become so pervasive for so long, we are starting to see the rise of chronic diseases among children that is very alarming. With their immune systems and bodies less developed the effects of these chemicals impact children more than adults. The most concerning are the effects on our reproductive systems and ability to procreate is the most dangerous. This is one of the contributing factors to the declining fertility rates seen across the developed world. The estrogen mimicking chemicals are feminizing men and causing a host of hormonal issues for women especially when combined with birth control or foods sprayed heavily with pesticides. The pesticide atrazine has been shown to change the sex organs of frogs that were exposed to it for extended amounts of time. Atrazine along with glyphosate, the key component in Round-Up that can cancer, and significantly disrupts the gut microbiome and mucosal lining which can cascade out into any health condition you could imagine. Below I will link to a home test you can take to see if you have been exposed to glyphosate which most people have and tests have found it in rainwater, so it is literally ubiquitous. Fortunately detoxing from this is fairly simple, if you add the amino acid glycine to your daily smoothie or beverage, the glycine occupies the receptors that glyphosate will bind to in order to remain in the body, so with the glycine occupying those receptors the body can eliminate the glyphosate. You can find glycine supplements here from the Health Yourself shop or wherever you get your supplements. Here is an article on glyphosate detox. How To Detox From Glyphosate | Listen To Your Gut
Endocrine disruptors are also incredibly damaging to your metabolism and are playing a role in the obesity crisis in America, nothing compared to the problem with the food, but it is certainly compounding that problem.
One of the first things you can do to address overexposure to EDC's, after you start to eliminate those products from your life of course, is start stimulating your detox pathways through things like sauna and various detox protocols you can do for different compounds and organ systems. Activated charcoal, bentonite clay, and chlorella are great natural detoxifying compounds that support detoxing the body. The liver is the most important detox organ so supporting liver function is always going to help your bodies detox abilities. This is one of the key body systems that we focus on in Health Yourself coaching programs. The other thing is to get your hormone levels checked which is something that we also do when you sign up for a coaching program.
You also need to start filtering your water, there are all kinds of contaminates in local water ewg.org has a page where you can type in your area code to find out what is in your water and the recommended filter to handle those contaminants. As well as going for a strictly organic fruits and vegetables and getting your meat from an organic farm with clean practices, like the Beef Initiative available at the Health Yourself shop.
Find out if any of the products you use on a daily basis are exposing you to harmful chemicals and take action to find safe replacements which ewg.org can help you find those as well as the building supply company linked below. Take some of the actions concerning detox and hormone testing to find out if you're suffering from any of the effects of EDC's.
I can't recommend the ewg.org site enough as the go to resource for information, mitigation strategies, and treatments, as well as how to take action in your community legally to get these chemicals out of our products or the products off our shelves.
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