Step 3: Grow Your Own Food
Growing your food is a fulfilling family activity; it also allows you to control what chemicals you use or don’t use in the process. With the right soil, potting mixes, and natural alternatives to treating and repelling pests, you can produce organic foods (literally) in your backyard!
As well as being extremely rewarding, this is a money-saving hack, and the low-tox benefits will be huge for you and your family.
You could also take this further by reducing your intake of ultra-processed foods. Eating fewer processed foods will make you feel better and contribute to a healthier, low-tox lifestyle. We have just started our food garden and are learning a lot – our little guy loves it too!
Growing your food is a fulfilling family activity; it also allows you to control what chemicals you use or don’t use in the process.
Step 4: Choose Your Clothes Wisely
There are more than 15,000 different chemicals used in fashion manufacturing. This includes toxic substances like solvents, bleaches, and pesticides. Researchers have found that these chemicals may transfer from clothing to your skin and penetrate the skin’s layers. Synthetic fabrics may contribute more to pollution than you realise through micro-fibers shed during every washing cycle. You can read more about this here.
By buying from brands that utilise sustainable fabrics (like GOTS-certified cotton), you can reduce the toxins you are exposed to through what you wear. This will make a difference to your skin and overall health, and supporting more sustainable brands will promote broader system change!
The Takeaway
By following these steps and approaching your regular routines with a low-tox mindset, you can drastically reduce the number of chemicals, toxins, and other nasties you and your family are exposed to. Over time, these simple changes and low-tox baby items will make a positive difference to the health of you and your loved ones. With so many pervasive chemicals surrounding us in our modern lives, it makes sense that we take responsibility at home and work to create the healthiest, lowest tox environment possible.
Shay Lawrence is the founder of CaliWoods and CaliBaby. They specialise in low-waste tools and low-tox baby items to help kiwi families reduce waste. You can follow them on Instagram @calibaby_eco.
