When I decided to become ‘healthy’ I wanted to take it to all levels of my life - food, exercise, eliminating toxicity, mind, work and play and many others. In listening to Oprah’s show with Julia Roberts discussing her new book, Gorgeously Green, I became more aware of several different things. One thing - deodorant!
Again, when talking about getting healthy, I needed to look at all aspects of my life - toxins I could be harming my body with. So, I thought I would try one of the health shops non-antiperspirant deodorants - paraben free. I bought Kiss My Face - Active Enzyme deodorant - $4.99. I got the scented (it looks like honeysuckle or jasmine on the front). I’ve been trying it for a week or so now. I have found, in general, it seems to work okay. At the end of the day, I get a slight wift of unpleasantness - I definitely can’t go a day without missing a shower with this deodorant, which may not be such a bad thing. Again, I don’t feel like a total b.o. blob walking around, just an awareness that I had movement that day and it lets me know just a little at the end of the day. Now, it becomes a different story when I am very busy during the day and hustling around, going non-stop, in and out of the house, working out, sweating outside - I definitely smell a big wift of myself! I have reached back for my antiperspirant.
In the end I do wonder how antiperspirant effects breast cancer. By stopping the body from sweating are we not allowing the toxins to flow from the body, which when not released could possibly accumulate in the tissue by the breast? I have already had one lump removed from my left breast - I wonder, and my mother had breast cancer. So we tend to spare others (and possibly ourselves) from the horrid b.o. smell but are willing to take the possible risk of it developing into breast cancer. With this thought (I am making myself think here) why don’t we see more men getting breast cancer since they use antiperspirant as much as we do but male breast cancer is not in the high numbers as it is for women.
In 2004 (the most recent year numbers are available.)
- 186,772 women and 1,815 men were diagnosed with breast cancer*†
- 40,954 women and 362 men died from breast cancer*†
Now don’t get me wrong, I am not an expert in any of this. I just know I want to get rid of my ill feeling and I am trying every direction in my life that I can. I am a normal suburban consumer. I am new to the organic - holistic - health conscious world. I am now having to make a conscious effort to look at everything I purchase instead of just throwing it in the trolley because it’s convenient. What may be convenient may not necessarily be what’s right and good for me and my family. Something to ponder.
‡Source: Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) Program (www.seer.cancer.gov) SEER*Stat Database: Mortality – All COD, Public-Use With State, Total U.S. (1969–2004), National Cancer Institute, DCCPS, Surveillance Research Program, Cancer Statistics Branch, released April 2007. Underlying mortality data provided by NCHS (www.cdc.gov/nchs).
