By Mary-Jane Liddicoat (broadcast on TBSe FM 1013 Mainstreet 'Family Affairs' program 23 November 2011 - radio interview link below
Here are two great, simple tips for keeping families safe and healthy.
Here are two great, simple tips for keeping families safe and healthy.
Do no harm
The first tip is: avoid potentially harmful chemicals in all your personal care, beauty and household products.
Keeping our children safe and healthy is the first concern of most parents.
So we buy soap, moisturizer and bubble bath labelled ‘gentle for baby’ and feel comforted knowing that even if you can’t control the environment ‘out there’, we are doing our best at home.
But are we really? When we look down the list of ingredients on the back of many ‘baby safe’ products, we find that, in fact, many contain a range of potentially harmful ingredients.
Ingredients linked to skin and eye irritations, eczema, respiratory and mental problems, and even cancer and birth defects.
Our skin protects us
Once upon a time, we thought our skin was a barrier that protected us from most things.
We now know that anything we use on our skin can be absorbed directly into our bodies and stored over time in our organs and can lead to serious illness.
Most of us would think that our governments and major well-known manufacturers would not allow the use of such ingredients in baby (or indeed any other) personal care products.
Sadly, the discoveries of melamine in baby formula, diethylene glycol in toothpaste, and talc (asbestos) in baby powder (Korea 2009) have shown us that their quality control systems are not failsafe.
What if it were easy? At this stage some people start to feel overwhelmed. What can we do? Many people simply ignore it because they feel helpless do change anything.
What it it were as simple as being aware and choosing differently? Here's how.
Amazing black magic: charcoal
The second tip is: keep a pot of black gold – charcoal – on hand
Charcoal is truly amazing stuff, used across Asia for centuries. Walk into most restaurants in Korea and you'll see lumps of it nestled in the corner of the shoe rack or in the toilet. Why? It absorbs the nasty smells.
Did you know that many people, medical practitioners, hospitals, companies and even NASA uses charcoal for a variety of purposes: to filter water and air, to purify food, to make clothes, to preserve things, to cook with, to grow things, to work for us underground, underwater and out in space. It also helps clean up our environmental mistakes.
Not least and not last, medicinal charcoal plays an increasingly significant role in maintaining, restoring and enhancing our family's overall level of health.
Did you know?
Charcoal has been known to:
What is charcoal?
Charcoal not a drug or a mineral (minerals are defined as inorganic). Sometimes it's listed as a food supplement, but that's incorrect. Charcoal is unique and there are no other elements or compounds like it, with which it can be grouped. It is completely inert and indigestible.
Charcoal science
The simplest description of charcoal is the cold hard black left overs after a campfire has gone out. Essentially all the water has evaporated, along with a few other bits and pieces, leaving behind the crusty crumbly black chunks we see in the shoe cupboard.
Charcoal can be made from animal bones or coal, but for medicinal use it primarily comes from plant-based sources such as hardwood, bamboo, coconut, or peat.
What is left after the fire goes out is, apart from a few trace minerals, pure carbon, just like the carbon atoms that make up the soft graphites in a "lead" pencil or the 345 carat diamonds.
What makes the carbons different from each other is their distinct physical structures. Unlike the ordered carbon atoms in graphite and diamonds, charcoal's carbon atoms have an intricate lattice-like design with no recognizable pattern.
The tiny particles of charcoal are riddled with a network of crevices, cracks, and tunnels such that 1 cm cube unfolds to a 1000 square meters! And it is to this large surface area that a vast number of chemicals (primarily those that are poisonous to life), bind electrostatically.
By subjecting the raw charcoal to the "activation" of oxidizing agents such as air, steam, or oxygen, at high temperatures, the internal structure of the charcoal particle is further eroded creating an even greater surface area.
Want to know more? Read more about the science of charcoal here.
A mystery we adore
Science has no complete answer about how charcoal works. Personally, we know it works wonders. If you would like to know more, there are many documented medical, pharmacological and scientific studies on charcoal which you can find referenced in the book Charcoal Remedies by John Dinsely available here.
If you are sick, suffering pain, or battling some infection, why not first consider a simple and natural remedy like medicinal charcoal? Here's how we use it regularly at home (my kids actually come and ask for it):
Five reasons to keep charcoal on hand
There are at least five good reasons why you should choose a natural remedy such as medicinal charcoal.
Charcoal WORKS
***
Mary-Jane Liddicoat is an ex-diplomat now looking at what different choices we might be making to help create more ease, joy, prosperity and abundance in our communities. Visit www.mary-jane.co and www.healthyhomes.asia for more information. Mary-Jane lives between Seoul, Korea and Sydney/Wollongong/Canberra, Australia, with her Korean sculptor husband and their three children, aged eight, six and three.
The first tip is: avoid potentially harmful chemicals in all your personal care, beauty and household products.
Keeping our children safe and healthy is the first concern of most parents.
So we buy soap, moisturizer and bubble bath labelled ‘gentle for baby’ and feel comforted knowing that even if you can’t control the environment ‘out there’, we are doing our best at home.
But are we really? When we look down the list of ingredients on the back of many ‘baby safe’ products, we find that, in fact, many contain a range of potentially harmful ingredients.
Ingredients linked to skin and eye irritations, eczema, respiratory and mental problems, and even cancer and birth defects.
Our skin protects us
Once upon a time, we thought our skin was a barrier that protected us from most things.
We now know that anything we use on our skin can be absorbed directly into our bodies and stored over time in our organs and can lead to serious illness.
Most of us would think that our governments and major well-known manufacturers would not allow the use of such ingredients in baby (or indeed any other) personal care products.
Sadly, the discoveries of melamine in baby formula, diethylene glycol in toothpaste, and talc (asbestos) in baby powder (Korea 2009) have shown us that their quality control systems are not failsafe.
What if it were easy? At this stage some people start to feel overwhelmed. What can we do? Many people simply ignore it because they feel helpless do change anything.
What it it were as simple as being aware and choosing differently? Here's how.
- Be aware of the potentially harmful ingredients commonly used in food, cosmetics, soaps, shampoos, moisturizers and other personal care products, including in those labelled ‘gentle for baby’, 'all natural', 'wellbeing' etc
- Take a list of these ingredients with you when you go shopping to make sure you don’t buy products containing them. Start by avoiding products using alcohol (mouthwash) SLS and propylene glycol. Enter your email here to receive a FREE downloadable list of the most common ones.
- Identify companies committed to using only safer, effective ingredients, and use only their products, and
- Invite your local shops to add more chemical free food and non-toxic personal care products to their shelves. In some countries you'll need to take a magnifying glass with you to read the labels!
Amazing black magic: charcoal
The second tip is: keep a pot of black gold – charcoal – on hand
Charcoal is truly amazing stuff, used across Asia for centuries. Walk into most restaurants in Korea and you'll see lumps of it nestled in the corner of the shoe rack or in the toilet. Why? It absorbs the nasty smells.
Did you know that many people, medical practitioners, hospitals, companies and even NASA uses charcoal for a variety of purposes: to filter water and air, to purify food, to make clothes, to preserve things, to cook with, to grow things, to work for us underground, underwater and out in space. It also helps clean up our environmental mistakes.
Not least and not last, medicinal charcoal plays an increasingly significant role in maintaining, restoring and enhancing our family's overall level of health.
Did you know?
Charcoal has been known to:
- whiten teeth (no need to use toxins like hydrogen peroxide!)
- absorb 4000+ deadly poisons from your body (keep it in your house and car as part of your standard first aid kit)
- alleviate hangovers (ok, so charcoal won't absorb alcohol, but it does absorb many of the impurities in common beverages which contribute to a hangover)
- clear up bacterial infections (great for kids with cuts and scrapes)
- remedy cystitis, ulcers, gallstones, hepatitis, jaundice, and many other medical conditions
What is charcoal?
Charcoal not a drug or a mineral (minerals are defined as inorganic). Sometimes it's listed as a food supplement, but that's incorrect. Charcoal is unique and there are no other elements or compounds like it, with which it can be grouped. It is completely inert and indigestible.
Charcoal science
The simplest description of charcoal is the cold hard black left overs after a campfire has gone out. Essentially all the water has evaporated, along with a few other bits and pieces, leaving behind the crusty crumbly black chunks we see in the shoe cupboard.
Charcoal can be made from animal bones or coal, but for medicinal use it primarily comes from plant-based sources such as hardwood, bamboo, coconut, or peat.
What is left after the fire goes out is, apart from a few trace minerals, pure carbon, just like the carbon atoms that make up the soft graphites in a "lead" pencil or the 345 carat diamonds.
What makes the carbons different from each other is their distinct physical structures. Unlike the ordered carbon atoms in graphite and diamonds, charcoal's carbon atoms have an intricate lattice-like design with no recognizable pattern.
The tiny particles of charcoal are riddled with a network of crevices, cracks, and tunnels such that 1 cm cube unfolds to a 1000 square meters! And it is to this large surface area that a vast number of chemicals (primarily those that are poisonous to life), bind electrostatically.
By subjecting the raw charcoal to the "activation" of oxidizing agents such as air, steam, or oxygen, at high temperatures, the internal structure of the charcoal particle is further eroded creating an even greater surface area.
Want to know more? Read more about the science of charcoal here.
A mystery we adore
Science has no complete answer about how charcoal works. Personally, we know it works wonders. If you would like to know more, there are many documented medical, pharmacological and scientific studies on charcoal which you can find referenced in the book Charcoal Remedies by John Dinsely available here.
If you are sick, suffering pain, or battling some infection, why not first consider a simple and natural remedy like medicinal charcoal? Here's how we use it regularly at home (my kids actually come and ask for it):
- mosquito and other insect bites and stings – rub a little on the spot or wrap up with a bandage takes the itch/sting out almost immediately
- sore throats/ears – make a poultice and leave on overnight
- coughs/chest infections – make a poultice and leave on overnight
- sore tummies – a mouthful washed down with water or juice is very effective in alleviating tummy upsets
- cuts and scrapes – it absorbs any potentially harmful bacteria to allow the cut to heal without infection
Five reasons to keep charcoal on hand
There are at least five good reasons why you should choose a natural remedy such as medicinal charcoal.
Charcoal WORKS
- for poisoning, drug overdose, and food poisoning
- for digestive and other gastrointestinal problems: such as acid reflux, diarrhoea, nausea, vomiting, and gas
- for poisonous bites: including bees, hornets, brown recluse spiders, scorpions, and poisonous snakes
- for allergic reactions to poisonous plants: such as poison ivy and poison oak
- for infections: including pink eye, diabetic ulcers, abscesses, UTI, and gangrene
- for diseases such as gout, Tourista, tetanus, diphtheria, and cholera
- for animals: including poisoning, infections, odors, and as a digestive supplement
- for purifying water, air, and food
- and more
- a safety record that goes back 3500 years
- rated Category 1 (Safe and Effective) by the FDA
- recommended by Poison Control Centers, Pediatric & Toxicologist Associations
- has no known adverse side effects
- non habit forming
- indefinite shelf life - does not age or spoil if properly stored
- universally available around the world
- in hospitals, clinics, pharmacies, and healthfood stores
- in the city, in the country
- in disasters, calamities, times of war
- for the wallet and for the body
- for whatever currency, whatever culture
- easy to make
- easy to take - orally
- easy to apply - as a poultice or bath
- requires no dictionary, prescription, license or degree
***
Mary-Jane Liddicoat is an ex-diplomat now looking at what different choices we might be making to help create more ease, joy, prosperity and abundance in our communities. Visit www.mary-jane.co and www.healthyhomes.asia for more information. Mary-Jane lives between Seoul, Korea and Sydney/Wollongong/Canberra, Australia, with her Korean sculptor husband and their three children, aged eight, six and three.
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