There’s What In My Toothpaste?! The Importance Of Reading Labels

So yesterday I learned an important lesson. Correction, I reminded myself of something I already know. A few weeks ago I purchased my “natural” (I’ll explain those quotes shortly) toothpaste. As some of you already know, I gave up commercial toothpaste a few years ago – I explain the main reason why in this post. Please read this and watch the short video if you haven’t already done so.

The reason why I am sharing this again is because the brand of toothpaste I chose the last few times is marketed as being all-natural, fluoride free – which is exactly what I want but after purchasing and reading the ingredients, it’s not. I am choosing to not share the name of the brand since my intention isn’t to publicly bash this company. I feel it is my responsibility to be an educated consumer but I wasn’t diligent enough to read all the ingredients before I purchased it. I fell into the marketing trap. So this toothpaste doesn’t contain fluoride – awesome! However, it contains sodium lauryl sulfate a.k.a. poison. SLS, rather it’s by-product dioxane, is linked to having many serious, negative health effects; however, it is commonly used in personal care products for it’s foaming and thickening properties. There’s information all over the Internet on this, but here’s an article by one of my favorite and in my opinion, very reputable, natural health websites.

Moral of the story: I reminded myself of the importance of thoroughly reading the ingredients list before I purchase a product. Be due diligent about researching ingredients so you know what to look for and what to avoid. Don’t fall into the marketing trap – just because it’s packaged nicely and the word, “green” or “natural” is thrown on the package doesn’t mean that it is exactly that. Words like, natural, organic and green seem to be buzz words right now, used so frequently with little regulation on the necessary standards companies have to meet prior to being able to use those words on a product. Wow, that was a long sentence that I hope makes sense, ha! 🙂 You get my point…hopefully.

It is our responsibility, as consumers, to rely on our own knowledge and experiences to make educated purchases. When you know better, there’s no choice but to do better. Don’t put your health and wellness in the hands of someone else – invest your time, energy and money into companies who have a vested interest in being transparent and creating quality products with your health and wellness in mind. Because no, many organizations do not have what’s best for it’s consumers on the top of their priority list or on their list at all, which is an entirely separate, complicated, long winded topic I may or may not get into some day. Nonetheless, transparent businesses that are unity, health and wellness conscious is something I am optimistic will  sweep across the global business market in my life time.

Since many natural and organic products are not “mainstream” – they are more expensive. I will pay more for an all natural, organic product if it is in fact that – natural and/or organic. I refuse to pay more (since money is actually spending my time) on something that is better than commercial products, but is still contains very toxic chemicals. It’s all or nothing with me baby! So I’m going to experiment with a few recipes and ideally in the end, come up with my own natural toothpaste. Please share below your recipes on your favorite homemade, natural products. I’d love to hear about them! Once I get my recipe nailed down, I’ll post it on here.

Always learning, some times forgetting but only temporarily.

With love,
S.