The Live Lightly Podcast

Bridget Walton (00:00)
Today, Jessica and I are doing something a little bit different than normal, and we are recording this podcast for you guys that will go out on both of our feeds. So if you are one of Jessica's normal listeners and you don't know me, you don't know my voice, I'm Bridget Walton. I'm a women's hormone coach and the host of the podcast, I'm Hormonal. And what I talk about on my podcast is women's hormone health, cyclical health, what you can do to understand your body.

understand what your body's trying to tell you and how you can ultimately feel better. So Jessica and I are going to be talking today about endocrine disrupting chemicals and how they impact hormonal health and the health of your cycle. So I'm excited to get into that in just a second here. But for my audience who may not have met you yet, Jessica, do want to go ahead and introduce yourself?

Jessica (00:50)
Yeah, thank you, Bridget, name is Jessica Franklin, and I'm the host of The Live Lightly Podcast, and I'm a family health coach. And The Live Lightly Podcast, we talk a lot about health and wellness, but through the lens of sustainability.

we look at health topics viewed through the lens of being a little bit more conscious of Mother Earth and how we can make changes and swaps in our day-to-day life.

as a family health coach, I work with families who are dealing with diagnosed disease, I've noticed that I grew up with a mom who had MS and it was hard on the whole family. And I've talked to people who, if they have a diagnosis or maybe their partner or their child, everybody has to make changes for that person in their life accommodate for.

what they need to do to help themselves. just kind of to help people be on the same team.

it can be really stressful for families. So that's what I do. so let's get right into the conversation. super excited about this because this is one of those topics that I feel like is out there. And these words are thrown around a lot, endocrine disrupting chemicals, endocrine disruptors. And I think there's just not a whole lot of

cohesive understanding about it. So Bridget, can you explain a little bit about what endocrine disrupting chemicals are and how this topic comes up with you in your work with your clients?

Bridget Walton (02:20)
So let's break down just the term endocrine disruptors or endocrine disrupting chemicals. We'll use those terms interchangeably throughout our conversation. But endocrine, that refers to our body's system that shuttles our hormones all throughout our body. We know that our hormones are the tiny little chemical messengers that help us to wake up in the morning or feel stressed sometimes, thank you, cortisol. But of course, people are really familiar with their sex hormones.

and blood sugar, or rather insulin, all these things. So our endocrine system is the system that masters all of those processes that help us stay alive and reproduce, all the good stuff. Now, disruptor, we're a little bit more familiar with this word because endocrine disruptors are any chemical substances, whether it's manmade or natural, that are disrupting what's going on with our hormones. So whether this chemical, and just for an example,

make this more salient, whether we're talking about BPA, which is found in plastics, or whether we're talking about the phytoestrogens in soy products, like some of the foods that you eat maybe every day or every week. These chemicals can either mimic or block or otherwise impact what your hormones are doing and how they're basically plugging into your receptors.

I'll just take this a layer deeper. When we talk about estrogen, we have estrogen receptors on so many tissues and cells in our body. And when we are interacting with a bunch of endocrine disrupting chemicals though, they plug into those estrogen receptors, which prevents your actual body's own estrogen from doing so. And that can result in symptoms of higher estrogen. We'll get into that in a little bit, I'm sure.

The long story short here is that endocrine disrupting chemicals are, it's anything that you come into contact with through your skin, that you ingest, that you inhale, and which is throwing some extra chaos into your hormones, normal daily operations. Now, this is a huge topic of conversation between me and my clients. When I work with clients one-on-one, we will always go through and review

endocrine disrupting chemicals, get an understanding of how they impact one's menstrual cycle and hormone balance, and really becoming familiar with, okay, what are these EDCs that I'm coming into contact with each day? What are the main sources of those chemicals and how can they make a plan, an actionable plan? I'm sure you work on actionable plans with your clients too, Jessica, but to...

mitigate or eliminate their interactions with those products or chemicals or foods and rate for the benefit for my clients specifically of supporting a better hormone balance and overall improving their menstrual cycles. So I just said a lot of stuff there. So let me know if I need to clarify anything or run it back. But that is the breakdown of what endocrine disrupting chemicals are and how I work with clients on them.

Jessica (05:45)
I feel like the biggest there is that they mimic estrogen. And can you just like go into a tiny bit more detail about what kind of havoc that can actually wreak on everything and what kind of, you know, things does this cause for a woman?

Bridget Walton (06:06)
Totally. So when we have all of these other chemicals that are mimicking estrogen, we can call them xenoestrogens, if they're chemicals or phytoestrogens, which are more of the plant-based sources. And when they are plugging into these estrogen receptors, taking up space for our body's natural estrogen, then that will result in symptoms of estrogen excess. What does estrogen excess or sometimes you'll hear estrogen?

dominance mean? That could be cycle symptoms related to really heavy periods. It could be related to PMS, could lead to irregular cycles, fatigue, bloating. Really, any of the, well, maybe not any of them, but a lot of the symptoms that gals experience towards the end of their menstrual cycle, so that week to 10 days before their period, those can be exacerbated.

And that's because those symptoms are normally caused by estrogen excess anyway, because it's not just endocrine disrupting chemicals that can cause those symptoms. If we have a lot of stress or other influences that are preventing our bodies from eliminating estrogen properly, then we're in the same boat anyway. So it can really just exacerbate a problem and cycle aside.

can certainly have an impact on the health of a pregnancy or the health of the child really, because while yes, those chemicals can plug into your own, like my body's estrogen receptors, they also can interact with the estrogen receptors of the fetus. And that's not necessarily gonna be a good thing for the baby's reproductive health, like when she or he grows up and is an adult either.

Jessica (08:02)
Hmm not at all and that brings up another question for me as you're saying this because you said that sometimes there are The reason would be an external source such as endocrine disruptors, but maybe there's another Source that's causing the excess estrogen estrogen dominance So how can you tell?

Bridget Walton (08:28)
Super good question. There's not a lab test or anything that's going to be like, hey girl, this symptom is caused by endocrine disrupting chemicals or it's caused by lack of regular bowel movements. So unfortunately, there isn't anything that I am familiar with or that I use with clients anyway that can point directly to it. However, it is possible to see that some...

Jessica (08:37)
you

Bridget Walton (08:54)
Like if you do lab testing or if a listener is familiar with the Dutch test, which is a dried urine test for comprehensive hormones, that's the panel that I use with my clients. There are certain markers that could be elevated potentially because of that endocrine disrupting chemical exposure, but there's just no way to say for sure. And that's why it's well important for just numerous reasons, as you know, and we'll get into about why we want to limit our exposure, but to really dial in

foundations across the board and look at this healthy lifestyle as a lifestyle as a whole instead of just things in different silos and band-aid solution. You know what I mean?

Jessica (09:31)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, you want to look at the big picture. And so it sounds like the Dutch test can give you an idea if someone is showing higher levels of disrupting chemicals, but you can't pinpoint if that's the reason for X, Y, and Z symptoms. Is that what I'm hearing?

Bridget Walton (09:58)
Kind of, but the reverse. So the test can say, hey, you have elevated levels of estrogen or elevated levels of certain estrogen metabolites. And we can say, okay, well, sometimes BPA exposure makes you more likely to have a certain picture show up in the markers, but we just can't say for sure it's speculation and bringing into mind every individual person's individual situation.

Jessica (10:15)
Mm. Mm-hmm.

Bridget Walton (10:25)
Which I know that's not a super clean answer, but yeah, it takes a little bit noodling through.

Jessica (10:30)
Yeah, but it is what it is. It just goes to show that it's not a simple, so there's not one simple answer. And so that's why it would be really helpful to work with someone like you because sometimes you go to the doctor and you're like, I just got this diagnosis or, I just have heavy irregular periods or whatever it is, or maybe you're having infertility issues.

It sounds like having a little side help be really useful because there's just a lot of different things that can be addressed in one's lifestyle from a holistic standpoint.

Bridget Walton (11:12)
Yeah, you're totally right. There's only so much that we can all do by ourselves through the tips that we get through Instagram or even like really good high quality podcasts. I'm not like dunking on Instagram, but yeah, for a lot of people at some point when you're like, I'm tired of being tired of this, then you know it's a good time to find a buddy. The other time, well, man, buddy, I don't know why I said buddy, but like, you know, somebody to walk through this journey with you and advise you, right?

Jessica (11:21)
you

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Bridget Walton (11:41)
Another time when it's good to find a buddy though is when you're like, hey, I don't know the information and I don't want to know. I don't want to do the research on it. I just need somebody to like tell me what it's like. So with that, I'm kind of curious, what is it, like when you first start working with your clients, what are the first areas that

Jessica (11:53)
Hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Bridget Walton (12:03)
can have a potentially dramatic impact on their endocrine disrupting chemical exposure.

Jessica (12:08)
I look at every room of the house and everything that they're eating. What water are they drinking? If it's filtered, what are you filtering it with? If you have a reusable water bottle, what's that made of?

so I really get down into the nitty gritty of, what you're exposed to on a daily basis through all the products that you're using on your body and everything that you're taking in. And also just kind of looking at overall, you know, exposure because we are inside quite a lot. And so air quality inside air quality, can't change outside air quality. and our bodies are, are amazing and they are detoxing all the time.

and working for us and I know we'll go into this later but there are only some things that you can control so I really try to focus on the things that one can control in their own you know environment meaning environment where they live their home really just what are they being exposed to on a daily and what are the areas where it's like

highest exposure. Those are the first things that I like to look at and address.

Bridget Walton (13:21)
that just makes me think maybe I should, I feel like I should know the answer to this already, but is there, you of the list of like acronyms that are endocrine disruptors, are there one or two or three that are considered the worst and that people should, you know, if they can only commit three to memory, like which three are those? Or is it just like, they're all bad for different reasons and we can't maybe pick the worst?

Jessica (13:41)
Mm-hmm.

Hmm. I kind of think that's the case. think that you just need to be aware of what they are and where they're found. And then like, what am I using the most in my day to day life? I kind of go at it like that. Because it's really dodgy out there. As far as you know, there's a lot of green washing, let's say with glyphosate. You know, you have

Bridget Walton (13:49)
What do you think?

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Jessica (14:17)
information telling you that glyphosate is safe. Right? Who's making, who, well, yeah, I mean, it's where, what the source is. You always have to look at the source of the information that you're receiving. Yes. Yeah. Exactly.

Bridget Walton (14:24)
interesting. Like studies or companies?

Right. Like the company funding a study that says like, yeah, glyphosate will help you thrive. Got it. And I guess for listeners who aren't familiar with the term glyphosate, glyphosate is what is commonly sprayed on our foods. Like it's a pesticide or is it herbicide? But can you elaborate on like, what is glyphosate?

Jessica (14:53)
believe that it is mostly used as an herbicide. That is my understanding of it. So to kill off weeds, that would be harming and killing off plants. And it's also used, and this is interesting and something that I think most people don't realize even if they understand what glyphosate is and that it's used in conventional farming, but it is also used to spray on the plants to dry them before

they're harvested. So it helps farmers have a higher yield more quickly. Yeah. And so you're getting it sprayed not only on your produce, your fruit and your vegetables, which was what I think most people think of when they're thinking of glyphosate exposure is fruit and vegetables. We don't want the weeds killing off the fruit and vegetables, right? It's on your wheat. It's sprayed on wheat to dry it.

Bridget Walton (15:30)
Hmm.

Jessica (15:51)
on soy, on oats, it's on beans. So a lot of food sources are exposed to glyphosate. It's just everywhere. So those are things to be aware of and the way to avoid it. I mean, you can't avoid it 100%. It's in our soil, it's in our air, it's in our water. But really the best that we can do, and I would just say like, okay, what can you do?

Bridget Walton (15:59)
Yeah, she's everywhere.

Jessica (16:21)
just try to, you know, source organic food. And I know that that can be a little bit of a challenge and it's a trade-off. Sometimes if you're spending more money on organic food, you're going to have to cut out some of the other things maybe that normally you would be able to afford if you were not buying organic food, which

Bridget Walton (16:21)
Mm-hmm.

Jessica (16:41)
I think in the long run kind of adds to the bucket of like things that you're doing to improve your health anyways, because oftentimes that extra money might be spent on food and drink that you don't necessarily for nutrition and aren't really densely filled with vitamins and minerals and quality protein. know, processed foods can be kind of the first thing you drop off that list.

Bridget Walton (16:54)
Yeah.

Jessica (17:07)
and any drink that doesn't necessarily add to the value of your health and nutrition, doesn't add any nutritional value, those things can drop off. Oftentimes those things are also packaged in plastic, so then you're taking care of checking off that box of not using plastic, which we'll get into, which is one of the number one sources of endocrine disrupting chemicals. I just wanna, yeah, go ahead. I wanna get into a few of the other

Bridget Walton (17:27)
Yes.

yeah

Jessica (17:35)
buzz words out there.

Bridget Walton (17:37)
I was just gonna say real quick on the note of food, at least I think of the Dirty Dozen, right? That's what I go to because I don't buy every single piece of produce organic. If it's not on the Dirty Dozen list, or I guess if it's on the Clean 15 list, then I will trust that and go with it to save myself, I don't know, a couple bucks on a potato. And for listeners too who are like dirty...

Jessica (17:40)
Yeah.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Bridget Walton (18:05)
dozen who, if you go to ewg.org, environmental working group, they are an organization who will publish this information about like per year and I think even per your location, what are the 12 produce items that you for sure want to get organic because they're laden with glyphosate and other icky stuff. And then what are the 15 produce items that generally don't have?

Jessica (18:06)
And it's right here.

Bridget Walton (18:34)
they're not slathered in chemicals and you can probably get non-organic. Did I get all that right? Is that how you kind of operate too?

Jessica (18:44)
I used to, until I started doing more research. So the problem is that glyphosate is in water and soil, and how does the plant get its nutrients into it?

Bridget Walton (18:50)
Tell us.

Jessica (18:59)
the glyphosate can get into the plant itself inside, not just on surface that could maybe be soaked in a bowl of water with soda. Yeah, it's still in the plant. So that's kind of where I draw the line is like, you know,

Bridget Walton (18:59)
Do we measure that? Or go ahead.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, being solo.

Jessica (19:21)
If I have to eat something non-organic because I'm at a restaurant or on vacation, you know, there's that, right? But in general, it's just not great for our soil, our air, our water, or the farmers. So I tend to lean in the direction of do a solid for Mother Earth and the farmers who are, out there doing the work to provide the food for us. And long-term overall,

of those resources and not necessarily a hundred percent my own benefit. So that's where I on that but I totally get I used to be where you're at and it's just like almost like the more you know the more you know and then the more you're like I can't do that.

Bridget Walton (19:51)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

But I think that's a good point too, though. Like just even voting with your dollar, right? We can support organic farmers or organic, you know, that part of the food supply chain by, well, giving them our money. Or maybe that's a good opportunity to see what local farms are in.

Jessica (20:24)
Yeah.

Bridget Walton (20:28)
your area and see like local organic farms that are in your area and how you can support them because I was surprised to learn about a farm that is maybe three miles from my house that makes 80,000 pounds of food a year or they grow 80,000 pounds of food a year. And so anyway, I'll shut up here. But yeah, there could be options closer than expected. Yeah.

Jessica (20:31)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

No, I love it. There totally could be. And then you're helping to reduce your carbon footprint. If you can find it at a local farmer's market, you're supporting your local farmers as well, which is great. And a lot of them that are at your farmer's market might not be certified organic because they're small. But if you ask them, do you use chemical fertilizers and pesticides, they will tell you. And most of them are just like,

don't do it. They just don't have the money or the resource to get the organic certification. It's very expensive. Some of them do, and there might be the bigger farms, but a lot of them don't, but they don't do that. And they do even practice regenerative and they are rotating their crops so that the soil keeps its nutrients and all the good things for the earth as well. A lot of them are doing that.

Bridget Walton (21:17)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Jessica (21:43)
So it's pretty cool if you can find tap into a farmers market or even a CSA Because that will come from a farm that might only be a couple hours away from you and you can get a CSA box on a weekly basis and you can change out your order and a lot of it is also just eating seasonally and that really helps to bump up the nutrients because then you're getting plants that are

Bridget Walton (21:53)
Mm-hmm.

Jessica (22:08)
growing and they are local and they are seasonal and so they are also going to be coming to you like they aren't picked early right like a banana my gosh like how long does a banana take to get to us yeah so just getting the most out of our food that we do invest in I think is the way to look at it because

Bridget Walton (22:18)
Good night.

Yeah, they're like optimally nutrient dense. Totally. Yeah.

Jessica (22:35)
you know, yes, it might cost more, but you're getting so much more out of food that is mindfully produced. I'm just gonna, you know, kind of end on that because food could be a whole entire podcast, but I know that we have a lot of other things to chat about, including that are floating around out there that are considered to be endocrine disruptors. And I think that they're not.

Bridget Walton (22:43)
Yeah.

Totally. Yeah.

Jessica (23:00)
like the dots haven't been connected fully between some of these buzzwords, and oh, it's an endocrine disruptor. if, yeah. Yeah, PFAS, those are the chemicals that are called forever chemicals. So another term you may have heard floating around is forever chemicals. So PFAS equals forever chemicals, same thing.

Bridget Walton (23:09)
Hmm, yeah, what are some of those buzzwords?

Jessica (23:26)
And those are a group of man-made chemicals and they are resistant to heat, water, and oil. So where you're going to find them most commonly is in your kitchen. So If you cook with anything that is basically nonstick, you probably want to replace it ASAP. because the forever chemicals are also the chemicals that once you've ingested the food that's cooked

those surfaces, now it's in your body and it takes the body a while to turn that around and detox it. And you can do detoxing for these chemicals that will get it out of your system sooner than 10 years, but don't ever do that your own because you can actually, I just wanna put this little, because detox is also out there quite a lot.

Work with a professional if you're wanting to detox from those chemicals, because they can lay in your body for quite a long time and become a burden. Also, I want to just kind of say that there are some hidden places besides your pots and your pans and muffin tins and waffle irons and rice cookers. Those are the most common in your kitchen. Also, the utensils that you're using, like a spatula and the ladles and the spoons, if they are nonstick or plastic.

Bridget Walton (24:19)
Mm-hmm.

Jessica (24:48)
Replace with stainless steel, silicone, you're fine. I use silicone and stainless steel.

Bridget Walton (24:49)
But silicone works. Silicone is good? Okay, cool.

Jessica (24:56)
also just want to put out there that the PFAS, a hidden place, those are kind of all the places that you will like, once I said it, you're going to look in your kitchen and go, my gosh, right? Hidden is like in a coffee cup, like you go get a coffee, right? And it has a waterproof kind of slick barrier.

Bridget Walton (25:06)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, gross.

Jessica (25:16)
That's PFAS. So that's something to replace right away. Just get yourself a nice little stainless steel mug,

Bridget Walton (25:18)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

when I work with clients, I talk a lot about getting plastic food containers out, changing them out with glass storage containers, bringing a reusable cup to get coffee or get whatever it is. So we're ditching plastic that we're eating out of. And especially if you're going to be heating something up, like if you have leftovers and you want to heat them up, like don't heat them up in plastic because it's the heat that allows a lot of these chemicals to just leach out.

Jessica (25:39)
Mm-hmm.

Bridget Walton (25:55)
Get into your food and get into your bod. Is that kind of where you start to or do you have any other honorable mentions

Jessica (26:00)
are just now starting to, these things are coming to the surface. A lot of white papers out there, a lot of PubMed scientific research. If you're into that, like I love geeking out on PubMed white paper. And so yeah, that's just my thing. But if you're not, then you to this podcast, working with someone who can get you there and just knowing the right resources to help you.

Bridget Walton (26:13)
Yeah, totally.

Jessica (26:27)
along the way

Bridget Walton (26:27)
Yeah.

Speaking of what is top of mind for conversation lately, what other buzzwords are there that we didn't cover, if any, for? Because we covered glyphosate, PFAS. What are the other top two or however many you want to call out?

Jessica (26:35)
Yes, there are.

Yeah. Okay. I'm going to call out Phthalates It's basically that group of chemicals, they're used as plasticizers. So obviously they'll be found in and they're used to help products and personal hygiene products and makeup.

they're used to prolong the sensory experience of a scent.

where are you going to find this? you can smell it, that's a phthalate And also can't like, I know this is such a hard one to say and I had to, you know, really this was one that I had to grapple with candles.

love candles, right? I just love lighting the candle and being like, smells like fall in my house. But yeah, not such a great thing. You know, and also anything that plugs into a wall that releases continuous scent, or, you know, you put something in your car for a scent, or you spray it in the air for a scent or like, you know, put it on your body.

Bridget Walton (27:22)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Jessica (27:47)
I would definitely say that that's one to just like, if you can smell it, don't use it anymore unless it's an essential oil, which is pretty rare. Those products are harder to find. So that's a, I would say that that's a huge one. It's also, laundry detergent, fabric softeners, because right, those are the ones that, and cleaning products, any cleaning product that has a, you know, smells like you've just ran through a meadow of daisies or.

Bridget Walton (27:54)
Yeah.

Jessica (28:15)
whatever, rainforest, like those are all definitely going to contain the phthalates. And then I want to talk about parabens because oftentimes you'll see paraben free. You're like, that's good. That must be better. It doesn't have that thing. But like, what is a paraben? And why does it need to be free of it? Like, why do I care? This is a group of chemicals used.

Bridget Walton (28:32)
Thank

Yeah, who is she?

Jessica (28:44)
basically to preserve makeup and beauty products and all the stuff, shampoo and all the things, right? So it's a preservative and it can also be used in food and beverages, which is interesting, parabens, this group of chemicals. Yeah, right?

Bridget Walton (28:47)
Mm-mm.

Gross. What does it use for in food and beverages? Is there like a, what does it do in there?

Jessica (29:08)
preservatives, they're used as preservatives.

Yeah. So, if you see a long word, that could be a paraben, a preservative of some sort, then also you hear a lot this term out there, heavy metals, right?

Bridget Walton (29:12)
okay. All right, that makes sense. Extending the life.

Jessica (29:26)
and heavy metals are lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury, they're found in makeup. So if your makeup has a color to it, that's heavy metals. And cleaning products, dish soap, laundry detergent,

Bridget Walton (29:41)
It has to be within the government's requirements anyway, but it's still more than zero. And that's the problem. Is that right?

Jessica (29:48)
yeah, and so also heavy metals are found in water. And obviously water that's tap water, there's everything in water, PFAS, heavy metals, all of it, microplastics, glyphosate. So there's that, but I would just kind of want to go back to like heavy metals. And it's not only in tap water, it's been found

in bottled water. like California is pretty on the up and up and they do a lot more testing of things and putting labels on things and banning things. Like you can't get certain things shipped to you here in California if it's like got a proposition that's banning it, which is awesome. So there was a study done that of six water sources of bottled water here in California, a study that found presence of heavy metals in all six.

in bottled water.

Bridget Walton (30:44)
Well, actually, yeah, maybe that's a good point. Like, what is a reasonable first step for maybe somebody who does drink out of plastic a lot? Is like a Brita filter a reasonable first step? Is that going to get some of the job done or what is, you know, what is that best case scenario kind of filter that somebody might want to consider if they're concerned about what they're drinking?

Jessica (30:51)
Mm-hmm.

That's a really great question. So I'm really glad that you asked that. there's, this is kind of a two part, I'm gonna give you two parts because number one is

yourself a nice reusable water bottle that is not plastic itself, right? So if you are using a reusable water bottle and it's plastic or it has a plastic straw, I know right now that there are

some really, there's a really popular and I don't want to throw any names out and, you know, be slamming anything. But I think if you're out there and you have one of them, you're going to know it's like very popular in the last year. They're big. have a handle and a straw, right? The straw in there in that water bottle is plastic. It is non BPA. is BPS free, but what is it? Right? So there's a lot of plastics that are BPA, BPS free.

but they've been like the molecules been changed and altered a little bit to not be BPS or BPA, right? So that was the thing that they made after BPA was BPS. Well, then people started testing and excuse me, finding the same stuff going on, same endocrine disrupting, same reproductive harm, same risks for cancer, right? So then they change it again and it's like, well, what's the new thing?

Bridget Walton (32:05)
Mm-hmm.

Jessica (32:25)
So just by yourself, they make the stainless steel straws that fit those water bottles. Buy that for yourself if you're using one of those. Don't go out and get a brand new water bottle. And then if you're filtering water at home, because that's how you're gonna get clean water into that reusable water bottle.

you're gonna want to probably use something better than a brita because first off, brita filter is not filtering out all the heavy metals, all the microplastics and nanoplastics. So you definitely want, because those are all endocrine disruptors and yeah, they're just, it's not enough. And then it's going into a hard plastic container, know, receptacle, right? To hold the water. So you're at home.

one is distillation. That's gonna get everything out 100%. They're expensive, they're big, they're kind of a pain in the butt. So the second level would be, I would say, like get something that's either for your counter or under the counter that is going to filter out pretty much everything and that is a reverse osmosis. That's like gonna get 99.9 % out of your water of all this stuff.

If you cannot do that for some reason, I would say that black carbon filters and a stainless steel receptacle, right? So after it filters through the black carbon filters, then it's in a stainless steel receptacle. That's probably, and they, the carbon filters are really good. They don't filter out fluoride, some microplastics.

the nanoplastics and so and also fluoride, which is not part of our conversation, but the GoPure pod is something that will get all those and the nitrates and nitrites. So I put that in the bottom of the recept in the place where the filtered water sits and waits for you to come get it. The little GoPure pod and that will take out all the other stuff that the carbon filter missed. And I also use those in my

water bottle because if I have to refill somewhere and I have to refill with tap water, then that little go pure pod is pretty darn effective.

kind of a long answer to your simple question, but hopefully it helps people out there because there's just, you know, there's a lot of layers to this.

Bridget Walton (34:44)
Hmm.

No, I-

Yeah, no, I like all of the recommendations that you gave and that it is layered, which is probably a good opportunity to say to people like, hey, you don't have to do all of these things at the same time. this is a ongoing sort of process, right? I'm sure for folks who have been kind of cleaning up their homes or their spaces for years, you know, there's still more things to do. So

Jessica (34:59)
Mm-hmm.

Yes.

No.

Bridget Walton (35:19)
If you're listening and you're like, my gosh, you just said 8,000 things I need to change. I hope that instead of like looking at this through the lens of potential overwhelm, look at it more like, okay, I have so many options of places where I can start. And that is like more freeing than burdensome because whichever one calls to you, whichever one seems the most accessible for you or for your family or for your budget or for

Jessica (35:23)
you

Bridget Walton (35:48)
whatever the life circumstances, then you've got places that you can start when you're ready and incorporate more and more as you go.

Jessica (35:57)
Thank you for saying that. Yeah, it's super important to realize that it's a process. You don't have to be perfect. Just start anywhere that you can see these things in your day to day. plastic the thing that I'm, you know, kind of coming into contact the most because plastic also contains like the heavy metals and

made of petroleum and petroleum is an endocrine disruptor itself and it has the plasticizers, so the phthalates are in there. Yeah. And the PFAS, all of it. So, you know, maybe start with plastic. right?

I would say that if you have things that are brand like you grew up with, they're kind of household name brands and you see a lot of ads for them still on on commercials would say that those are the brands to clear of and not be supporting anymore, even if they have things on their label, which maybe we can talk about a little bit with greenwashing.

that might indicate that they are cleaner and

Bridget Walton (36:56)
Yeah.

Yeah.

To me, greenwashing means label on the laundry detergent or dishwasher detergent, whatever it is, that makes it look like it's nice and clean and eco-friendly because they put a cute leaf on there or something, but there's still junk in there. So is that what greenwashing means to you? And what can people look for to not fall for those traps?

Jessica (37:09)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, definitely. You hit it on the nose. Anything that indicates that something is natural or has all natural ingredients or is clean, that's oftentimes, maybe they change one or two ingredients. Or they put that paraben-free or phthalate-free, PFAS-free on their label. Well, maybe they took that out.

but left all the other stuff in to keep it mostly have the same feel and a lot of the same because a lot of this is to our products to create some sort of benefit, right? Some sort of ideal outcome or convenience, And so I would say that anything that's clean your dishes that would also clean oil spills off of ducks, you know.

if they have something on their label that's indicating any of that, you might want to think twice. And also, even in the name, now there's so much out there. It took me a really long time to sift through all this stuff. If you've got in the name of the product or bio in the name of the product, that indicates it's like,

really good for the planet, which obviously would then be good for our health. That's not always the case. beware, even if you're at a health food store and you're going down the cleaning aisle or the makeup and personal care product aisle, I would almost say that gonna find better options. But even there, you're looking at it's packaged in plastic.

What are the ingredients? Are they sourced well? And they're free of some stuff, but not all the stuff. So it's just like pick, pick which thing you're not going to get checked off your list. You're not going to get something checked off your list, even at the health food store Yeah.

Bridget Walton (39:11)
Good night.

Yeah, I.

I guess it is all relative though, like even if it's still better to pick something that has, you know, five hypothetical things in it than the one that has 50. But yeah, what are some tools that's something what are some tools to be more careful about that? I know you have a great resource that you can talk about. And I'll just mention too, there are plenty of apps that could do a good job of

Jessica (39:43)
Mm-hmm.

Bridget Walton (39:51)
you you're in the store, you scan the barcode of a product and it'll give you a quick green, yellow or red, like, sure, go for it, don't go for it, kind of signal and information about what's in that product. So you can make a decision on strictly what is, what are potential endocrine disruptors or other harmful ingredients that are in the product.

Jessica (40:16)
what do you use and what do you recommend for your clients to use in those scenarios to help them?

Bridget Walton (40:23)
I use, you're talking about the app, right? Which app do I use? Yeah, I use the app called Yuca, which is Y-U-K-A. There's also one called Think Dirty. I think they're both like probably great options. I just happen to use Yuca and that's what I recommend. I'm not like super biased, but it gets the job done. It's a clean, easy to use interface. I think if you wanted to pay four extra bucks a year, even, I don't know, it's like pretty accessible if you want.

Jessica (40:25)
Yeah. huh. Yeah.

Hmm.

Bridget Walton (40:52)
the paid upgrade, I use it for free. so that's what my go-to is, Yuca.

Jessica (40:59)
Okay, yeah, I remember using Yuka, I think when it first came out, my son had fun going through the aisles of the grocery store and like I said, go grab, go to all the things that I tell you no, and just scan it and see what it says. And I think that was a great lesson for him in like reading labels. And so now at school, he's in middle school.

he reads the label on the foods that they're handing out at school and he'll be like, okay, no, thank you. And he'll tell me, my gosh, you should see all the sugar and all the chemicals in the foods that they're giving us at school. So I think that's a great tool for adults and something fun for the kids to just go wild with. As you're shopping, you're like, here, do this. Keeps them occupied. Yeah, so.

Bridget Walton (41:44)
Totally.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Jessica (41:51)
prior to that being a thing, did a lot of research online as to what I needed to avoid. And then I just started like looking at the labels of every single product. And if I didn't have a label available to me, then that was a warning sign. Like don't, that's not a product I want.

look up all the ingredients because that's kind of I think what you're talking about EWG you've talked about that already EWG is a place where if you're wanting to sit down and dissect and look up every ingredient in your food or in your makeup or Your shampoo or whatever it is. You can sit there with that label and you can look them all up on EWG have a very low tolerance for anything, that's going to show up

as something that they don't like as an ingredient. you can even just type in the product and sometimes they already have this is getting a seven or an eight or nine. That product that you type in can be rated in, yeah, out of 10. Yeah, can be rated. But if it's not in their system, then you have to go through each and every ingredient. So I've done that to find.

Bridget Walton (42:50)
Mm-hmm. Out of 10. Okay.

Jessica (43:04)
the products that I'm going to support and recommend to bless you to my and my clients and that I use myself. So that's pretty much how I vetted all the ingredients. It's a great resource.

Bridget Walton (43:10)
Thanks.

Yeah, wow. Well, thanks for spending all of that time doing all of that research so that now I can save a bunch of time and listeners can save a bunch of time just by checking out your guide.

Jessica (43:25)
you

think it started out as kind of a selfish, you know, I was just doing it to make sure that, wasn't going to be exposing myself or my son and my husband to any of these chemicals. And then I became like, now I'm doing it for the planet and for all of the pieces of the puzzle to be a sustainable, like unified thing. So it's just kind of been a.

fun, passionate project for me and I just like geeking out on all that stuff so I figured like why not just make it into a resource that I can share with people

Bridget Walton (44:06)
Well, I love what you just said too about, yeah, the health of, it's the health of our bodies, but also the health of our community and our planet and how everything is interacting. So I think that's so important.

Jessica (44:18)
now that we've gone over all the stuff, we know what endocrine disruptors are how to find them and to help them. I was just wondering kind of quick wins you seeing with your clients when it comes to people who are following protocol?

Bridget Walton (44:37)
So it'll be totally dependent upon the person, which I know is the most annoying answer ever. But generally, when folks are starting to make changes and reduce their exposure, if you have symptoms like really heavy periods, if you have symptoms like irregular cycles, or when it comes to any other kind of PMS symptoms, between one and three cycles,

is what I kind of like to look for to see results. Now, this is also given that, you know, this is under the assumption that you're not like drinking three glasses of alcohol every day, which will surely slow things down. But if you are living a generally healthy lifestyle and you start to remove these chemicals from your life, then you can see results within that kind of one to three month mark is what I'm normally hopeful for and normally what we see. Also,

Jessica (45:31)
Mm-hmm.

Bridget Walton (45:33)
Or one other thing that's pretty common, and this has been in the news lately too, there was a study recently that talked about the metals that were in period products, but also a lot of period products are like plastic based and have a ton of chemicals in them. So I don't have a specific study to cite or something, but just anecdotally at least for some menstruators who have a lot of cramping and like with their period, when they stop using

when they stop using those kind of traditional products and opt for organic products or they opt for menstrual discs or menstrual cups, which don't have those same kind of chemicals in it, then they also can see some changes pretty drastically there. So for somebody who does have period pain, might not be like, it might not fix the problem, but actually, even if you don't have period pain, would a million percent recommend opting for

Jessica (46:05)
Mm-hmm.

Bridget Walton (46:31)
a cleaner solution than like the same tampon brand that you've been rocking with since you were in eighth grade. Just my two cents there and a really good place to start that we'll see a quick one for you because your, you know, your tissue, your vaginal like whole microbiome and tissues are all so sensitive and absorbent that of course, something touching your skin on your hand is still impactful in getting into your bloodstream. But when you're

putting these things on your most sensitive tissues and that also is having a really big impact on their access to, you know, your bloodstream and circulating all around.

Jessica (47:10)
Hmm, yeah, that's a great point. Do you have anything that you recommend as an alternative option?

Bridget Walton (47:18)
Yeah, I love to talk about a menstrual disc as much as I can. We can put a link in the show notes actually for this. Nixit is the brand that I go with. It's basically it's a medical grade silicone cup. Kind of looks like a frisbee if you've never seen one. Well, you've seen a frisbee probably, but if you haven't seen a disc, it looks kind of like a frisbee shape. There are some cup options that are more like bell shapes. And so

Jessica (47:28)
Mm-hmm.

Thank

Bridget Walton (47:48)
while you're on your period, you will insert it into your vagina, like up closer towards your cervix. So it'll collect your blood and then, you know, you'll empty it out, replace. And so it's great for endocrine disrupting chemicals or for avoiding them rather. It's also good for your budget and it's good for just not producing additional waste. You know, you're not, I haven't thrown away period related trash.

Jessica (48:05)
Mm-hmm.

Bridget Walton (48:17)
in many moons here, so all around would recommend.

Jessica (48:19)
you

I love that. Thank you for sharing that with us because I think that's totally one that people either A, haven't heard of at all or super intimidated by it and like, wow, that's kind of weird. I, you know, is that something I should do or? And so yes, Bridget says that is something that's legit.

Bridget Walton (48:42)
Yeah. And that's 100 % how I felt too. I remember my best friend in college, she told me she used a menstrual cup and I was like, that is so weird. But it is so easy. It makes my life, it makes my periods so simple. And again, I'm always like, how can I save? I don't even know how much champagnes cost anymore, but how can I save $15 a month? Because you just buy one disc for $30 that lasts you.

half a decade or something. So anyway, I'll get off my soapbox, but yeah, love a menstrual disc.

Jessica (49:12)
Yeah. love that because, you know, that initial investment of 30 bucks might seem like a lot, but think about they have us in this vicious cycle of the disposable products again and again and again. And so you should be offended that you've been tricked to have to do that for how many years now? Like think about what you've spent up until this moment.

$30 is a drop in the bucket. And that's kind of how most of these products are. Initially, you might pay a little bit more to buy the glass water bottle than the plastic one it's going to be so much longer.

and replace so many plastic water bottles or so on and so forth that you have been told you need to rebuy every single week, every single month, every single year after year, right? So it's just kind of one way to look at it. But hey, I think we had such an amazing conversation and hopefully so much value to our listeners and hopefully

Bridget Walton (50:11)
same.

Jessica (50:16)
feel empowered and inspired to come out and just like, hey, tomorrow I'm going to do this thing. And it's going to make such a great difference in their lives.

Bridget Walton (50:26)
Yeah, I love that. And for you listener out there, before you go on to your next task or listen to your next podcast, just jot down or send this in a text to your partner or your mom or your best friend or whoever. What is the one thing that you want to change or start doing or stop doing and share that with your people and just make it a topic of conversation and make it more and more relevant in front of mind in your life for your best health?

Jessica (50:52)
I love that you're such a great coach.

Bridget Walton (50:55)
It's all about the plan. You gotta have the plan or it ain't happening for most people.

Jessica (51:00)
Absolutely, totally. No, you have to have an action plan. And if you don't do something like that right now, then you're probably going to forget. And also, I love that you mentioned sharing it and just bring it up with your girlfriend at coffee or on your walk or whatever you're doing with your girlfriend or your sister or your mom. And just start talking about it, your neighbors, your coworkers, because this stuff can help them too.

So either you hit the share button and you share it with them right away and then have that conversation later, or it's just something you remember to talk about. And yeah, also I want to ask how can people connect with you if they're thinking, they're listening out there going, my gosh, I need hormone coach

Bridget Walton (51:43)
Yeah.

Totally. Man, I don't know why I was nervous. Like, what is she going to ask me? But you're right, I do have Instagram and I am active on there. You can find me at Bridget Walton, which is B-R-I-D-G-E-T-W-A-L-T-O-N, or surely will link it up in the show notes so you can check me out there.

Jessica (52:04)
Yeah, definitely. And do you have a website as well where people can connect with you? Maybe schedule, do you offer like a consultation or how do you work with people?

Bridget Walton (52:15)
Totally. Yeah, you can go ahead through Instagram, check out the link in my bio so you can schedule, like pick a time for a consult call. That's I was going for. If you want to go to my website, which is BridgetWalton.com, there's also a link for you to schedule a consult call. do free consult calls. So if you're like, what is this whole women's hormone coaching thing? Then I'm here for you and we will talk about it and understand what's going on with you, what your goals are.

And let me think, that's pretty much it. Yeah, Instagram, my website. And if you want to check out my podcast, I'm Hormonal, then that's how you can find me. How can my listeners find you, Jessica?

Jessica (52:53)
Yeah, so a couple of those same ways, Instagram, @livelightlybyjessica the podcast is The Live Lightly Podcast. And my website is livelightly.eco. So livelightly.eco. And that is...

also where you can not only find all of my previous episodes, but also, you know, easily link to any of the podcast sites, YouTube, and also there's a little tab there for guide. So can sign up for my newsletter and receive my sustainable wellness guide where I have listed in different chapters and categories, all of the products that you can just easily swap out.

in your day to day, like every time you go and you're like, I need a new this or, you know, toothpaste or whatever, you don't even have to think about it. It's just there.

Bridget Walton (53:47)
Perfect. All right. Well, thanks so much. This has been really fun.

Jessica (53:48)
Yeah, all right. Definitely, and I know it's a longer episode, so thank you all for hanging with us and taking the time out of your so busy lifestyle to listen, but I know that, this is adding value and helping a lot of people. So thank you all for listening.

Bridget Walton (54:07)
Thanks. Bye, everyone.