Given that I grew up on a steady diet of frozen fish sticks, French bread pizzas, hot dogs, HoHos, Twinkies, Wonder Bread, bologna, Kraft singles, tater tots, Doritos, Entenmann’s, and all other manner of foods that are not food; while riding in a car without seatbelts; and wearing toxic flame-retardant pajamas to bed; and drinking all manner of high-fructose corn syrup laden soft drinks, I consider it a stroke of good luck to be alive today. (Was it just me, or do other Gen-X’ers remember a strong aftertaste of ammonia and rubbing alcohol while eating frozen fish sticks?)
But my 60th birthday looms, and I know that if I want to have a shot at enjoying the next twenty or thirty years free from an environmentally-triggered death sentence like cancer, I need to focus on giving my body its best chance at staying alive.
Or, better put, I’ve been thinking a lot these days about longevity. If an assumed 80-90% of all cancers are caused by environmental factors—everything from smoking to living near a toxic water supply to ingesting microplastics to excessive alcohol consumption to poor diets—it makes sense to start focusing on the environment in which I spend the most time: my home. Right?
Enter Dr. Aly Cohen, board-certified rheumatologist, integrative medicine physician, environmental health specialist, and now author of Detoxify: The Everyday Toxins Harming Your Immune System and How to Defend Against Them. I will admit this book got lost, initially, when it first arrived, from Dr. Cohen’s publisher, in my apartment. I was scatterbrained. Busy. Planning a wedding. Creating a new home with my partner and combing through all of our furniture, books, and kitchen supplies to figure out which went where and what to do about having two copies of this book or that pan. Between us we had six plastic cutting boards. Who needs six plastic cutting boards?
No one, it turns out.
Two days before my daughter’s wedding, a new report in Nature—“Identification and analysis of microplastics in peritumoral and tumor tissues of colorectal cancer”—was published. It’s conclusion? “The greater abundance of MPs [microplastics] in tumor tissues and their association with lifestyle factors, such as takeout food consumption and bottled water intake, underscore the need for heightened awareness of the potential impact of environmental pollutants on human health.”
So, a few weeks after the wedding, hoping for at least a decent shot of meeting my future grandchildren, I did two things: 1) I scheduled my second colonoscopy; and 2) I sat down and read Dr. Cohen’s book. Then, both enraged and encouraged by its contents, I embarked on my own 21-day detox: the number of days Dr. Cohen suggests is a reasonable, no-stress timeframe to take a good look at one’s exposure to home-based toxins and then take action.
I got rid of all of our plastic cutting boards and found a single cutting board with wood on one side, stainless steel (for raw meat) on the other. I threw out all of our plastic cooking utensils and found a cheap bundle made out of wood and silicone. I couldn’t afford to buy several new All-Clad stainless steel pots and pans to replace the many toxic ones in our possession, so I got rid of every Teflon-coated frying pan and saucepan in our joint collection and found a good bundle of stainless steel pots and pans of various sizes and shapes by a highly-recommended cheaper manufacturer. (They are excellent, I’m happy to report. And—unlike with All-Clad—I don’t cut my fingers on their sharp edges.) I got rid of all the random plastic cutlery I kept in the pantry “just in case.” (In case of what? In case I want to poison our guests?) I tossed out all of our scented candles. I threw out my aluminum-laced antiperspirant and found one to which my Healthy Living app—an app created by the Environmental Working Group, so consumers can check which of their products are toxic, which are not, and which are somewhere in between—gave its highest seal of approval. I tossed out our plastic water filter pitcher and found one made out of glass. I even replaced all of the plastic sealed tops of my glass pantry jars with bamboo lids and tossed out all of our plastic food storage containers, replacing them with glass, too.
Of course, I’d been meaning to do all of this detoxifying for years. In fact, back in 2010, a mentor of mine, then 69, came over for dinner. She was dying of leukemia at the time, but she’d told no one aside from her husband. “You wanna give everyone in here cancer?” she said, staring at the scratched up Teflon pan in which I was sautéing that night’s vegetables.
“Ha ha,” I said, figuring she was joking. She had the quickest wit of anyone I’ve ever met. Before or since.
“I’m not joking,” she said, not joking. “Get rid of that pan.”
It was a strange, even oddly aggressive exchange for the two us, particularly for her, who was not an alarmist. It only made sense in retrospect, after she died two years later.
Ever since her funeral, I’ve been meaning to get rid of my Teflon pans. And my plastic cutting boards. And all those plastic food containers. Etc., etc. But inertia, economics, a divorce, life as a solo mother, and other traumas kept me from making that clean sweep. It took the calm assurance, no-nonsense attitude, science-backed studies, and medical degree-guided, step-by-step plan in Dr. Cohen’s book to make me finally take action.
And now I see it as my moral imperative to tell you about this book, too.
A quick note, as we head into the holiday season: Writing these stories is how I make my living these days. Today’s missive is free. I want important health information and interviews with doctors such as Dr. Cohen to remain free. But paid subscriptions are how I’m able to do this work. To that end, when you’re thinking of what to give a friend or family member this year, might you consider gifting them a gift subscription to LADYPARTS? Or, if you’re a free subscriber, might you consider upgrading to paid? I lost a ton of paid subscribers when I wrote about my support for Zohran Mamdani. But I would write that story again and again, even knowing it would cost me thousands in revenue. I want my voice to remain independent. It’s really important to me to not seek advertising, if I can help it.
Another idea, to help me continue doing this work. I’ve lowered—significantly—all of the prices on the framed photos I sell on my website. The smallest prints, 8”x 10”, used to be $85. They’re now $75. The largest prints, 24”x 36”, used to sell for $450. They’re now $285. Every photo has several size options, once you click on it. They’re photos I’ve shot over the years, I’ve chosen many of the ones I myself have framed on my own walls, and the company I use to do this does a great job of printing and framing them. If you order one now, it will usually arrive within 10 days, nicely boxed and ready to be wrapped as a present. That, too, will help me keep writing this publication, interviewing experts, and highlighting stories I think are important. Thank you for your support! I appreciate each and every one of my readers, and I will repeat: if you cannot afford a paid subscription but would like to read paid content, simply reply to this email, and I will give you paid access, no questions asked. I struggled for many years as a solo mother. I get it.
Happy holidays!
Love, Deb
