Minimalizing Chemical Clutter

Guest Post by Betty Jo Martin – joy with less

Over twenty years ago I was diagnosed with Multiple Chemical Sensitivities (MCS). In broad terms MCS means an unusually severe sensitivity or allergy-like reaction to many different kinds of pollutants including solvents, VOC’s (Volatile Organic Compounds), perfumes, petroleum, diesel, smoke, mercury, lead,  “chemicals” in  general. The list of toxic chemicals used today in our homes, yards, and offices/studios are too numerous for me to list.

My physical decline began in my thirties when the first ever fillings were placed in five of my teeth. The dentist used dental amalgam fillings, sometimes called “silver amalgams,” which are actually half mercury. Within two days of having the dental work, I experienced severe pain in my limbs and along my spine. It was so painful I couldn’t hold a teacup, or climb the stairs to our bedroom. I sat up at night due to the excruciating pain in my back. I spent many days and weeks bedridden. Periodically, and for several days at a time, the pain would lessen somewhat and I could actually make it up and down stairs without crawling or being carried.

We were living in England at the time, serving with a benevolent organization as hospitality couple to families passing through the UK from around the world. We maintained a huge, rented, centuries old stone house in the country. It was similar to running a bed and breakfast. My husband also traveled five days into London working with book, and humanitarian aid distribution. I took care of school activities with our boys, the daily running of the house, and handled many of the hundreds of inquiry letters received by the organization. We also traveled many weekends with the ministries outreach programs.

After hospital tests I was diagnosed with a viral infection in my spinal column and told there was no treatment except bed rest. We never accepted that diagnoses and decided to continue our search for answers and hopefully a cure. Of course it was basically impossible to handle the vigorous work schedule, which took the two of us working together as a team, so we decided to take a less strenuous position in the US.  My husband would continue his work with the organization in one of their book distribution warehouses, traveling often. I would stay home, coping with my disabilities, and starting a very long trek through the maze of doctors and further medical tests. It was extremely difficult, and some days it took all I could do simply to get from my bed to our living room couch due to the horrific pain in joints, back, and head, much less face specialists and tests. At the time, we, nor any of the doctors I consulted, connected the amalgam fillings to my becoming basically an invalid within a couple of days of having them. That knowledge came years later.

Once back in the US the viral infection in my spinal column was ruled out as being nonexistent, as I suspected it would be. I was tested for MS, which one doctor was totally convinced I had. There were also tests for other immune mediated diseases. But, to everyone’s amazement, all of my diagnostic tests proved negative to any disease!

To make a long story shorter, I’ll now jump ahead three or four years.

My husband decided to take another “job” with less traveling, giving him more time to help me. We relocated to Chicago, IL where my husband was employed by a book company. A board member of the company rented a house to us only minutes from where my husband worked. This gave him opportunity to check in with me several times a day. It was an older home and my husband painted rooms, put up wallpaper, and made many repairs. We were only there for a short time when my health took a nose dive, the pain grew worse than ever, and again I was bedridden for long periods of time. I experienced relentless “brain fog”. Fighting depression was a daily affair.

When a new friend I met at church heard of my plight she began to educate me about chemical toxins and how they can affect our health, especially the immune system. My hubby and I began to read everything we could get our hands on about the subject. We read incredible information by Theron Randolf, Debra Lynn Dadd, Lynn Lawson, Doris J. Rapp. Light bulbs came on! It didn’t take us long to piece together that the toxic mercury in the dental fillings I received in England was the beginning of the damage to my immune system. I was later tested for mercury and I registered extremely high with mercury toxicity. We then realized that other toxins in our environment continued to add to the load, affecting my immune system even further.

We began to hunt down the toxins in our environment and rid our lives of the chemical clutter. We were forced to leave the home we occupied, due to new paint and repairs, a gas heat system and cook stove, as well as the volatile gasoline toxins from the myriad of cars passing our home daily in the congested Chicago area where we lived. We relocated to rural North Carolina, my hubby taking a job managing a pizza parlor, and to continue our cleansing process surrounded by cleaner air and natural beauty.

We learned that as consumers we were spending a lot of money on products containing toxic materials that were adding to my physical digression, and possibly harming our children in ways that might not be detected until they were older. We also began to realize the impact toxic products have on the environment at large.

I saw immediate relief from a lot of the physical problems as we began to replace household toxins with natural products. Although to this day I still have severe sensitivities to many, many chemicals I am now able to live a limited, but somewhat normal life, without daily pain. It is basically impossible to live in a chemical free environment, but I can and will, continue to minimize my exposure as much as possible.

Since reading much in the minimalist online community I’ve come to realize that clearing the chemical clutter from my home was the actual beginning steps to a more simple lifestyle and minimalism. Another reason I chose joy with less as the name of my blog.

Here are a few of the products we purged years ago, and perhaps something on the list will inspire you to clear away chemical clutter in your environment. For more in-depth information do a computer search of individual chemical names found on a product’s packaging. One of the best online sources for further info I’ve found is ATSDR (http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/toxfaqs/index.asp).

• Gas heat, cook stove, and hot water heater (Switched to electric. Solar power is even better.)
• Chemically filled household cleansers
• Oven cleaner
• Synthetic materials in clothing
• New furniture
• New cars
• New carpet
• Pesticides: I use an electric (ultrasonic) device, and haven’t had any household pests in years.
• Deodorizers, air fresheners
• Nail polish and nail polish remover
• Shoe polish
• Paint, paint strippers
• Dry cleaning
• Perfume/cologne or perfumed personal grooming products
• Chemically laced: shampoo, deodorant, toothpaste, and lotions
• Prepackaged products sold as food with long chemical lists of ingredients
• Canned foods
• Most plastics: food containers, plastic wrap, bottles, cups, place mats, shower curtains, toys, just to name a few
• Dryer sheets
• Newspapers and magazines

Symptoms of exposure to the chemicals found in these items can include headache, backache, stiff and painful joints, nausea, diarrhea, asthma or allergy attacks, dizziness, memory loss, stuttering, premature puberty, low sperm count, reduced motor skills, sudden mood swings, dyslexia, ADHD, anti-social behavior/autism and birth defects, depression, among others. Pound for pound, children’s exposure levels are higher than adults because, although the amount of chemicals in an exposure remains equal, children’s bodies are smaller so the concentration is stronger. Also, their immune systems are still developing. Children are probably the highest risk population for chemical exposures. For many of these same reasons, pets may also be at risk. Other populations with a pronounced risk are breast cancer victims, the elderly, asthma and allergy sufferers and those with compromised immune systems.

Thank you Colleen for the invitation to share my story on your wonderful blog.

ITEM 253 OF 365 LESS THINGS

I hope some one will find these bits and pieces useful they are remnants from days when I used to sew more.

What Illness Taught Me About Decluttering

Guest Post by – Donna Tressler The Sound Of My Own Wheels

Recently I watched the 2010 Messiest Home in the Country episode of Clean House, which featured a family of four living in a home filled with an incomprehensible amount of clutter. There was a lot of finger pointing in the episode – particularly at the father who “guilt shopped” while he traveled for work, but the thing that struck me as interesting was how illness (the mom was a thyroid cancer survivor) had played a roll in the accumulation of the family’s clutter. Serious illness has a profound affect on people and we all react differently. For this family buying more stuff was the answer to their pain. For me, it was just the opposite.

In 2001 I was diagnosed with Crohn’s Disease. Initially I was euphoric to have an answer to all the health issues that had plagued me for months, then the reality of living with an incurable (but manageable) illness set in, and I went into denial. I didn’t take care of myself as well as I should, and eventually I went into a flair up of the disease that lasted 16 months.

It was a horrible time in my life and by the time I came out of the flair up, I was physically and mentally exhausted from trying to maintain my job, my house, my marriage, and my relationships with family and friends. It took nearly two years to completely regain my former self, and during that time I began looking for way to improve the quality of my life. In addition to taking better care of myself and managing stress (which is a huge factor in my illness), I looked for ways to simplify my life in the event that I suffered another flair up.

Eventually I realized that the less stuff I have, the less I would have to maintain if I did get that sick again. I’d like to say I had an epiphany and instantly went on a decluttering mission that got rid of every unnecessary item in one fell swoop, but life is rarely that way. Instead it has been a continuous journey of looking at each area of my life with fresh eyes. I began by getting rid of things I didn’t use, clothes I didn’t wear, books I would never read again, and have continued on from there. I’m constantly revisiting a cabinet, a closet, a shelf, and asking what can go from this area?

As I have pared down, I have found that there are several methods that have been most effective for me in getting on, and more importantly staying on, the declutter path. My methods work for existing items in my house and items that I contemplate buying.

• I ask myself if I got “that sick” again, would I want to deal with this item
• I ask myself the questions on the Declutter Decision Making Guide here on 365lessthings
• I ask myself how many hours of working/commuting it would take to pay for the item

Someone once said “life is what happens while you are making other plans.” For me that’s a whole other blog post, but by sticking with my trifecta of clutter busting methods, I have managed to mostly stick to the trail and continue on the decluttering path, which in turn simplifies my life, helps manage my stress and thereby my overall health. It’s a win-win situation.

ITEM 246 OF 365 LESS THINGS

More things I won’t need to iron yay!

A guest post by – My Husband

During a recent overseas business trip I read about an experiment to choose six clothing items and only use those items for a month. You could have multiple copies of each item, even a different colour counted as a separate item but underwear, sleepwear, shoes and jackets etc did not count. I looked at my standard travel wardrobe, and found two pairs of Columbia pants, four sweat-wicking golf shirts (three colours) and two pairs of shorts. Five items to which I could add a more formal shirt for those dressier occasions, and still meet the Six Items or Less challenge. I lived with these five items for three weeks, and as you read this I am using them again for a month in Italy. No one ever comments on my limited wardrobe, and my daily choices are limited to picking the colour of my shirt for the day. Could I live like this for longer periods, or is six items too few to cover every contingency?

I decided that with some minor modifications, the experiment could be applied to my every day life and significantly reduce the size of my wardrobe. The first adaptation was to allow different colours of the same items so my four golf shirts would become one item. I also allowed myself some latitude items that get regular use in rotation with other similar items. For example, I had many long-sleeve shirts of different brands from which I selected the ones I use regularly and counted them as one item. As these items wear out I will look at following my plan to find an item I like that will replace all the differing brands. Using these adaptations, I have reduced my wardrobe to seven items plus work uniforms that are supplied and required by my employer.

I feel liberated from the fashion cycle, and yet have retained the best of my clothes while ridding myself of clothes that are functional but never made it into my rotation. For most of us, we keep returning to the same old favourites until they fall apart, so why clutter our closets with clothes that are never going to be worn? With a smaller clothing footprint, the clothes are not jammed into the hanging space, come off the hanger ready to wear and I can see my entire wardrobe in one place.

The Six Items or Less challenge looks daunting at first but a worthwhile experiment for anyone seeking to simplify their life. The original experimenters had a variety of experiences, and you can read their stories here. Now it is your turn.

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The first of the clothes that were decluttered from my hubbies closet

A place for everything and everything in it’s place!

• If you always know where everything is you won’t need to replace it because you can’t find it.

Know the difference between need and want

• It is easy to convince yourself that something you want is something you need. Don’t be fooled by this.

Only shop for what you need

• This one speaks for itself, if you aren’t bringing anything you don’t need into your home it will stay uncluttered.

Make it clear you don’t want clutter gifts

• If you plan ahead with this one it will save a lot of embarrassment of refusing to accept such gifts.

Remove clutter receptacles in your home

• Adding clutter is difficult if you have no where to store it. Things such as bookcases, display cabinets, baskets, shelves and storage containers are clutter receptacles. Get rid of them as soon as you get rid of the clutter that was in them or you may just fill them up again.

Don’t sacrifice your principals for the desires of others

• Don’t accept other peoples clutter just so you don’t hurt their feelings. Your feelings matter too and you shouldn’t be expected to sabotage your lifestyle in this way.

Remove any items that become useless immediately

• Lifestyle changes are inevitable as time goes by. Once an item become of no further use to you remove it from your home or once again clutter will start to develop. Just because something wasn’t clutter once doesn’t mean it won’t become clutter in the future.

It am sure there are more strategies that should be on this list but it is late and I am tired so I will leave it at that for now. If anyone has anything they think should be included please leave a comment and I will add it  and perhaps make a page of it.

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Maybe I should add cancel magazine subscriptions to the list above

One thing I have observed during the process of writing my posts, answering comments and emails, and reading other decluttering blogs is that lack of communication is a real problem when it comes to clutter. It causes clutter in the first place by people giving well meaning gifts that are not wanted by the receiver. Also because we try to protect others feelings people keep items they no longer want.

Although it is commendable to try to be thoughtful about others feelings, sometimes your own personal needs should take precedence when the result effects your new sustainable way of living. Sometimes we assume we know what the reception will be and give up on communicating before even trying. We fear what the reaction might be if we tried to assert our needs but often we underestimate how understanding others might be.

Taking into consideration what your motivation is behind decluttering and the passionate need you have to clear your space it would be very unreasonable for another person to reject your feelings. Even if the giver is a little disappointed I am sure they will forgive you this little indiscretion. If, however they are just totally unreasonable then I have to wonder if their selfish feelings are worth protecting.

Here are some examples of how you might go about refusing a gift or explaining the absence of one in your home on inspection by a giver etc.

• Refusing a gift: “Thank you so much, this is a really lovely gift but I really can not accept it. Please don’t be upset it is nothing personal. I have recently embarked on a more minimalist lifestyle and I am no longer bringing anything into my home that is not a necessity or consumable…”
• Inform friends and family you no longer wish to receive gifts: I just want to let you know that in future I would prefer that you no longer send/give me gifts for birthdays, Christmas etc as I have recently embarked on a more minimalist lifestyle and I am no longer bringing anything into my home that is not a necessity. If you would like to give consumable gifts or donate to a charity on my behalf I will be happy to accept.”
• When someone asks about a previous gift that no long resides in your home. “I am sorry please don’t be offended but I have recently embarked on a more minimalist lifestyle and I am greatly reducing the number of non-functional items in my home. It was a lovely item that needed a new owner that would appreciate it  so I have…  1) donated it to charity 2) given it to a friend who has admired it for some time 3) sold it and used funds to…”
• When returning something to the giver that you no longer wish to keep. “I am sorry please don’t be offended but I have recently embarked on a more minimalist lifestyle and I am greatly reducing the number of non-functional items in my home. This was a such a lovely/expensive/thoughtful gift and I wanted to give you the option a taking it back rather than me giving it away. I have enjoyed it up to now but it no longer fits into my new way of living.

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It has been a while but at last we have another ebay sale these Rugby League Football magazines sold for $20.00

When I first started this adventure of decluttering at the beginning of the year that was all it was to me, decluttering. As I go along on this journey and discover the freedom that unburdening our lives of things that only bring stress on us I am starting to embrace the idea of taking it to the next level.

It really is a natural progression because the fundamentals of minimalism  have been a constant topic of conversation in our home for some years mostly without me even realising it. My husband has been reading up and considering the options available to us  for some time now and I have only just put a label to the concept.

In a round about way I stumbled onto a blog recently – Sanity In Simplicity – that follows one person’s journey into to minimalist lifestyle. I haven’t read that much of her posts yet but what I have read I have enjoyed.

Here is a small sample from the very first post from Megan’s blog….

Minimalism means many things to many people.  To me, it is a way to declutter my space so that I can declutter my mind so that I can declutter my life and sort out my priorities.  It a way to have more time and less stress, and be more environmentally friendly.  It means working less and playing more.  Minimalism, to me, is freedom…

Megan has some links to other great blogs about minimalism as well that are worth a look at.

Maybe next year I will have a whole new blog topic to consider “How I stumbled into minimalism” but lets not get ahead of ourselves after all one step at a time is the motto of 365lessthings.

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This is another of my ski gear eBay auctions, a pair of child size 10 Columbia Snowboard Pants that fetched $32.95.

Previously I mentioned how a change of  location and or lifestyle can have an impact on the necessity for certain  items around your home. Our move from Seattle in the USA back to Australia has rendered our ski gear mostly useless to us as we are now 700km from the closest ski fields. Sure we might like to take a winter holiday to the snow some time but in Australia you can hire both ski clothes and equipment should that ever happen. We also have some items that no longer fit our children anyway. So I decided to sell it all on eBay.

Now I did my homework first and checked similar completed auctions on eBay to see how this type of product was selling and it didn’t look that great but I figured I would give it a shot anyway and take what I could get. The goggles in particular weren’t performing very well.

I am pleased to be able to say my auctions have gone very well. Everything I put up for auction sold and now there is a lovely big space in one of the cupboards in our house. The combined starting price for my auctions was $108.00 and the total amount that I fetched was $312.00, “got to be happy with that”. Those 4 pair of goggles I mentioned brought in $147.87 of the total.

Altogether I sold…

• 1 adult jacket
• 3 kids jackets
• 4 kids pants
• 2 pair of kids gloves
• 4 pair of goggles (2 kids 2 adults)

I haven’t had any feed back yet but I hope the buyers will all happy with their purchases.

ITEMS 127 OF 365 LESS THINGS

I have decided to list each combined auction sale as one item because otherwise I will be boring you with ski gear for the next two weeks as it is it will take ten days to get through it all. These two items sold for a grand total of $37.50.

I know I am getting slightly outrageous today but I just wanted to plant this thought.

Now that you have created space in your home do you really need it? That much space I mean. How many of us live in homes that are far to big for our needs.

Is your home just a status symbol with more rooms than you need that just cause you a whole lot of wasted time doing housework.

When I was a child with four siblings and a mum and dad, we all managed to live quite comfortably in a four bedroom house with one bathroom, a kitchen, a lounge room with a rumpus room under the house.  One of the bedrooms was actually used as a spare room and Mum’s sewing room as she did dress making from home for extra cash.

When I was 21 we moved into a house with four bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, a billiard room, a study, a kitchen and a formal dining room. At this stage three of my siblings had already left home. Now my parents have “downsized” to a house with four bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a billiard room, a study, a lounge room, a kitchen and a dining area and they live together alone in this house.

I know my mum likes to think we can all fit into this house should we all come to visit at once but now that the grandchildren are growing up and starting to get married and have children of their own is she going to  buy a hotel to fit everyone in.

It was just a thought, please don’t thing I have gone completely off the rails with the whole decluttering thing.

ITEM NUMBER 110 OF 365LESS THINGS

Clearly this has nothing to do with the topic of  the day but it is however my contribution for day 110

A change of living location can render some items in your home useless due to variation in things like climate, living space, geography etc . For example, a snow shovel becomes redundant when you move from snowy New York to sunny Florida, a lawn mower may be of no use if you move from a house with a yard to an apartment building and those goggles and flippers won’t come in too useful if you move 300 miles inland. I know that in a couple of years time you might have a complete change around but trust me things can deteriorate from lack of use and might just become useless anyway so pass them on now while they are still in good order  and buy new ones or someone else’s cast offs if you return to your old lifestyle.  We moved from Seattle in the USA to the east coast of Australia making our snow gear just one of those things taking up valuable space in the garage so we sold it on eBay and I am sure it’s new owner will get more use out of it than we will and lets face it we bought it secondhand ourselves so the re-cycle goes on.