No More Toxic Tub Report

Although my site is narrowly focused, this might be of some interest to solveeczema.org users:

A new report by the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics discusses toxic contaminants in children’s bath and personal care products.

“Despite marketing claims like ‘gentle’ and ‘pure,’ dozens of top-selling children’s bath products are contaminated with the cancer-causing chemicals formaldehyde and 1,4-dioxane, according to the March 2009 Campaign for Safe Cosmetics report, ‘No More Toxic Tub.‘”

Of most interest to users of solveeczema:

“The chemicals were not disclosed on product labels because they’re contaminants, not ingredients, and therefore are exempt from labeling laws.

Formaldehyde contaminates personal care products when common preservatives release formaldehyde over time in the container. Common ingredients likely to contaminate products with formaldehyde include quaternium-15, DMDM hydantoin, imidazolidinyl urea and diazolidinyl urea.

1,4-dioxane is a byproduct of a chemical processing technique called ethoxylation, in which cosmetic ingredients are processed with ethylene oxide. Manufacturers can easily remove the toxic byproduct, but are not required by law to do so. Common ingredients likely to be contaminated with 1,4-dioxane include PEG-100 stearate, sodium laureth sulfate, polyethylene and ceteareth-20.”

Read the entire report at safecosmetics.org

Talk of Pillows

Someone asks me recently if I could suggest pillows that would work, a question I have been asked before, but I really cannot answer in relation to the material on Solveeczema, at least with any degree of certainty.

We still mostly do without.

At one point, I ordered several very expensive organic pillows (cotton, wool, etc.) that were supposed to have been formulated for people with allergies.  All caused congestion (but no eczema).

I did wash all of the pillows, which turned out to be pretty difficult — especially with cotton, any agitation at all would ruin the fill.  I did a lot of machine soaking and spinning out with no agitation.  There’s no way to know if the congestion was because of the materials or a failure of the washing technique.

In desperation, I did finally pull some old boudoir-sized 100% goosedown pillows out of the closet, and toss them in the washing machine.  At least I didn’t have to worry about lumps forming from agitation.  I wasn’t sure they would survive the washing, though.  I washed several times, including a soaking with oxygen-based bleach, followed by soap and including hot water washes, followed by lots and lots of plain water washes and rinses.

The pillows came out of the front-load washer as flat as pancakes.  They looked ruined.  But I put them in the dryer by themselves, and dried until they were thoroughly dry.  They came out beautifully normal in the end, like I had never washed them.

I can’t recommend this to other people, because down is expensive (and we were probably lucky we didn’t ruin ours), and I suspect a great many people will still be allergic to something like down even after thorough washing.  But it was the only thing in our case that we were able to wash thoroughly — and in the end, surprisingly, it didn’t cause any congestion or eczema.  (Though it did become clear that if we wanted the pillows to remain so, we would have to keep them pretty clean, i.e., wash them again on a fairly regular basis.  Who knows how long they will last this way.)

Web Site Renovations

I am taking an online web design class and making long-overdue updates to Solveeczema.org.

The changes have taken a lot more time than I anticipated — among other things, making any file changes with my current web host is a nightmare — so the web site (and the content) will be something of a construction zone for the next several weeks.

After that I hope to go back and answer some long overdue emails for the site.

Elephant Pharmacy closes doors

With all the business shakeups and closings of this financial crisis, I suppose no one is immune.  I will miss Elephant Pharmacy the most.   Yesterday they closed their doors and declared bankruptcy.

Where are the angel investors?  This is an amazing business concept.  Very loyal customers, judging by the local buzz.

I found most of my bar soap products here, including the one we use now for showering, unscented Sappo Hill.

And it was a great traditional PHARMACY, too.  If the pharmacy side couldn’t keep the business afloat, we are indeed in hard times…

Avoiding Detergent “Dust”: The Mattress Problem

For us, the crib mattress was never a problem because it had a waterproof surface that could easily be washed.  Many, if not most, crib mattresses seem to have waterproof surfaces.

Finding a safe twin mattress when the time came (per the issues on solveeczema) was more of a challenge.  Most mattresses are covered with fabric of some sort.  Many mattresses are filled with potentially problematic materials.  Even natural and organic bedding contained cottons and wools that were certainly washed along the way.  Latex was a potential allergen in our case.  Even if we did risk it with a “natural” mattress, the cost of most was prohibitive.

After much research and cost comparison, we ended up ordering a “No Compromise Organic Cotton Ultra – Twin” from Naturepedic.  We ordered it directly from the manufacturer, who was able to match the usual free shipping deal everyone else was offering on the web.  

The mattress cover is organic cotton, coated with a waterproof dust-mite barrier of food-grade polyethylene on top, sides, and bottom.  It’s pretty inert.  We have had no congestion, eczema, or other allergy issues with it.  (Note:  When it arrived, it had a slight smell – not significant compared to most mattresses – which was gone after a week or so.  Not all of this manufacturer’s products are entirely covered by this barrier, this is the only one that seemed a pretty sure bet for us.)

We considered an inexpensive metal bed frame from Ikea, but at the time we were buying, they didn’t have a design we liked.  It was tempting, though.  They had one all-metal bed frame for under $40.

We ended up getting a solid maple bed frame from Pacific Rim.  It had the option of no finish or an oil-based finish.  We took a chance on the finish, and let it air out for a few weeks before using it.  We have had no allergy issues with it either.  (The model we chose also had fairly sharp corners – a problem for us in a very small room – so we simply sanded the corners.  It wasn’t difficult, it looked fine, and we no longer had problems when we bumped into the frame.)

Prices for this same bed varied wildly on the web.  We got the best price and terms from Satara Inc online store.

All told, the mattress and frame together were, for us, a big expenditure.  However, the quality is great and they should last for decades.  Having no allergy issues was priceless.

Happy New Year!

Thankfully (but unfortunately only after three-and-a-half years of paperwork nightmare), the medical insurance matter was resolved (at least, the care covered) around Thanksgiving.  For the first time in as long as I can remember, my family’s holiday wasn’t completely dominated by medical paperwork.

To further capitalize on this breather, I am hoping to redesign and update the Solveeczema web site this spring.  And finally get around to answering my email more promptly.  Thanks so much for bearing with me.

And a huge Thank You again to those who made donations that defrayed the cost of the site enough so that I could renew the domain names and keep it going.  As promised, this week I will take down the donations button.  At some point, I will add one to the Solveeczema site proper, but probably not until I am able to apply for some kind of non-profit status.   

I am still looking for an angel investor who might like to sponsor a clinical study.  If that might be you, please contact me through the links on the solveeczema web site home page.

I wish you all a Happy, Healthy, and Eczema-Free New Year!

A.J. Lumsdaine

Still Sidetracked

I feel I must apologize once again for my inability to really answer any correspondence for the site or spend any serious time on new posts or revisions. I appreciate the wonderful letters and feedback I have received lately, it has really buoyed me through this trying time.  There is nothing like knowing another child can have a normal life!

I may as well just tell you why I am so preoccupied.  As usual, it’s medical insurance paperwork.  (The amount in dispute is more than a whole year’s disposable income for us, it’s a big deal.)

On October 7, 2008, I received a letter from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, the government agency in charge of federal worker healthcare contracts, which said that Blue Cross Blue Shield had promised to “provide benefits for the disputed claims.”  

I thought my family’s long, three-and-a-half year nightmare was over.  Unfortunately, in spite of my follow ups with the government, Blue Shield has neither sent the promised revised explanations of benefits nor the promised reimbursement. They did, however, promise the government rep that they would take care of it by November 7, 2008.  They didn’t.

This is the same healthcare plan that Barack Obama would like to offer everyone for US healthcare reform.  Look, I am still high from election night.  I voted for him even in the primaries.  But I don’t think this is the right way to reform our system.  Not at least if we want better results for less money.  Insurance companies have put federal workers in an even worse place than everyone else with insurance in this country.  We don’t have the right to sue the insurers.  We don’t have the right to seek independent medical review the way people do in states.  And so on.  

I don’t think granting those things is enough to solve our healthcare crisis, but you can imagine the field day insurers are having with those of us who have even less recourse than everyone else.
 
President-elect Obama would like to extend the coverage he and the Congress have to everyone else.  Well, I have the same PLAN he has — I’d like to know how I can get the same COVERAGE.  You see, the insurance companies are well aware of who is in Congress and who is not.

I’d like my life back.  If government (as opposed to PRIVATE insurance companies) were doing this to people, there would be rioting in the streets and tea thrown into harbors. Or at least a lot more gun buying.  I have a half room in my small house devoted just to insurance paperwork, and that doesn’t include the boxes, filing cabinets, and shelves full of the stuff elsewhere in my house.  

The President-elect’s Mother had to spend the last months of her life arguing with insurance companies from her hospital room.  By contrast, my Aunt from a wealthy country in Europe that spends considerably less per capita on healthcare than the US but gets better results and covers everyone — my Aunt the career secretary fought cancer for fifteen years, in which time she flew airplanes, climbed mountains (even part-way up Everest), took regular vacations in other countries, drove a nice car and lived in a nice apartment (her ability to enjoy life probably partly responsible for why she lived so long with a cancer that usually kills in under five years).  When she died, she left an INHERITANCE from her savings to all of her grand nieces and nephews for their college education.  Can you imagine anyone in this country suffering from cancer for fifteen years and leaving anything but medical bills and paperwork?

How bad does the economic crisis have to get before we decide we can’t afford the luxury of an industry that spends $450 billion a year on administrative costs in order to delay and deny care for their own profits?  The cost to the lives of ordinary Americans is incalculable.  I know it has been to mine.

(I wonder how Oprah’s Peter Walsh would make that odious medical paperwork clutter disappear and give me back my peace!  Or at least give me back the ability to do something useful with my time, such as help people the way I’m hearing the site is helping.   I tried to sign on to the declutter plan, but that ten minutes a day thing only goes so far with this stuff dominating the house…  And my life…)

Superwashing Tip

I recommend Country Save Non-Chlorine Bleach on solveeczema.org as a laundry booster.  (Not their detergent, obviously, just the non-chlorine bleach.  Unfortunately, last I checked, the packages look nearly identical.)

In my experience, Country Save Non-Chlorine Bleach is probably the most helpful laundry booster to aid in superwashing.

I just did a load of hand-me-down kids’ clothing from a friend who uses detergent.  I have sometimes had to wash the clothing (initially) a dozen or more times to get the old detergents out so my son doesn’t react.  I have found that soaking the clothing with soap flakes and Country Save Non-Chlorine Bleach works noticeably better than soap alone or soaking with just water or soap.  I still have to wash several times, but it cuts the number of necessary washes down considerably.   So I will wash & soak with Country Save and soap flakes once or twice (or more, depending), then wash with soap, then wash with just water.  

Borax works well as a laundry booster, too.  It does a better job of removing old perfumes and scents than anything else I have tried.  Please refer to comments and cautions about both Borax and Country Save Non-Chlorine Bleach in regard to superwashing on www.solveeczema.org .

Score Another One for Miele

I have a washing machine again!  Thanks to Miele for working with me the way they did.  I know of no other appliance company that offers this level of customer service, consistently, as they do.  As they have over the years.  I have a $50 wedding ring and a grainy, 15-year-old t.v.  I clip coupons and buy milk by the case to save 10%.  But this Mercedes of washing machines is definitely worth every penny (many, many pennies).

Off Topic: One of the best web sites on the Internet

With no working washing machine for a month now, Halloween costume plans had to change in our household.  Fortunately for us, Canon sponsors one of the best web sites on the Internet, from which we were able to print plans to build a really cool red panda mask out of paper card stock. No washing required.

Link to the site:  Canon Papercraft

I don’t have words to do this site justice.  You can download detailed kits for building animals, dinosaurs, pop-up cards, whole towns, trains, airplanes, gift boxes, wedding cake teddy bears, the Parthenon, the Taj Majal, the Sydney Opera House, the Statue of Liberty, and on and on — all out of paper!  And all with the highest level of design values:  clear instructions, amazingly intelligent design, simple to build.  The hardest thing is just cutting out the pieces.  If you use this site, PLEASE do not forget to thank Canon, as they are sponsoring this site.  It’s absolutely amazing.