Update on mattresses: Avoiding dust

Here’s an interesting development.  In a previous post, I wrote about our experience choosing a mattress that wouldn’t be an allergy source for this specific detergent problem.   In trying to find something that wouldn’t shed detergent-laden dust or introduce potential allergens such as latex, we chose an organic cotton mattress with a food-grade polyethylene dust-mite barrier from Naturepedic, on a solid maple platform bed from Pacific Rim.

With some months of experience behind us now, I have to add a wonderful observation.  Not only have we had no problems with detergent dust, we have had no problems with dust of any kind!  In my experience, the space under mattresses is a breeding ground for large dust bunnies.  Under this mattress, there have been no dust bunnies to speak of, and almost no dust at all.

I don’t know if the dust-mite barrier is entirely the reason, or if it is a combination of the barrier and the higher-than usual space under the bed (good air circulation) — but the rest of the room has remained quite low-dust as well, with no dust bunnies around the bed, either.

In contrast, the traditional mattress in the other room begets as many dust bunnies as ever, as I have come to expect is normal under a bed.

Quite apart from the allergy issue, it’s wonderful not to get those piles of dust under the mattress.  I never realized shedding from the mattress could be such a source — especially since we vacuum our traditional mattress every time we change the bedding.

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.)

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.

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 .

No-detergent Diaper Wipes

When our son was a baby, we used a great diaper wipe from a company called Tushies.  It had no detergent in it whatsoever, and the major cleansing ingredients were aloe and glycerine, which are also good for the skin.  We loved that we could understand every ingredient – no ten-syllable words you can only find in a chemical industry manual.  

The wipe worked well.  But then the company changed the formula – it became just another one of those supposedly “natural” detergent wipes.  When we ran out of the old formula, we switched to a spray bottle with filtered water and Bounty paper towels for diaper changes.  If we tore the paper towels into individual pieces and stacked them next to the changing table, this turned out to be no more trouble than wipes.  It also worked extremely well.  After cleaning up with the water and paper towels, we patted the skin with a little cornstarch, and that was it.  We never had any diaper rash, not once.  So we stopped using the wipes and never looked back.

But wipes come in handy for more than just diaper changes.  They are great for on-the-go clean ups.  Teachers at school even ask parents for donations of wipes along with other school supplies.

I recently went to the store expecting to find nothing but detergent-soaked diaper wipes.  I was pleasantly surprised.  Tushies seems to once again be making a simple no-detergent diaper wipe under the Tushies name.  I tried TenderCare wipes (which I believe are also made by the Tushies company) – the product works well, is flushable, and best of all, has a short, simple, truly natural and safe ingredients list.  No detergents.  Not even any ingredients I had to scratch my head about and look up on the Internet to be sure.

Tom’s of Maine SLS-free Toothpaste

Here’s cause for celebration:  Tom’s of Maine has launched a new line of SLS-free toothpastes.  They are made of simple, straightforward ingredients.  No detergents.  www.tomsofmaine.com

More cause for celebration: some have fluoride.  These may very well be the only non-detergent (and no-sorbitol) toothpastes with fluoride out there.  (For people who don’t want fluoride, there are no-fluoride options, too.)

I have only one reservation – and only because I don’t know enough yet, not because there is a problem.  The pastes in this line all contain a foaming agent called glycerrhizin, which I have not been able to adequately check out.  It appears to have an impact on membrane permeability, but I cannot figure out whether it might have a positive effect here, a negative effect, or perhaps may not be of concern.  From the things I’ve read so far, there may be no straightforward answer for us short of just trying it out.

Bottom line – spot test it first before using, and talk to your doctor if you have any concerns.  We did a spot test, and so far so good.  Yay!  

I am thrilled to see a prominent natural product company like Tom’s of Maine offer such an extensive line of detergent-free toothpastes!

 

 

Make your own soap powder the easy way

Check this out – someone is selling already grated soap for making your own soap-based laundry powder:
http://www.soapsgonebuy.com/ 

They sell Borax in bulk, too.  I can’t for certain say that all of their products are non-detergent, but most seem so.  (I would be careful to check out the unscented “powder” first by asking them directly, because they don’t say what brand of hard soap they start with or what ingredients are in it.  However, they do seem to know the difference between “old-fashioned lye soap” and detergent.)

The site also has a section with laundry powder recipes using grated soap.

Good article on “natural” cleaning methods

I’m still up to my, ahem, bootstraps in medical insurance appeal paperwork, but I thought I’d pass along a great article I just came across about so-called natural cleaners.  It’s not about the detergent issues I discuss in solveeczema, but it has a good general discussion about less than scrupulous marketing in the “natural” cleaning products industry and a wonderful list of links, with all non-detergent and non-toxic cleaning suggestions at the end.  Scroll down to the very end of the article for the suggestions.

Link to article

I hope I’ll get a breather from all this BS insurance paperwork soon.  (What?  My insurer chose those initials…)  I will get back to the site and blog, and especially to overdue correspondence, as soon as I can.

List of handcrafted soapmakers

I just ran across a promising resource: soapnaturally.org.  The site is mainly for soapmakers, but there is a page with links to people who make traditional soaps around the world.

I have not been able to check all of them out – sometimes people claim to be traditional soapmakers, but they use raw materials that contain detergents (even SLS), so it’s important to check first.  The sites I checked clearly described the soapmaking process on their sites, so they are true soap makers.  (I have not used any of these products.)