Throw out your scent beads, stop poisoning yourself with candles, stop raising your stress response with plug-ins

If you have watched regular TV lately, you may have noticed that the commercials are largely for two things: drugs and various laundry & household products for "scent."

The scented products that are being advertised are some of the most toxic things you could ever bring into your home.

How Olfaction works to Raise & Lower Stress (and why)

These synthetic scents overwhelm your system in a number of ways.

Here's how that happens:

• Any type of scent enters your nose and interacts with your olfactory bulb that "reads" the scent and sends a signal to the brain.

• The signal is either "hey--that's a natural scent & we are safe" or "this is a dangerous or unnatural scent & we are in danger"

• Depending on that signaling, the body either dials up or down it's fight-or-flight response.

☢️Our bodies are adapted to recognizing scents that could mean poison or danger--spoiled food & the smell of fire are two examples.

🌿Our bodies also understand that natural scents, like a pine tree in the summer heat or the scent of a rose, represent safety.

Synthetic scents that are in laundry scent beads, scented dryer sheets, plug-ins, and most candles & melts (unless they are only scented with essential oils)--these contain scent molecules that are NOT recognized by the body. And when the body doesn't recognize you, it's stranger danger time.

‼️This means that although you think you like a scent or that burning that candle is relaxing, inside your body, a completely different biochemical and electrical shit storm is happening. The flight-or-flight response is getting jacked up, and cortisol and adrenaline are rising in response to this.

(This is nothing to speak of the fact that these products also contain high levels of other toxic chemicals such as phthalates that are known endocrine disruptors all the way up to being carcinogenic).

⛔️Not only this, but these synthetic scents are wildly overwhelming to the olfactory system. They clog up the olfactory bulb, preventing other scents from entering.

• This means you aren't receiving the olfactory signaling from the smell of your food cooking that tells your body to begin digestion by releasing HCL and digestive enzymes.

• This means that you aren't smelling natural smells fully or receiving their benefit.

• And it might even have made you think that you don't like natural smelling stuff.

My friend, this is because your olfactory sense is overstimulated and filled with confusing body signals. And you need to stop it.

How to reset your olfactory system and detox from synthetic scent products

Essentially, you need to detox your olfactory system by removing your exposure to these things.

And, you need to learn how to swap those things out for healthier options. Might I suggest fresh air & open windows, diffusing pure essential oils, and airing your laundry and bedding out on the line?

👃🏻😱Afraid you smell all of the time without these scents? Well, there can be different reasons for this, but it's more likely that your olfaction has been warped by over-exposure to synthetic scents.

👉🏻I promise you, once you remove these offenders from your environment, after a period, you will begin to smell more clearly again, and probably begin to appreciate natural scents more fully.

👉🏻You will notice exposures to synthetic scents right away.

👉🏻And you will begin to understand why so many of us are offended by the scent of that laundry detergent.

Seriously--this is a problem, and it's even being called the new Second Hand Smoke, because we are often exposed to these things against our will. Scent sprays in the bathroom. Scent in the hotel lobby.

Some personal examples? Recently I attended an outdoor (OUTDOOR) walk for charity, and the smell of scent beads and synthetic dryer sheets was so strong in the air, I got a headache, even outside.

And last year I was at a Christmas party where scented candles were burning, and I felt sick for two weeks afterwards.

This stuff is bad.

Trust me, this is one of the easiest things to ditch, and you and everyone around you will thank you for it.

Need help with this? This coming month in Rewild + Untame, we are going to be chatting more about how to create a natural home environment, including swaps for some of these products many of us are habituated to buy and use without thinking. Or, grab one of my essential oil courses.

Stay wild,

Erin