Along with those two pink lines on the home pregnancy test and the full-color ultrasound picture, there is another milestone in modern parenthood, one that increasingly gets included somewhere between the first genetic testing and the last all-couples’ baby shower—a thorough household detoxification. Many parents confirm that their pre-delivery to-do list, which used to be limited to chores like “select theme for nursery,” now includes tasks like checking for potentially harmful chemicals in plastic, soaps, bedding, carpets, and household cleaners.
According to the medical network Pediatric Environmental Health Specialty Units (PEHSU), children may be more vulnerable to environmental exposures than adults because their systems are still developing. In proportion to their body size, they eat, drink, and breathe more than adults, their systems are less able to break down pollutants, and their behavior (think of all that outdoor and floor time) can lead to greater exposure to harmful substances.
“Before you become a parent, your focus is on yourself, and you might be more willing to compromise on your own personal health decisions. But when you bring a new little one into the world, you reevaluate everything,” says Ryan North, owner of Moss Envy, a Minneapolis-based store that features recycled, natural, organic, and eco-friendly products. He says that he and the store’s staff have noticed an increasing uptick in the number of parents who are seeking to make their baby’s environment as toxin-free as possible.
Cosmetics to mattresses
For Keturah Pestel, a Roseville mother of two children under the age of five, it was a journey that began in pregnancy. “I became concerned about the cosmetics I was using, and their possible effect on my gestating child,” she says. After a visit to the website of theEnvironmental Working Group (see sidebar), she tossed out all her traditional makeup. “I figured that everything I put on or in my body goes into making a kid, so I needed to be careful,” she says. “Once I learned about all these chemicals in my cosmetics, I changed my skin care routine. Now, if I can’t pronounce the ingredients, I don’t buy it.”
Pestel’s research led her to begin considering other eco-friendly choices, including a chemical-free crib mattress, which is a common next-purchase for many parents, North says. He explains that traditional mattresses, which use synthetic chemicals to make them fire resistant, have been an increasing concern in environmentally conscious circles. The first visit to his store is often from expecting parents who have done some research and discovered that chemicals such as boric acid, antimony, formaldehyde, benzene, toluene, and chlorine are traditionally used as flame retardants for mattresses.
“It would be nice to think that those chemicals stay in the mattress, but the fact is that they don’t. They leach out and are absorbed by the skin and lungs. Ten years from now, we’ll look back and be astounded that we subjected ourselves and our children to these chemicals in the place where we go to restore our bodies, our beds,” North says. Moss Envy stocks the Savvy Rest and Naturepedic lines of mattresses. Made with certified organic materials like latex, wool, and cotton, the mattresses meet and exceed Federal and state flammability standards without the use of potentially harmful chemicals.
Cloth diapers? They’re baaaaaaack
For those who are somewhat more committed to serious eco-friendly choices, there is the return of that old standby, reuseable cloth diapers. “They’ve come a long way,” North insists, adding that diaper pins and other safety concerns are a thing of the past. Even with environmental factors taken aside (the two options have about the same impact, once the energy of washing is included) he explains that the most compelling reason to go with reuseables is the cost.
“You will spend four times as much on disposables over reuseables, over the life of your child, from newborn to toilet training,” he says. North admits that the move to cloth is “still fairly much a niche thing—it’s definitely not mainstream yet.” Still, he says, for parents who have more time to dedicate at home to doing few extra loads of laundry, it can be worth the effort. “Plus, he says, “Kids who use reusable diapers, on average, are potty trained faster.”
If you feel ready to make the switch, he insists that a Bum Genius brand diaper spray, which hooks directly into the plumbing of a toilet, is a must-have piece of equipment. The device, which rinses off dirty diapers directly into the toilet, is a top seller among those Moss Envy customers who have stopped using disposable diapers. “Parents tell me that it’s indispensable,” North reports.
Disposables with a difference
“Our kids are ages three and two, and we just had a baby in September. We talked about it, but it seemed that using cloth diapers was just not possible for our situation,” says Jessie Seehof Carlson of Minneapolis. Concerned about the global footprint and presence of chemicals used in the manufacturing of traditional disposables, she researched brands that were plant-based and biodegradable. Carlson selected the Swedish-manufactured Nature Babycare brand, which she orders in bulk from diapers.com. With the arrival of her daughter this fall, she added orders for newborn-sized disposable diapers from The Honest Company, the eco-friendly baby products company founded by actress Jessica Alba.
Whether it’s the selection of diapers, food, clothing, or any of the other choices facing parents, Carlson tries to keep a sense of perspective. “I look at our generation, and we were raised on TV dinners, fish sticks, and microwave food, but we’re healthy, smart, and functioning, so we made it through that. We try to follow the ‘90-10’ rule – ‘Do your best 90 percent of the time, and the other 10 percent of the time, you can relax.’ So if my daughter eats a non-organic apple, I don’t immediately think she’s going to get pesticide disorder illness. I just want to give my kids a fighting chance, given all that their little bodies are up against,” she says.
Prioritizing costs
“I have a very long ‘wish list’ of eco-friendly things that I’d like my baby to have, but my budget is certainly not unlimited,” says Jennifer Tucker, a Coon Rapids resident who is expecting her first baby in March. Tucker teaches nursing at Anoka Ramsey Community and is an on-call nurse for the newborn intensive care unit at Hennepin County Medical Center. “Children’s health is obviously an interest of mine, but when I began doing research on the costs of many of these baby items, I decided I’d have to prioritize,” she says. After discovering the price of an eco-friendly crib, she decided to buy a second-hand model that met all current safety standards. “A used crib will have already off-gassed many of its chemicals,” she says, adding, “But it really did seem important to get a non-chemical crib mattress, so that made it into the budget.” Her other purchases will include painting the nursery with low VOC (volatile organic compound) paint, using cloth diapers, and buying eco-friendly wooden chew toys. “I just try to think about the places where the baby will be the majority of the time, and the things that will be most used,” she says.
Your grandparents were right
North, who is the father of one son, Zander, age 13, says he is sure that many grandparents are chuckling at the return of such vintage items as glass baby bottles and wooden teething rings. “The things our grandmas and grandpas did are suddenly making more sense, like composting, using a push mower, or hanging up clothes to dry on a line outside,” he says.
As to the concerns of parents who are seeking eco-options for their children, he observes, “Many parents are just overwhelmed with all the choices and risks out there, but new moms and dads are really eager for information about ways they can give their baby a good, healthy start in life.”
