6 Harmful Ingredients in Your Beauty Products

Most people don’t read the ingredients label beyond the tv/social media ad. We often rate the quality of a product based on the cost of the product, by recommendations by beauticians or friend, or by smell.  Though that tends to be the trend, the best practice would be to choose by the safety of the ingredients. There are a lot of ingredients that are present in items that we are familiar with so they don’t raise a red flag.  But, those products are attracting you by branding.  We often by products from established brands without a second thought. So many of the products we know and trust could be causing serious harm and damage to our health. 

To achieve maximum esthetics, many of the products contains harmful chemicals that, at the smallest dosage, could cause cancer, hormonal imbalance, and other skin or organ conditions

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Sodium Lauryl/Laureth Sulfate

Sodium lauryl sulfate is often used in shampoos, soaps, and bubble baths that makes them foamy or sudsy. This is ingredients was originally used in commercial floor cleaner

This product can effect: heart, liver, and brain

NOTE: Ethoxylation is often obtained in sodium lauryl sulfate, which changes it to sodium laureth sulfate and makes it less corrosive. Sodium laureth sulfate can cause hormonal problems and cancer.

Diazolidinyl Urea

Diazolidinyl urea is used in various cosmetics as a preservative. However, the component in it that acts as a preservative is formaldehyde.

Note: Some products are required to put the warning “contains formaldehyde,” but in others, a thorough inspection of the label must be done to find diazolidinyl urea on the list.

Diethanolamine

Diethanolamine is a chemical that is routinely used as a wetting agent in shampoos, lotions, and other cosmetic creams. When these products have time to sit on the shelves of retail stores or in your bathroom cabinet, the diethanolamine reacts with other chemicals within in to produce the carcinogenic nitrosodiethanolamine.

This is known to cause stomach, esophagus, liver and bladder cancers.

Ceteareth-20

Ceteareth-20, used in some baby wipes and sensitive skin care products, contains Ethylene Oxide and 1,4-dioxane, both of which are known to have carcinogenic properties. Though 1,4-dioxane can be removed from products to lessen the risk, most cosmetic manufacturers choose not to do so.

Ceteareth-20 can be used safely but even at low doses, it causes irritation on the skin, predominantly around the eyes, mouth, and lips.

Phthalates

Phthalates are found in many cosmetics such as lotions, soaps, shampoos, and other cleansers, as they help hold color and scent, as well as in nail care products. Phthalates also cause extreme hormonal disruption, both in adults and unborn children via the mother. When pregnant women are exposed, phthalates can interfere with development, altering hormone levels, especially in baby boys.

In men, phthalate exposure is associated with low sperm count and even infertility. They have also been shown to cause an increase in breast tumor cells and can cause anti-estrogen treatments to be less effective.

Talc

Talc is a mineral found mostly in powders, from baby powder to designer perfumed powders. It is also used in deodorants. When talc is processed from talc rocks to the trace minerals, asbestos-like fibers are not removed, which makes it harmful.

Asbestos is a carcinogen known for causing tumors in the ovaries and lungs of cancer victims, and talc particles incite the same response. Frighteningly, talc particles can even move through the female reproductive system and become embedded in the ovarian lining.

Note: Talc miners are subject to lung cancer from inhaling the powder and several thousand infants each year die or become sick from breathing in baby powder containing talc.

I hope this helps you identify harmful ingredients.  We have to be diligent in our own healthcare to attempt to avoid invasive solutions.