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Today, I'm joined by Dr. Kat Bowden, a naturopathic doctor from Portland, Oregon, and founder
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of SeaChange Medicine.
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The inspiration to have Dr. Kat on the podcast is because I see some people at Migraine Heroes
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who suffer from migraine disease from their home environment,
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and part of the root cause just stems from there.
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And Dr. Kat explores how the hidden toxins in our homes can quietly shape how we feel
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from our energy and focus to migraine patterns.
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And in this episode, Kat is going to share with us simple practical steps you can start
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today to make your home a cleaner, calmer, and more healing space for your brain and
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Very warm welcome.
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I'm here with Kat Bowden, a naturopathic doctor.
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Thank you so much, Kat, for being with me today.
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Yeah, thank you so much for having me.
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I'm really excited for our conversation today.
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So I'm so excited to have Kat because a lot of the women I work with, men I work with,
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have migraines because of toxicity, toxicity of their medications, toxicity of things that
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they have or are ingesting.
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But some of them also have it because of their environment.
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Then we talked about how the environment conditions migraines and the impact inside of us.
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So Kat, the floor is yours.
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I'm a naturopathic doctor in Portland, Oregon, and I treat a lot of environmental illness
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So there's a lot of mold illness where I live.
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We live in a very wet place.
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And I see a lot of people coming in from symptoms of toxin exposure.
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And so the world we live in, unfortunately, is a toxic place.
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It's something like here in the United States, I think it's 6.5 billion pounds of chemicals
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are released every year into the atmosphere.
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And unfortunately, very few of these chemicals are actually tested for safety.
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Only I think like a few hundred of them have really gone through rigorous testing.
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There's only like 80,000 in use.
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And I mentioned this because there's a lot that's out of our control these days.
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And when I first started learning about this, it was very overwhelming.
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And the way it was taught to me, unfortunately, was kind of like, you know, there's so much
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we're being exposed to.
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It's all killing us and there's nothing you can do about it.
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And I really want to shift this messaging because there's actually a lot that we can
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do, especially in our homes.
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You know, we want our homes to be as safe and a healing environment as possible.
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And the recommendations I want to talk about today are not only what are good for you and
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your family and your pets, but also good for the planet and good for your wallet as well.
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What sort of problems do you see, you know, a home that has a lot of toxins can bring
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in a healthy body?
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Common symptoms of toxin exposure can be headaches, including migraines, fatigue, brain
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fog, acne, rashes, sometimes difficulty losing weight or gaining weight, bloating, dark circles
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under the eyes, muscle aches and joint pain, swollen lymph nodes, bad breath, dull skin.
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And something else that can clue me in a little bit with with home health is people feeling
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better when they're not in their home.
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Yes. And then probably things become a lot more severe as the illness progresses or the
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imbalances progresses.
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It's usually they have some underlying imbalance and the toxin exposure is making their
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symptoms that much more severe.
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So the analogy I use in my practice a lot is our body is is like a bucket.
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You know, we have our genetics.
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Sure, those are the cards that were dealt in life.
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There's nothing we can really do about that.
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But genetics is actually really only five to 10 percent of our health outcomes.
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So we have genetics. We have past medications. We have an inflammatory diet.
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We have sedentary lifestyles and then we have toxins.
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And over time, you know, this water level in our bucket starts rising and we eventually
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start having significant symptoms when the water level spills over.
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So my treatment philosophy behind is like, what do we do about this?
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First off, we want to stop adding things to our bucket.
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And that's what today's talk is really going to be about is how do we stop adding
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additional toxins into our body?
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But then also we want to poke holes in our bucket to bring the water levels down.
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And those are things through detoxification protocols, mind, body medicine, supplements,
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stress resilience, things like that to overall, you know, just bring that water level down
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and have our symptoms be less severe.
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So that way, you know, and I just want to say now sometimes people come in, sometimes,
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you know, an average 20 year old person may already have a very, very high water level
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because of toxin exposure from their childhood home.
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And then some people may have a very small water level.
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If there's toxin in a home, not always everyone is affected because it depends on what else
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is going on in their body.
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You know, someone who maybe already has a pretty high water level, they can't stand
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like the VOC off gassing from their new upholstered furniture, but maybe their partner is totally
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fine and isn't getting headaches from it.
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So what are some of the main problems you see in homes?
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There's a few areas I want to talk about today because I think these are things that, you
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know, I want to leave people with some action steps that they can start doing right now
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to help, to help make their home as clean as possible.
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And actually the first thing I want to talk about is even before we get into the house,
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one of the very best things you can do is just take your shoes off before you enter
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your house. When we take our shoes off, we avoid bringing in dirt, pesticides, road sealant,
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It's really every, we're just not tracking the outdoors into our homes.
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It also is a bonus and it means you usually have to vacuum and sweep less too. This is
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a little bit less upkeep. So what I recommend to people is, you know, have it be a
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shoes off policy for your house, both for the people that live there and for guests.
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And in the colder months, you know, you can have some washable slippers or socks for
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guests so they feel comfortable when they're in your house.
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But that is just such an easy thing to do right off the bat to make your home cleaner.
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The other area I really want to focus on today is the kitchen.
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So the kitchen is a very, very, very common source of unnecessary toxin exposure,
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whether it's in a couple areas I want to talk about is cooking and heating food.
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So the next step I want to recommend to people is never, ever cook or store hot food
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in plastic. So plastic, unfortunately, has chemicals in it that are
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xenoestrogens or they mimic estrogen in our body.
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And of course, I'm sure many of your listeners are already aware of the hormonal
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component to so many people's migraines.
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We don't really want to be adding unnecessary estrogen to our bodies.
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And so I always recommend for people, you know, look at what you're cooking your
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food in. You know, it's very common when you're cooking on the stove to have nonstick pans.
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And now there's a little bit more awareness around the concept of Teflon.
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But you know, Teflon is still a bit of a pervasive substance.
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And I do not recommend cooking in Teflon whatsoever, especially if your pans are chipped.
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So if this is something where you look at your nonstick pans and you're noticing you haven't
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for a while, they're chipped or cracked, that is something you'd want to get rid of.
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Not all nonstick are the same.
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There are some companies that have better materials than others.
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It is always good whenever you're buying any product to see if they use third party testing
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to verify the validity of whatever type of health claims they're making with their
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products. My favorite types of pans to cook with on the stove would be cast iron.
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Cast iron is fantastic.
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It is super cheap and it will last a lifetime as long as it's taken care of
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well. Other things that can be, you know, better than Teflon or some of the other chemical
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nonstick plans would be stainless steel and ceramic.
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And so, you know, if you have a pan that's chipped, there's likely some Teflon or
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nonstick substance getting into the food and then you're eating it.
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Cast iron pans don't really chip
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and if they do, you get a little iron in your food, which a lot of people, you know, need
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more of that to begin with, but realistically very little iron comes off the cast iron.
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And then sometimes I'm okay with people using plastic in terms of storing food as long as
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the food is cold. You can keep it in plastic, but just wait for that food to cool down to
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a room temperature before storing in the plastic.
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I do recommend as much as possible using glass or silicon or stainless steel for
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storing food, but I just want to say it is okay to use plastic as long as the food that
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you're putting in the container is cool room temperature.
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A couple other things too with the kitchen that I just like to talk about, because
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these are easy fixes, is we always want to run a fan when you're cooking over the
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stove. Indoor air has actually been shown to be as much as 80 to 90 times as polluted
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as outdoor air, which is kind of wild to think about.
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And so the off-gassing from like combustion and from cooking foods can actually have
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us breathe in some things that can create inflammation in the body.
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So as much as possible, we want our kitchens to be well ventilated.
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And actually if we cook with the back burners, it actually allows for more of that
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off-gassing chemicals to be sucked up by the filter.
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I think it's up to like 50 to 70% of more pollutants can be taken out of your
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kitchen rather than there to recirculate.
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But more about the products that we're using. So whether they're cleaning products
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or personal care products, the studies in the US at least
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show that the average American puts 168 chemicals on their body every day in
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terms of personal care products.
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So we think about everything that is in your lotion and your toothpaste and your
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makeup and your shampoo and perfume.
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And of these chemicals that are used in personal care products, only 11 substances
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are actually banned in cosmetics in the United States compared to 1300 in Europe.
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So at least here where I am, you know, there's a lot of stuff that is on the market
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right now that we really, really don't want to be putting on our skin because our
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skin is highly absorbent.
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You know, there are some people out there that say, if you wouldn't put it in your
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mouth, you don't want to put it on your skin just because we can absorb everything
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through there and especially anything that has a fragrance.
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But anytime that there's a smell that lingers, we know that there have been
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chemicals added to that product.
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Usually they're phthalates, which are a type of plasticizer that is another type of
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xenoestrogen, like I mentioned before, that can mess up our hormones.
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The phthalates have been linked to breast cancer, endometriosis, thyroid issues, male
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reproductive problems like low testosterone and decreased genital size.
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And we just don't want, we want to really minimize our exposure to phthalates overall.
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And so although it is more, I don't know, I don't know if annoying is the word,
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it is just a thing where if you're using a more natural product, say like a roll-on
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essential oil perfume, you know, after a few hours you may not smell it as much, but
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that's actually a good sign.
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It's a sign that there hasn't been these chemicals added to these products that can
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really mess with our hormones, trigger headaches and migraines.
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And you know, the phthalates, not only are they not good for our health, they're
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also not good for the planet.
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They often degrade really poorly and can be really harmful to aquatic ecosystems.
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So, you know, there's a saying in the environmental medicine world that
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fragrance is the cigarette smoke of our generation.
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Now everyone is using these fragrance products and we're kind of just seeing how
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harmful they can actually be to, to our hormones.
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Yeah. Interesting. Cause it's really started early, like even preteens start to
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wear perfume with the event of social media, they get exposed to a lot more
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advertising and quite sort of cheap fragrances where all of the money of the
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fragrance goes into the marketing and it's really not in the product.
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Yeah. I mean, I think we can even take it back earlier and there's even like scented
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baby wipes that we're wiping on, you know, our babies.
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Like it really starts like right after we're born, unfortunately.
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Yeah. Another thing I think we should touch on right now just with marketing is
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concept of green washing.
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So, you know, there is so much money in the wellness world and it's, it's so amazing to
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see people actually really starting to care about the products they're using on
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their bodies and in their homes.
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But now companies are aware of this.
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And so they're putting labels on things like clean, all natural, eco-friendly,
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green, and they may seem like, Oh, this is a green cleaner. Okay.
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It must be good. But that actually means nothing.
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And so this is why it is so, so, so, so important to read your labels.
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You know, whenever you're using a product, whether it's, it's makeup or it's a
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cleaning product or even if it's food, you know, you always want to find a
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company that is celebrating their ingredients. So when
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we talk about, you've started to elude mold at the beginning,
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this is a really big one.
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It's a very difficult one.
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Where do you see it mostly in homes and how do people get out of it?
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Oh man. Okay. Well, that is an excellent, excellent question.
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So mold, people often will come in and be like, Oh, there's mold in my shower.
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There's mold in my shower grout or there's that like pink mold in my toilet,
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which is actually not really a mold,
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it's a bacteria. Mold found in places that get wet.
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So we think grout, sinks, shower walls,
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that type of mold, you know, we don't want to like put it in our mouths or like
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spend too much time around it,
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but that type of mold is usually not that damaging to our health.
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The problematic types of mold are molds that are found in areas of the
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house that should be dry.
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So we think drywall, ceiling tiles, flooring around windows.
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And it is something that is just so, so, so pervasive, especially here in
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the Pacific Northwest where I live.
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It's not necessarily, is there mold in your house?
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It's how much mold is there. Here,
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you know, a hundred percent mold avoidance is, it's not impossible, but it's pretty
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close to it. We just want to make sure there isn't like a rampant source.
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So for mold to be very problematic, it needs a food source, which is often
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like wet wood or wet paper products.
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And mold is complicated in that it can actually affect pretty much every
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symptom of the body.
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So common sources of mold exposure can be headaches, including migraines,
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nasal congestion, diarrhea or constipation, brain fog, anxiety, urinary
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frequency. And these are all things that, you know, you wouldn't necessarily
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tie together as it's affecting many different parts of the body.
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Also mass cell reactivity, so like rashes or histamine intolerance is also
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very common. And so number one thing to do if there is a mold problem in the
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house is to reduce exposure.
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And if there's one thing I could change, this is really the only thing it
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would just be to not have to tell people that their home is the source of all
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of their health issues because, and same thing with the toxins, you know,
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our home is supposed to be a safe and healing environment.
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And for people to find out that their home is making them sick is very, very
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deregulating. So we want to do everything that we can to mitigate exposure
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for people that can moving best case scenario.
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However, that's not always the case.
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Sometimes people are stuck there.
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And so we want to make sure that, you know, they're on good mold support
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protocol from a supplement perspective for things to help decrease the
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inflammation and the toxicity from the mycotoxins.
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We want to make sure that they're filtering their air with a good quality air
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filter. There are some great brands out there, varying degrees of expense.
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Whatever your brand is, I just want to make sure that if it's a HEPA filter, you
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want to make sure it says a true HEPA filter.
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The true is actually a certain type of standardization, meaning that it is
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small enough filtration to actually help with the mold.
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It's not just filtering out like larger molecules.
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It's getting down to filtering the ones that are harmful and create so much
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inflammation in our bodies.
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That's a really cool one. I like it.
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Yeah. And then, you know, as as much as possible, I just want people to think
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about, you know, really voting with their dollar and choosing to support
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companies that have good manufacturing practices and are using good ingredients,
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ideally shopping local as much as possible.
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You know, farmers markets are a really great way to find, you know, cleaning
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products and things like that.
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And, you know, just taking things step by step.
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And maybe today all you do is you talk to the members of your household about,
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hey, let's try and just keep our shoes off when we come home.
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And then maybe next week you download the Healthy Living app and you go through
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and you start scanning everything that you use in your bathroom to start,
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or maybe you go through all of your personal care products and just make notes
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of the ones that are on the higher side.
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Yeah. Thank you so much.
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That's really like a pack, a ton of advice that are super pragmatic and can be
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actioned today and can really, like you say, you know, reduce the amount of
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water you have in your bucket.
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Yes, absolutely. And
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I would just say, again, look for companies that are highlighting
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their ingredient list and just think of this as really saving you money when we
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think about the cost of chronic illness.
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And so there is so much out there that is out of our control, but we can focus
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in a very sustainable, easy way on what we can control in our homes.
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So please don't hesitate to reach out if anyone has additional questions.
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I absolutely love talking about this stuff.
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Thank you so much, Kat.
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This was super informative.
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Thank you for doing this with me.
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Thank you for having me.
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To dive deeper into Dr.
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Kat Bowden's world of healing and longevity, follow the link in the show
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notes and keep the ripple of change going.
