SANCTUARY!

Hey Moms (and Mom-to-bes, and okay maybe Dads)! Wanna scare yourself silly? Do an internet search for: parabens, "BPA," sunscreen, or phthalates.

You'll find statements such as:

"Parabens are widely used synthetic preservatives found in the most of the nearly 25,000 cosmetics and personal care products in Skin Deep. Parabens can disrupt the hormone (endocrine) system, and were found in the breast cancer tumors of 19 of 20 women studied. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) tested urine from 100 adults and found parabens in nearly all."
- Source

SUPER! Let's rub this all over my baby! (Obvious sarcasm.)

Today the Holts wanted to venture out into the harmful sun to watch the Blue Angel airshow at Pensacola Beach.

We stopped at CVS to find a sunscreen for Andrew. I know, I know... babies under 6 months of age shouldn't wear sunscreen. I figured that a lack of sunscreen (and risk of a sunburn) was more harmful than a small amount on his arms and legs. There's no shade at the beach, and we were going to have to walk to set up camp on the beach. ("Camp" includes a tent, so there was shade for Andrew.)

I find "Baby Lizard." It's from the Blue Lizard company, and it says it's Chemical Free and Fragrance Free. It's #1 on the Environmental Working Group's Top 10.

Well... Baby Lizard is one of the few companies that lists all ingredients. Which includes methylparaben (and 2 others). PARABEN!?? EEEK! We've been trying to avoid these! But it's supposed to be CHEMICAL FREE!

I applied it once to Andrew's arms and legs for the walk across the parking lot/beach. The packaging on the sunscreen says to "Reapply to dry skin as needed or after towel drying, swimming, or sweating." The walk across the hot parking lot is enough to 'sweat' it off, and I don't reapply it once inside the tent. In fact, I wipe the sweat off of him- which is pretty much equivalent to 'toweling off.'

Andrew is in the tent the entire time, and has a Little Swimmers UV Sensor stuck to his arm and leg. The UV sensor never reaches the harmful level. But Andrew gets hot... and then fussy, and then wants to nap. It's about 11:00 am and the Blue Angels aren't scheduled until 2pm. We pack up and leave our awesome parking spot. Andrew falls asleep in Grandma Ruth's arms on the way back to the car. He either falls asleep or passes out from the heat. (Kidding only.) I'm pretty sure he was asleep because he woke back up to be put into his car seat.

Where was I going with this? The sun has fried my brain, or maybe it's the toxic ingredients of EVERYTHING I eat, breathe, and rub on myself. Oh right, that reminds me...

I was better off when I didn't read the internet, watch the news, hear on NPR how to supposedly keep my child safe from toxins, plasticizers, pesticides, child molesters, flash floods, killer bees, packs of wild dogs, runaway train cars, mine shafts, etc.