127. Allison Evans: Hidden Household Toxins That Are Making You Sick

Toxin exposure rarely announces itself loudly, yet it quietly shapes hormone balance, immune resilience, mood, and neurological health long before a diagnosis appears. The real tension lies in the fact that these exposures are largely invisible, normalized, and happening inside the very spaces meant to keep us safe. We dive deeper into this in the Extend podcast with Allison Evans. We also chat about the "toxic bucket" concept, why synthetic fragrance and harsh disinfectants can act as endocrine disruptors and neurotoxins, how asthma, fertility challenges, and chronic symptoms can be triggered by everyday products, and where to start removing toxic load without fear or overwhelm. Allison Evans is the co-founder of Branch Basics, a household and personal care brand focused on reducing everyday chemical exposure. She is an entrepreneur and health educator with a background in environmental and dietary health. Branch Basics products are sold online and at Target nationwide. Branch Basics: Use code DRSHAH20 at branchbasics.com https://branchbasics.com/DRSHAH20 to get 20% off from a selected list of products, including Ultimate Starter Kit, Premium Starter Kit, Cleaning Essentials Kit, Laundry Kit, Gel Hand Soap, Laundry Detergent. The offer is valid for first time buyers only through January 13, 2025. What We Discuss: (03:55) Why Toxin Exposure Is the Invisible Fourth Pillar of Health (05:10) How Everyday Symptoms Act as Early Warning Signals (17:45) The Toxic Bucket and Why Some Bodies Spill Over Faster (23:40) How Synthetic Fragrance Disrupts Hormones, Metabolism, and the Brain (29:50) Why Asthma and Anxiety Can Be Triggered by Household Chemicals (31:30) How Cleaning Products Can Make Indoor Air More Toxic Than Outdoors (38:45) Why Removing Toxins at Home Beats Expensive Biohacking (50:35) Why Laundry Detergent Is a Constant Source of Chemical Exposure (52:45) How Plastic Food Storage Disrupts Hormones and Metabolism (54:05) Why Fear Around Toxins Can Be More Harmful Than the Exposure Thank You for Our Sponsors: IM8: Try IM8 today with a 30-day money back guarantee. You can get 10% off your first order with code DRSHAH at https://im8health.com/discount/DRSHAH. Vitaboom: For supplements you can trust and wellness solutions tailored to your health, visit https://vitaboom.com/ Learn more about Dr. Shah: Website: https://www.drshah.com/ Clinic: https://www.next-health.com/ Instagram:@darshanshahmd https://www.instagram.com/darshanshahmd/ Learn more about Allison Evans: Instagram: @branchbasics https://www.instagram.com/branchbasics Website: www.branchbasics.com http://www.branchbasics.com

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:03Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Welcome to Extend with me, Dr. Darshan Shah, a podcast dedicated to cutting-edge science, research, tools, and protocols designed to help you extend your health span. Having become one of the youngest doctors in the country at the age of 21, and trained and board-certified at the Mayo Clinic, I've accumulated three decades of practice as a board-certified surgeon and longevity expert. Over that time, I've discovered that a mere 20% of health knowledge yields 80% of the results when it comes to your health span. We're living in a new era where we are creating a new healthcare system, no longer focused on disease management, but achieving optimal health and vitality. Join me as I interview world-renowned experts, offering you a step-by-step guide to proactively avoid disease, and most importantly, extend your health span.

• 0:49Dr. Darshan Shah?

  In today's episode, we're going to uncover one of the most overlooked root causes of chronic symptoms, the invisible toxins that are hiding inside your home. What are the products that you use every day? Your soap, your detergent, your disinfectant, even your perfume were quietly affecting your hormones, your metabolism, brain, and energy levels without even realizing it. Today's guest is Allison Evans. She's a co-founder of Branch Basics, which is a company built on one mission, to help people detoxify their homes and reduce everyday chemical exposures. In this episode, we're going to break down the science behind the hidden toxins inside your home, how they're affecting your hormones, metabolism,

• 1:33Dr. Darshan Shah?

  brain, lungs, and your long-term health, and the swaps that you can make that can dramatically lower your toxic load. From pesticides and synthetic fragrances to cleaning products, plastics, and personal care items, Allison explains why these chemicals are so harmful, why they're still allowed on shelves, and what you can do today to make your home a safe, low-toxic environment. This conversation is full of practical, science-based changes that anyone can make without fear, overwhelm, or perfectionism.

• 2:10Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Allison, I've been stalking you for a year and you're finally here. Thank you for joining today on X10.

• 2:16Speaker 01

  It's funny, people will say, oh, I feel so creepy. I'm like creepy, I'm the one putting myself out there. You're not creepy. I love that you're following us.

• 2:23Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah.

• 2:24Speaker 01

  I'm excited to be here.

• 2:25Dr. Darshan Shah?

  It's such a, such an honor to have you and I know you're super busy. You're an entrepreneur, you are building something great. And it really was a game changer for, for me personally and also for my family.

• 2:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:37Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And so for the listeners of this podcast, I went to Houston to do a talk. And the lady, one of the ladies who was an amazing obvious health and wellness advocate.

• 2:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:47Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Could not wait to raise her hand and tell me, do you know Allison? And I said, no, who are you talking about? Well, she's in Houston and she has the most incredible company because I spend a lot of time.

• 2:56Speaker 01

  I should start paying this particular woman.

• 2:59Dr. Darshan Shah?

  You really should.

• 3:00Speaker 01

  She is like a Post-it note for Bridge Basics.

• 3:03Dr. Darshan Shah?

  She is, he's incredible. And you know, she, I just finished talking about toxins. And to be honest, I felt like an imposter because after I researched what you do and the company you formed, I was like, I'm not doing any of this.

• 3:16Speaker 01

  Oh, please.

• 3:16Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And why am I not doing this? Cause and I realize is because I just didn't know where to get the options, right? And someone else was taking care of it, you know, in my home. And so I didn't really think about it. And I just feel that, you know, what you've brought into my personal health journey and the journey of my family.

• 3:34Speaker 01

  Oh, well, thank you.

• 3:35Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I mean, it's such a monumental change that, and you know, the changes we make in our habits and our routines.

• 3:42Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 3:42Dr. Darshan Shah?

  They stack up over our lifetime.

• 3:44Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 3:45Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And it can completely change the trajectory of where things might've headed.

• 3:49Speaker 01

  You and I, I feel like we complement a lot in terms of what we do because I'm trying to lessen the toxic burden of people. But then you're an expert at getting those toxins out and helping the body re-regulate and just amplify and all the biohacking things. So gosh, if we can just marry what we're doing.

• 4:05Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, absolutely. Perfect marriage.

• 4:07Speaker 01

  Yes, I love it. We found out last night, we had dinner together and found out we have daughters, basically the exact same age, which I think is so sweet.

• 4:14Dr. Darshan Shah?

  It's so sweet. It's such a sweet age. And they both turned nine in a few weeks.

• 4:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:20Dr. Darshan Shah?

  So to fill everyone in on what we're talking about here, Allison has created a company through her own personal health journey, kind of the same way I did, to help people detoxify their lives. And you've heard many times in this podcast me say that our level of toxic exposure is the fourth leg of the stool of foundational health. And the biggest problem that I see when I talk to patients in our clinics is that because this fourth leg of the stool is the invisible leg,

• 4:52Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 4:53Dr. Darshan Shah?

  people are just completely unaware. And then when people become aware, they become overwhelmed.

• 4:58Speaker 01

  Right.

• 4:58Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And then they get paralysis by over analysis of all the information. And your message is it's not that hard because you change your own life through your own research as well.

• 5:09Speaker 01

  No, I love, I love that you brought that up. And the last thing we ever want people to feel is overwhelmed. We want people to actually feel excited and empowered and full of hope because we have so much more control over our health than we are told. You know, we think, oh, well, my mom suffered from this or all my friends have horrible cramps or are going through horrible menopause or whatever stage of life you may be in. And we don't have to be the victims of those diagnoses. We don't have to have that, that identity. We don't have to be like the rest just because it's common doesn't mean it's normal. And as long as we're breathing, we can, we can heal and we can make changes.

• 5:45Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, I love that. I love that. And you know, you kind of happened along this journey because of your own family's journey, right? And so I love that because it's like you had this reason for making this happen for your own life. And then you translated that into something that benefits everyone else now.

• 6:01Speaker 01

  And so I'd love to hear kind of like how you discovered toxins in your life and their impact. Yeah, no, I would never have chosen this path. I was not an entrepreneur at heart. We never set out to sell soap. I really, my best friend, my aunt and I became so passionate about educating people and the importance of identifying toxins and the things that we're putting in on and around our bodies, removing those things and allowing our bodies to heal. Cause that's real healing, right? Real healing is giving the Body uniquely what it needs and then taking away uniquely what it does not need.

• 6:35Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Exactly.

• 6:36Speaker 01

  Versus finding a symptom and giving a treatment or giving even a supplement or a surgery to basically cover or make that symptom go away. The symptoms actually are our friends. We should partner with them and say, what are they trying to tell us?

• 6:48Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yes.

• 6:48Speaker 01

  You know, so that's, I guess that kind of leads me into my story. So I grew up in Houston, Texas, standard American diet, you know, soy formula, because in 1985, that was the absolute best my mom was told she could do for me. So, you know, I wonder why I had ovarian cysts by middle school and body odor and acne. I mean, I was so estrogen dominant, you know, and all the different synthetic perfumes that my mom brought into the home. Of course, now she cringes. She's like, if only I had known. But again, the body can heal. So I had my first period when I was in sixth grade and then I never had another one. So I went to this top endocrine doctor in Houston, Texas, when I was in high school. And he said, I had one of the worst cases of polycystic ovarian syndrome he had ever seen.

• 7:31Speaker 01

  I mean, you literally could not see my ovaries on the sonogram. They're just full of cysts. And I'll never forget asking the nurse practitioner, can I do anything about this? And she said, no, it is just genetic and it's becoming really common. One in nine women are getting PCOS and take birth control, you'll never be able to get pregnant naturally, but we will be able to help you get pregnant when you're ready. And listen, honestly, they were telling me the very best that they knew at the time, you know?

• 8:00Dr. Darshan Shah?

  How old were you?

• 8:00Speaker 01

  No fault. I think at that time I was about 14.

• 8:04Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Oh my god.

• 8:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, so I started birth control then.

• 8:06Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Devastating for a 14 year old to hear that.

• 8:08Speaker 01

  It is. And so I owned it. I mean, if you, if you had a white coat and you had authority, I mean, that was my identity. So fast forward to college, I was at the University of Texas in Austin. I met Kelly, my best friend, who's my business partner now. And my body started to break down. I mean, at first it was like, gosh, I must have studied or slept the wrong way or studied too hard. And then by my sophomore year, I am riddled in pain. I have neurological symptoms, loss of motor skills. I remember reaching for, back when I used to drink a conventional cow's milk. Reaching for the gallon of milk and it falling to the floor. I had arthritis, I had insomnia. I was on, by the end of that year, steroid injections in my spine.

• 8:49Speaker 01

  I had twice a day hydrocodone, muscle relaxers, sleeping pills, antidepressants. I was traveling all over the country trying to figure out why my body was crumbling. And I was registered as a student with disabilities. I couldn't sit through class without an ice pack. I mean, when my ice melted, like, I had to go back home. So it was pretty miserable.

• 9:08Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And the only diagnosis you had was polycystic ovarian syndrome.

• 9:11Speaker 01

  Yes, and at this point now, we're being thrown out hypermobility, early-stage MS, potential juvenile arthritis, I mean, all these different things.

• 9:19Dr. Darshan Shah?

  All the things where doctors really have no idea what's going on.

• 9:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, they use the word syndrome, you know, just to say, I really don't know what the heck to tell this woman.

• 9:26Dr. Darshan Shah?

  By the way, you know, if anyone listening to this has a syndrome or just a constellation of stuff and you're struggling with figuring out what's going on with the traditional medical route, really, we need to start looking elsewhere. And that elsewhere is where you started looking next.

• 9:40Speaker 01

  Yes, no, and that's actually the perfect segue because my aunt comes along. And at this time, I mean, I knew her as kind of my hippie aunt, lives out in the Texas Hill country. She actually lives in Hunt, where the Texas floods were this summer.

• 9:50Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Oh, no.

• 9:51Speaker 01

  And she starts asking me questions that no one else had asked. And I thought she was crazy because she's asking me about my diet. How crazy is that? What we put in our body affects our health? What? Who are you? And but really, it was like, give me a three-day diet diary. Had you recently been exposed to mold? Had you remodeled your home? So think about all the different, and I had, I'd recently moved into a brand-new apartment complex. We ended up connecting those dots. So, I mean, you have the formaldehyde-ridden cabinetry, the conventional carpets, the windows that don't open, the high VOC paints. I had just gotten back from Africa where I was taking all the malaria pills and the vaccines. I later found out I had Lyme disease. I mean, none of these things were brought up during my two years of seeing

• 10:33Speaker 01

  literally the top specialists in North America. So at first, I thought, you're off your rocker. I've been eating the same things, my 100-calorie packs and my Splenda and my SnackWells cannot be causing this issue. My repainting my dorm room every other month cannot be that bad for me. My gel nail, whatever it was.

• 10:51Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah.

• 10:52Speaker 01

  You know, but I thought I have nothing to lose. And at this point, I'm miserable. I mean, I'm scared and I'm miserable. So I did, I started changing my diet and I found that even within a few weeks of getting rid of, I don't want to say names, but basically the really toxic disinfectants that I was using, the perfumes, the body lotions, the artificial sweeteners, I mean, you name it. Merrily basically said, we all have a threshold of strength and resiliency.

• 11:16Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right.

• 11:16Speaker 01

  Right? But there is a spillover at some point. And that can be colic and eczema and fussiness as a baby, all the way to ADD, ADHD, allergies, you know, then cancer or neurodegenerative diseases. I mean, this is where you could, you could come in and speak to that. And these things don't just happen for no reason.

• 11:35Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right.

• 11:35Speaker 01

  So I was intrigued because my body was responding and I thought, I'm going to go live with Merrily upon graduation in the Texas Hill Country and see what this woman's about.

• 11:45Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Oh, so you moved to the Hill Country with your aunt, your aunts.

• 11:48Speaker 01

  I did, I did. And so I'll veer off for just a minute and tell you Merrily's story because it, it really just adds so much context to why our company even exists and why her home was so healing. So Merrily is in her seventies. She had two catastrophic events that happened in her life that really opened her eyes to the impact that our diet and our environment play on our health. So one, her first one was in her early twenties. She was diagnosed with basically kidney failure. She was told she needed dialysis. She needed a kidney transplant. She'd always been a really sickly child. They did exploratory surgery. She wasn't, she was a pre-med student at, at, in Houston. And she woke up from her surgery and the doctor said, you know, we've got to get your kidney out, we need a transplant.

• 12:30Speaker 01

  And she had this feeling well up in her and she had so much respect for these doctors, but she said, I am so glad you're not God and that I am not a victim to what the medical community has to offer me today. What if there is an answer in 10 or 20 or 30 years? And she basically said, no, I'm going to see if there's another answer. Within a few days, um, as God usually does, his timing is always perfect, but this idea of using food as medicine comes across her plate. So for 10 days, she went on a very Strict and specific medicinal diet. And within, so 10 days later, all of her kidney numbers are normal. She avoided dialysis. She has not been on a prescription drug since. This was almost 55 years ago.

• 13:07Dr. Darshan Shah?

  10 days.

• 13:08Speaker 01

  Yes, 10 days. She ended up leading a macrobotic resort that does medicinal food cooking in Jamaica. I mean, she has had this whole history since then. Fast forward to in her 30s, she has a 10 year old son. This is my first cousin. They live in Hunt, Texas. Drops him off at school one day. He is coordinated. He is brilliant. He is obedient. He's athletic. Picks him up from school that day and he cannot walk a straight line, spell a three letter word. His lymph nodes are swelled up like BBs. It turns out he was exposed to a banned pesticide called Chlordane.

• 13:39Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Oh my gosh.

• 13:39Speaker 01

  At school along with other children. They were in the auditorium and it had rained. They had been applied and then the rain had come up. There was a flood. So she took him to some of the best top, you know, post-war doctors that treated all of these victims of Agent Orange and stuff. Had amazing knowledge about chemical exposures. And they said his brain is too severely damaged. It will never regenerate. His immune system is so shot, he will be a bubble child. Give him 16 shots a day. Keep him in a safe place. He will never recover. Again, that same feeling.

• 14:11Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah.

• 14:11Speaker 01

  This is before we knew about neuroplasticity, but Merrily said, absolutely not. I thank God you're not God. My hus- my, my son will completely heal. Okay, this is before the internet. This is before any other. Not, all she knew was about food. Okay? Takes him back home. She was told to get rid of the toxins in her home. So she puts everything in a little box, like her cleaning products, her perfumes, her lotions and stuff. He was so sensitive, they had to sleep outside in a cot for two years.

• 14:35Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Wow.

• 14:35Speaker 01

  Okay, under the stars, because every time he would come inside the house, he would react. So one night she's laying out in this, and under, underneath the stars and she's like, God, what is it? And she had this vision of this box. Okay, she thought there's no way this is affecting him. She goes inside the next day, takes it out. And it was that day that he was able to come inside and stay in for more than the seven to 10 minutes, where he would typically get really agitated. He would have to go outside. And he said, Mom, what is it? What have you done? She didn't say a word. She thought there's no way.

• 15:00Dr. Darshan Shah?

  So it was that box of all of her cleaning products?

• 15:02Speaker 01

  Box of all of the very fragrant, very high.

• 15:05Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Just having it in the house.

• 15:06Speaker 01

  Exactly. And she thought, there's no way that this really did what I think it's doing. She goes to the cleaning aisle the next day. She's at the grocery store. She had an aha moment. She thought, okay, these bottles are sealed shut and unused. And you know that that smell when you go down the cleaning aisle, right? And she thought, the cleaning aisle is that box for my son because he's so severely damaged. He's a canary in the coal mine. He is reacting to the parts per million, billion, even trillion level. And it's, it is literally setting him off and triggering his immune system and his brain. So that was really the crux of his healing. He was able to spend the night inside after she removed that box. He was the first homeschooled child to be accepted into the US Naval Academy, graduated top of his class. Far from a bubble child, he has three kids in his mid 40s.

• 15:48Speaker 01

  So this is the house that I'm entering that summer, right? She had since gone on to become an environmental and dietary health consultant for thousands of people during the time, you know, between him, his story and my story. So there's no fragrances, there's no pesticides, there's no dryer sheets, there's no raid, you know, all of those things. So this is the home I'm entering. We're drinking real juice. This is the summer of 2008 when people were drinking orange juice. And she's like, no, this is a kale. This is a machine you put it in and this is the juice that comes out of the kale. I'm like, what? Didn't even know what a kale was, much less juice from a kale. So this is what we did for eight weeks. And after that, that eight weeks in that summer, my life completely changed.

• 16:28Speaker 01

  So I went in with all the pain, all the medication, and I left completely unmedicated, completely symptom free. I went back to that original doctor that I had seen in 2002 when I was in high school. The cysts on my ovaries have now disappeared. He comes in holding my sonogram. He said, what did you do? I said, with all due respect, I got off your birth control. And I started eating real food and I got rid of the toxins in my environment. Well, he's since opened an entire arm of his clinic that teaches about the lifestyle impact. And how, and endometriosis and PCOS, all of these things. So we joke, my husband and I, that we've tried three times and got pregnant four times. We had a surprise baby. But then, you know, what's interesting is my best friend's story. She comes to hunt with me that summer. And we joke that you either have to be sick or smart to get on this train. Okay, so I'm the sick one. I'm being forced into this, right?

• 17:14Speaker 01

  Kelly's just coming along for the ride. Her body Her body odor leaves, her menstrual cramps leave, her dry skin, her itchy eyes, you know, all of these things that we thought were normal, but they were just common.

• 17:25Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right.

• 17:25Speaker 01

  You know, and the very first day we arrived, Mary Lee said, we need to take off all your clothes and put them in the sun. We're like, what's wrong with our clothes? By the time we left, we couldn't even be around. I mean, our clothes, we could smell all those things because our body had been unmasked.

• 17:38Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right.

• 17:39Speaker 01

  You know, we, we had been dumping and detoxing all of these chemicals. And so we can now be aware. It's like a smoker. They smoked their whole lives. They stopped smoking. They're like, oh, how did I, how did I do that?

• 17:48Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah.

• 17:49Speaker 01

  So really that's why we started branch basics. We couldn't unknow these things. And we wanted to tell people how to identify and remove toxins.

• 17:56Dr. Darshan Shah?

  You know, I want to highlight one thing there real quick. So you mentioned like the spillover effect, right? And so the way I like to paint this analogy for patients is that you have this bucket in your body of the amount of toxins that you can handle. And when it gets too full, it's going to spill over and you'll start getting symptoms.

• 18:12Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 18:13Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Now, it seems like to me, your aunt, your nephew, right? And then you.

• 18:19Speaker 01

  My first cousin and then my best, yes.

• 18:19Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right. You're all in the same family. So maybe there's something genetic there where your bucket's a little bit smaller.

• 18:26Speaker 01

  To my aunt, but yes, exactly. I agree with you. We were predisposed. Some people have strong constitutions.

• 18:31Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Exactly.

• 18:32Speaker 01

  Some people are predisposed to things. But listen, I'm so thankful that I had that spillover early because I can almost promise you that I would have been one of my friends that could not have gotten pregnant when I tried, you know? Like, I almost feel like I would have just been kicking the can.

• 18:46Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, for sure.

• 18:47Speaker 01

  And my, the PCOS, I never even tried to heal that. It was just a byproduct of me getting out of pain.

• 18:52Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right. And so like, you know, like to your point, like a lot of people kick the can down the line. You, I mean, it's almost like a blessing in disguise that you did not have as big of a bucket maybe, and you spilled over early. And then I would say like, some people, like your, like your best friend, they're having weird symptoms, but they don't know what's causing it. Like we talked about this earlier. If you're a person that has a lot of weird symptoms, eczema, you know, stuffy nose, like all these things that no one can really figure out what it's from. And then you get all these weird syndrome diagnoses. You'll probably have a bigger bucket, but you're experiencing a spillover.

• 19:25Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 19:26Dr. Darshan Shah?

  But then some people have a really big bucket. They just don't get any symptoms, right? Like I'm one of those people. Like I have no idea if there's anything going on in my body. Like maybe I'm just unaware, you know?

• 19:35Speaker 01

  Right, right.

• 19:35Dr. Darshan Shah?

  But, but. Still, those toxins are affecting you from the inside out.

• 19:41Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 19:42Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And the toxic burden for me personally was causing chronic disease. And I had no idea I was causing chronic disease. And once I started eliminating toxins, all my biomarkers got better. My blood just got better. So my point there is that, you know, you might be one of these people that are having massive symptoms like you did, right? From a young age, or you might be-

• 20:01Speaker 01

  Your detox pathways are not as strong. I mean, if you look at my genetics, I'm like lit up like a red Christmas tree.

• 20:06Dr. Darshan Shah?

  So you saw it in your genetics, right?

• 20:08Speaker 01

  MTHFR, CONT, my, you know, lymphatically, I'm backed up. And so I was forced to become aware at a young age, you know?

• 20:16Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And thank goodness.

• 20:17Speaker 01

  But you wonder all the people, exactly, you wonder all the people, like even just my friends. And I'm like, okay, you say you're healthy, but you're taking sleeping pills, thyroid medications, birth control. You have menstrual cramps, you're missing work and you're cranky and you're fatigued and you need that cup of coffee. And, you know, I'm thinking like, how much have we normalized feeling poorly?

• 20:35Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, that's exactly right. And like to your point, like, you know, MTHFR, for example, like if you're, if you have an MTHFR gene disorder, then you will not detoxify the way your other people can.

• 20:47Speaker 01

  I think of Mark Hyman's story. He's a great person that talks about that. He's like, you know, I had, had to force myself to look at these things early. And look, through his pain has come so many people's gain.

• 20:56Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Exactly. And so the message out to the listeners of this podcast is just because you're not feeling anything, doesn't mean you're not having an effect, right? And if you are feeling symptoms that no one can figure out what is coming from, look at the level of toxic exposure. And then, you know, obviously for you, it was like, get your genetics tested. Like, everyone should know your genetics anyway.

• 21:17Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 21:17Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right?

• 21:17Speaker 01

  And Vibrant, Vibrant does a really good total tox burden test, which is really interesting as well. Okay, amazing, amazing. Where you're looking at your PFOs and your phthalates and your, you know, and it's, it's really, again, Kelly came that summer saying, I just want to learn. She had no idea that the cramps, the dry eyes, I mean, we have eczema, we go and we run and we get a steroid cream. We shut the symptom up. We don't, we don't know how much these toxins affect us until they're removed.

• 21:43Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right, exactly. And so that's such a great point, like covering up the symptoms with like corticosteroids, for example, you're not treating the actual problem. You're just covering up your body screaming. It's like you're putting a piece of duct tape over your mouth of your body screaming for help, right?

• 22:00Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 22:01Dr. Darshan Shah?

  You're not, you're not taking care of the issue. And so it's such an important point for people to understand. And this is actually like scientifically shown that everyone has a different level of resilience to toxins.

• 22:12Speaker 01

  Right, exactly.

• 22:12Dr. Darshan Shah?

  It has to do with your microbiome, it has to do with your genetics, it has to do with other

• 22:16Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 22:17Dr. Darshan Shah?

  predisposing chronic diseases you might have.

• 22:19Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 22:20Dr. Darshan Shah?

  All of these things add up to some level of resilience.

• 22:23Speaker 01

  Exactly. Well, and your, your audience is so smart. So maybe we go into this for a second. Cause some people say, well, okay, how are they actually affecting you? Like, I don't feel them. They're all around me. And I'm like, okay, so science shows, government hasn't quite caught up to science, right? Because the government allows these things. And so we think that they're safe. Because why in the world would they be on the shelves?

• 22:43Dr. Darshan Shah?

  That's the biggest problem.

• 22:44Speaker 01

  Let's look at history, right? I mean, pregnant women were told they could smoke.

• 22:48Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah.

• 22:48Speaker 01

  We had asbestos, we had X-rays used for shoe fitting devices, you know, thalidomide. I mean, all the things that we have said were okay. But in the end, science shows that these toxins are causing oxidative stress. They are damaging our DNA. They are reducing glutathione. I mean, when you look at people that are, they're living the longest, that have the least amount of disease. They have the highest amounts of glutathione.

• 23:10Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right.

• 23:11Speaker 01

  They displace our body's own minerals. So like, take lead, for instance, you know? We think, oh gosh, like, I don't have lead paint. Well, first of all, lead, you can be exposed to lead in so many different ways besides just lead paint, right? So as an example, lead paint, as you know, displaces calcium. So whatever enzyme needed that calcium, you now have lead, you have the lead that is attaching to that receptor site and throwing off all of those things.

• 23:37Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right.

• 23:37Speaker 01

  The same thing with synthetic fragrances. We know, I had to come up with an acronym because I was like, gosh, these things do so much damage. So I came up with the acronym OCEAN. Okay, they're obesogens. They can literally cause us to store fat. They are, um, let's see, C, they are carcinogens. They are endocrine disruptors.

• 23:53Speaker 01

  They are asthmogens. They can literally trigger asthma and they are neurotoxins. So when you have a house full of these scented candles and you have dryer sheets and when you think about your laundry, you don't escape your laundry. So whatever you're washing your kids clothes in, they are, it is in systemically in their bloodstream, right? And they go to school and they can't focus. They can't behave and we're putting them on, you know, ADD medication. What if all the candles that we're burning in our homes, the dryer sheets, the, the, the fabric softeners? What if we actually took science for what it says and we're, it's showing that these are neurotoxins. It affects behavior. It affects the gut, you know?

• 24:33Speaker 01

  And when we remove these things, the amount of stories we hear from parents where all of a sudden their kids are able to cut back on medication. They're being more respectful. They are not as hyperactive, you know? The, the mom does a cleanse because her child is having some issue, but then she, you know, by default loses 11 pounds. Calls barely, why am I losing weight? Well, because your body doesn't have to sequester these toxins anymore, you know? I mean, our bodies are so amazing, created by God, and we actually will create fat cells to sequester toxins from our vital organs. You know, and so all of these things, again, that, I mean, I'm kind of going off and this is, I've kind of gone off on a tangent, but it just shows you that they are affecting all of us in some way.

• 25:12Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, I love your analogy. I mean, your acronym ocean, right?

• 25:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, right. I'm like, it's an ocean of problems.

• 25:20Dr. Darshan Shah?

  It's an ocean of problems. So let's just go through that one more time. So these toxins, and we're going to go over all the toxins here in a little bit and then where you can find them. But they cause obesity, obesogens, they cause cancer.

• 25:31Speaker 01

  We always say, we go, is your shower curtain making you fat? Because think about the calories in the BPA. I mean, it's an extreme comment, but you know, anyway.

• 25:38Dr. Darshan Shah?

  It's so true though, right? It's so true. And it's plastic too, right?

• 25:42Speaker 01

  Totally.

• 25:42Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah. And then you're heating it up and all that microplastic and the. Okay, so, so, um, obesity, cancer, right?

• 25:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 25:51Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Endocrine disruption, that's a really important one that we should highlight. For you, it manifested as PCOS.

• 25:56Speaker 01

  It can be endometriosis, early breast budding.

• 25:59Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right, right.

• 26:00Speaker 01

  Girls that are, you know, moms calling us, their six-year-old has pubic hair and they wonder why she gets rid of all the fragrances in her room and the pubic hair falls out in six weeks.

• 26:07Dr. Darshan Shah?

  So, I wanted to talk about that because it can increase and mimic estrogen, but really decrease testosterone too.

• 26:14Speaker 01

  Right.

• 26:14Dr. Darshan Shah?

  So, men have low testosterone now, early in life, like, you know, adolescence, when your testosterone is supposed to be like skyrocketing.

• 26:22Speaker 01

  Right.

• 26:22Dr. Darshan Shah?

  We see really low testosterone levels, even like 20-year-olds.

• 26:25Speaker 01

  What that study, it shows a chart where the higher the BPA, the lower the sperm count, it has an inverse relationship.

• 26:33Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Absolutely, yeah.

• 26:33Speaker 01

  And I think it was, I think it said that the top 10% highest BPA, when taken in this mass study of men, correlated with zero sperm. I mean, when we think about infertility, we were blaming the women.

• 26:45Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I know.

• 26:45Speaker 01

  Thinking, like, you know, it takes two to tango.

• 26:48Dr. Darshan Shah?

  It really does. I mean, I think, I think now, when I talk to fertility doctors, it's so amazing to me because they do realize that fertility is definitely a male and female problem equally now, it's 50/50, but also, there's still a lot of learning that needs to be done as far as like, how does toxin exposure affect fertility?

• 27:05Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 27:05Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And so, that's, that's like a massive point to bring up. So, if you're having trouble getting pregnant, you know, whether you're a male or a female, really look into how many toxins you're exposing. Or that endocrine disruption is critical.

• 27:15Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 27:16Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And it's a big problem.

• 27:17Speaker 01

  It's only going to support whatever path you take. Let's say you're doing in vitro or IVF, like, there is zero judgment. I'm not saying go and live in a hippie farm and just like wait till you get pregnant, right? But whatever path you choose, by removing toxins from your home, you are only, it's a catalyst for healing. You're only supporting yourself. There's no negative impact. And the beautiful thing is, there's so many amazing alternatives these days.

• 27:38Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah.

• 27:38Speaker 01

  There are lotions, there's mascara, there's candles, there's, you know, swaps for snacks, there's good oils. I mean, it's, so many companies are rising up and doing it right. Why not take advantage of that?

• 27:49Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Hundred percent. And so, and by the way, it's a lot cheaper to do that than it is to get IVF.

• 27:54Speaker 01

  Oh, don't even talk to me about the cost. I mean, that's one thing. People say, well, it's so expensive. And I'm like, it is proof is in the pudding. You're going to pay for this.

• 28:02Dr. Darshan Shah?

  It's much more expensive to not do this, for sure. And by the way, you know, when you look at, for example, Branch Basic products compared to other products, we're saving money at our house, you know?

• 28:12Speaker 01

  Right, right.

• 28:12Dr. Darshan Shah?

  So I want to talk about that a little bit later, but what was the A again in Ocean?

• 28:17Speaker 01

  Asthmagens.

• 28:17Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Asthmagens.

• 28:18Speaker 01

  I mean, God, now there's something. Think about, you know, we do this thing called the 10 day stay at Branch Basics. It's basically this on boots on the ground experiment where we remove someone from their environment for 10 days. Okay, we divorce them from their clothes. We give them all, you know, organic cotton washed in Branch Basics. We put them either in a hotel. We recently did one at Calavi, the spa in outside of San Diego. And we clean their room with Branch Basics. We give them all Branch Basics approved body care and skincare products. They eat an all organic diet for 10 days. Okay. Day one, we take their urine. Day 10, we take their urine. The results are wild. I mean, we have things like 97% decrease in BPA. These are transient chemicals. We don't need to be scared that our entire lives we've been using them.

• 29:03Speaker 01

  As soon as we stop using them, our bodies, unless it's basically PFOS, but which are forever chemicals. But most of these chemicals are transient pesticides, plasticizers.

• 29:12Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Our body wants to get rid of them.

• 29:12Speaker 01

  They do, and they want to rehomeostasis. So they're going to dump them through our urine, through our sweat, through our bowels. If we're women, we get to have our blood, breast, whatever thing is going to come out of our bodies, those chemicals are going to dump. And so, I mean, we're seeing in these, this urinalysis, you know, between basically 85 and to 97% decrease in phthalates, total VOCs, the total toxic burden. But what's amazing is back to the asthma gen point, this one woman that did it, who's now become the director of our social media, because she was like, that's it, I'm selling everything in my life and just jumping on the Branch Basics train. She had been on an inhaler five to seven times a day since she was five years old. When she came to the Branch Basics 10 day stay, she was 39. Okay. Day two, she was off her inhaler. She has not taken it since.

• 29:57Speaker 01

  So what she thought- Was asthma.

• 29:59Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah.

• 30:00Speaker 01

  We believe were all the synthetic fragrances that she was using, you know? And we have story after story, people who couldn't climb a flight of stairs without using their inhaler or had anxiety. And then once they did the 10 day stay, they're like, I didn't even know I had anxiety and I thought I'd always had asthma. You know, but I'm not anxious anymore. And all of a sudden I don't need my inhaler.

• 30:19Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yes.

• 30:19Speaker 01

  So what, again, what are we thinking is genetic or owning as our identity from a diagnosis from an early age? That we don't actually have to deal with.

• 30:28Dr. Darshan Shah?

  So I grew up with asthma myself.

• 30:30Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 30:30Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And it really was a major Achilles heel in my life because I couldn't do sports.

• 30:36Speaker 01

  Totally.

• 30:37Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I would be scared to get into a run, you know, because if I have an asthma attack, how embarrassing is that? And I, I just remember like it was such a.

• 30:48Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right, exactly. It just, just a lack of confidence and all of that. And you know, it was crazy to me because when I moved away from home and I went to college, my asthma went away. And I really believe we were using a lot of toxin. My parents were really. Really like forceful about us cleaning our rooms, right? We had to keep our rooms clean.

• 31:11Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 31:11Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And that included using the myriad of sprays that you buy, you know, there's a spray for your windows and then this pledge spray.

• 31:23Speaker 01

  And they say, I think they say after a conventional clean, your home indoor air is up to a thousand times more toxic. Now, what is the irony of that? We bring these products in to create a safe environment and they're actually the thing that is undermining our health.

• 31:38Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Destroying our health. So I moved to college. I didn't clean like that anymore.

• 31:45Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Exactly. And I got better. My asthma went away. I stopped using my inhaler. It was crazy. And I'm like. And I, I remember now, like now, if you, if I'm around any pledge, because we use a ton of pledge, I get asthma. And I'm like.

• 31:58Speaker 01

  Your Achilles heel, that trigger.

• 31:59Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right. And for years, as a teenager, I suffered with this and I had to leave the house and the cleaning products to get better. And so I just think like, you know, if you have a child. Or if you're suffering for asthma, like this is, the problem is not that you have asthma as a diagnosis. Like this is not something that is a medical issue that is something that you're going to live with for the rest of your life or you're born with, you know? I think for most people, there is a trigger and you have a amount of resilience and you remove the triggers and you get under your resilience level and it can get a lot better.

• 32:33Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 32:33Dr. Darshan Shah?

  It's not true for everybody.

• 32:34Speaker 01

  Genetics loads the guns.

• 32:35Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Exactly.

• 32:35Speaker 01

  Our choices pull the trigger. So of course our genetics are at play. I think it's so important to have your, you know, genomics like there and you know what your Achilles heels are. But we can be predisposed to something, but the science of epigenetics actually proves, really it's the science of hope. It proves that our choices are so powerful, they can turn on and off genetic expression. I mean, I'm preaching to know about the flood. You get this, but I mean, who was it? Ben Lynch that wrote Dirty Genes?

• 33:02Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yep.

• 33:03Speaker 01

  And it's actually so promising, you know, because if you look at my genes and my kids' genes, like my daughter, who's the same age as your daughter, she on paper, according to her genetics, does not have a good stack. She does not have, I mean, if you were to just look at her genetics, you would think this is a sickly child. There's no way she is not on, you know, total like learning disability, you know, issues.

• 33:26Dr. Darshan Shah?

  ADD medications, Alzheimer's.

• 33:28Speaker 01

  And all the things. And yes, she doesn't suffer from any of it. Not one of those genes has actually manifested. And but, but when we kind of veer off of our diet, if we're traveling, if she's not sleeping well, she's been exposed, pink eyes, one of her things that comes up, her eyes start getting red and eczema will flare. So those are her red flags, you know, and her genetics actually will speak to that. So it's, it's really wild. Then my second child, her genetics shows me that she's really susceptible to food dyes and sugar and stuff like that. So we are, we have a hard no when it comes to food dyes in our home. They're banned in Europe and they're banned in my house, you know? Um, until the US can figure out and knock them all out of the country.

• 34:05Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right.

• 34:06Speaker 01

  But I see with her, you know, my oldest daughter versus her, they can eat the same sugary treat. My younger one is going to go berserk, climb up the walls, you know? I'm not going to punish her for that. She can't help herself. So what I do. Is the most loving thing I can do is put boundaries to her freedom with her diet.

• 34:23Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah.

• 34:23Speaker 01

  You know, people will say, oh, that's so restricting or don't your children feel weird? No, no, no. They feel the way that they're made to feel. They feel in control. They feel focused, you know? And she actually, starting around five or six years old, she, it's like she knows what her body needs and what it reacts to.

• 34:39Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah. Yeah, and you teach kids this early, like in our house, we do the same thing. And they grow up not craving,

• 34:48Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 34:48Dr. Darshan Shah?

  you know, really colorful food with food diets. Like, our kids could care less.

• 34:52Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 34:52Dr. Darshan Shah?

  If they have like, you know, a colorful cereal or something.

• 34:55Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 34:56Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Like, their mind doesn't want it.

• 34:57Speaker 01

  Highly palatable foods where there's so many natural flavorings, which really is kind of an MSG. But they're, they're such extreme taste. And so when my kids do have that, like a birthday party, they're like, I don't even like that, you know?

• 35:08Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I, I, you know, I'm not bragging about my kids. It's hard not to brag about your kids, but I'm so proud of them. They'll go to a birthday party and most of the time, like, they won't even like want the cake and they won't want all the, they go trick or treating at Halloween. They don't eat any of their candy because they just don't have a taste of it. They eat some of it, but very little, but they don't have a taste for it, you know? And they don't, they don't mind it.

• 35:32Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Hi, Dr. Shaw here. I want to take a minute to talk to you about cellular health. So in my clinics, I've actually seen 30-year-old people with cells that look like they're pushing retirement. And I've also seen 60-year-olds with cells that look like they're 40 years old. So what's the difference? It's really about how fast their telomeres are breaking down. Your cells, you see, are like phones and they have limited cellphone battery. Poor sleep, stress, processed foods, all of these things can drain that battery way faster than it should. So this is the reason why I partnered with IM8. IM8 powers that cellular battery. It's not just another multivitamin. It's a comprehensive 92-ingredient formula designed specifically for cellular health and longevity.

• 36:17Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I'm talking 900 milligrams of vitamin C. That's like 20 oranges worth of DNA protection. The clinical dose of CoQ10 that you need to power your cellular engine. You also get zinc, selenium. Vitamin, vitamin E, alpha lipoic acid. All of these work synergistically for cellular repair and protecting your telomeres. So instead of taking a handful of pills every day and all these supplements, IMAID actually gives you everything that you need in one scientifically formulated system. And this isn't just a theory anymore. IMAID had partnered with Oxford University, the International Space Station, San Francisco Research Institute, and they've done studies and they've gotten this NSF certified to truly power your health.

• 37:00Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Most people are aging twice as fast as they should, unfortunately. You don't have to be one of them. Try IMAID. I actually have a discount secured for you if you go to drshah.com/imaID or go to imadehealth.com/discount/drsah and you can get 20% off with my discount code, drshah. You can also find the link below.

• 37:24Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Okay, so this is such great information. I want to highlight one thing real quick. You said there is a urine test for toxins. I think this is a game changer.

• 37:33Speaker 01

  It is.

• 37:34Dr. Darshan Shah?

  So I actually, you know, we do it for our patients here and next to my clinic on our patients because we want to know 90% of the time that people getting the test have no idea that they had exposure to these toxins. So then it's kind of like the impetus to start working on toxic exposure.

• 37:50Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 37:51Dr. Darshan Shah?

  The second thing I did was because, you know, I feel that it should be available to everybody, right? So I put on my website at drshah.com/ToxKit.

• 38:00Speaker 01

  Okay, this is so good to know.

• 38:02Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, so people can go to my website and get one of these, direct to consumer to your home, and it's a urine sample. He's peeing.

• 38:09Speaker 01

  I took mine three days ago. Once a year I do it through Vibrant. Well, now I'm going to switch to you. I'm going to put your link to yours. This is awesome.

• 38:14Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Oh, amazing. Thank you so much. Yeah, so I really like it because then we have a health coach get on the phone with you and tell you how to start avoiding the toxins. And what it's kind of confusing because most people aren't used to reading like all these hundred chemical names or what they are.

• 38:28Speaker 01

  Right, it can be overwhelming. You really do need someone to kind of help quarterback your care there.

• 38:31Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Absolutely. And you'll be very happy. Now, I also have a free guide to removing toxins from your life in fifty two weeks. That's at drshah.com/Toxins and Branch Basics is in there with a link to your website.

• 38:45Speaker 01

  I love that.

• 38:46Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, I give it to everybody. Like, I go all over the country speaking to audiences. I tell everyone, like, this is such an important thing.

• 38:52Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 38:52Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And here's a free guide to do it because, you know, all the things that you can do, most of them are free that to remove toxins from your life.

• 38:59Speaker 01

  I'm so glad you're bringing this up because people will say, well, I'm just not, I don't have the means to live this healthy life. I'm thinking, no, it doesn't. Sure, the infrared saunas and the hyperbaric chambers and the IVs and all these different add-ons and ways to biohack. I mean, of course, they're amazing and they have a place and I wish that everyone in the world had access to them. But honestly, I would rather see people go home, get back to basics, remove all of these toxic chemicals, remove the dryer sheets, the pesticides, the Lys shampoos, the synthetic fragrances, like all of the body lotions, the hotel samples that you collect. I'd rather those be removed from your home than pile on a bunch of expensive treatments, but keep your home toxic.

• 39:41Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yes.

• 39:41Speaker 01

  Right? I mean, it's crazy. Open your windows, take your shoes off. I mean, free medicine is everywhere and it's really the most powerful thing you can do. And then start up regulating and biohacking and putting these add-ons.

• 39:53Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I even tell people, don't even biohack if you're not going to remove the toxins from your environment. It's a waste of your time.

• 39:57Speaker 01

  You're running on a treadmill. You're not getting anywhere.

• 39:59Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Exactly. It's a waste of time and money. So that's, that's really important. And I think that you don't have to do a urine test for toxins, but it is good to know. That way you know kind of where to focus your attention. But in reality, there's some simple things that everyone can do at their home that will really, really make a major difference.

• 40:18Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 40:19Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Obviously, like, that's where, let's give people, take home maybe top ten things that you can do at home. Let's try to think about what those are.

• 40:27Speaker 01

  Yes, okay.

• 40:27Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And maybe we go from like free to you have to start spending a little bit of money, right? Can we do that exercise?

• 40:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, no, let's do it. I mean, like I said, I send Branch Basics out to so many people. I mean, if you're my Uber driver, if you're stuck with me in a carpool line, you're getting a Branch Basics starter kit. But I tell people, please do not go set this next to your, I never name names, but the disinfectant wipes and these brands that are very smelly and have been around forever. Because again, you're just, it's like you're cancelling them out. You know, I'd rather you see, you remove these toxins from your home that are creating a low level chemical soup in your home's air. By doing that, your entire family has gotten a liver cleanse and they don't even know about it.

• 41:06Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right.

• 41:07Speaker 01

  You know, you don't need to go crazy and put your whole family on a parasite cleanse.

• 41:10Dr. Darshan Shah?

  No.

• 41:10Speaker 01

  If you're still using toxic dryer sheets.

• 41:13Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Exactly.

• 41:13Speaker 01

  You know, I mean, so number one is pesticides. They are, they are the number one underminer of our health. They seek lipid dense areas, what is the fattiest area of our body, our brain. Um, I mean, there's study after study after study showing that they are, they're, they don't belong inside of the home. When we introduced toxins into the home, there was a 28% increase in childhood cancer. Anything with the word side at the end, the suffix side, side means to kill. So you have your, like I said, your lyshampos, your roach killers, your ants, you know, sprays, whatever it may be, all of those pesticides. But not only that, the conventional cleaning products that actually contain EPA registered pesticides. So if it's a disinfectant and it's not alcohol based, you can be pretty darn sure, unless

• 41:57Speaker 01

  it's something like force of nature, which is awesome, that it has an EPA registered pesticide in it. So this is a really key thing for people to hear today. If you take away one thing, it is that removing these things can, can really change the health of your whole family. So when we're attacking germs and viruses in the home, we should be removing them with a plant-based surfactant, a mild soap. We can even use things like hydrogen peroxide and high proof alcohol. Just go to the bar, you'll probably have everything you need to remove germs. Exactly.

• 42:29Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Alcohol you have there.

• 42:30Speaker 01

  But you do not ever need to have a conventional disinfectant in your home. There is no need for it. When we use them as sanitizers, we are decimating the microbiome, not of, not only of our hands, but it's, it's systemic. It gets inside your body and it creates dysbiosis, it creates allergies. So get all of those harsh disinfectants out of your home. The pesticides, next, I would say a synthetic. Fragrances. So again, I've said it a million times, but the bath bombs, the, you know, synthetically fragranced candles, all the laundry products that have synthetic fragrance. I mean, I have three daughters. They come home with scratch and sniff stickers for doing a good job. You know, the shoes now, some of those jelly based shoes are smelly. I'm like, get these things out of the house.

• 43:12Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yes. Can we also give people replacements too? Like, let's talk about that. So number one was pesticides.

• 43:18Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 43:18Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And we had a ton of pesticides at our home, roach killers and ant killers.

• 43:22Speaker 01

  Same, I grew up with it. Yes.

• 43:23Dr. Darshan Shah?

  You know, when it gets hot out, they all come in.

• 43:26Speaker 01

  Absolutely.

• 43:26Dr. Darshan Shah?

  But then a second, you know, what do we do about these ants?

• 43:28Speaker 01

  I love that question. Okay. So we have actually an entire PDF on our website. It is free and it is, it lists pests in alphabetical order.

• 43:35Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Oh, wow. Okay.

• 43:36Speaker 01

  And we have for roach spray, for instance, I mean, listen, I live in Houston, Texas. We got roaches. We got those big old water roaches. But if you mix equal parts cornmeal, boric acid and powdered sugar, mix it up in a jar, put it in little water bottle caps throughout your home, you know, underneath your fridge and stuff, it will take those things away. So I mean, that's just one example.

• 43:55Dr. Darshan Shah?

  That's awesome though.

• 43:55Speaker 01

  Diatomaceous earth. I mean, there's so many things that we can do integratively to approach pests without just killing them.

• 44:02Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Peppermint too.

• 44:02Speaker 01

  Peppermint. They hate it.

• 44:03Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Peppermint is incredible. They hate it. So that's what we do. We just got a peppermint, we just got a water bottle, peppermint and water and we spray that anytime the ants come in.

• 44:10Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 44:11Dr. Darshan Shah?

  They hate it. They don't come in.

• 44:12Speaker 01

  There are so many things that you can do without going through the neurotoxin. I know.

• 44:18Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Roach spray and ant spray, right?

• 44:19Speaker 01

  Exactly. Exactly.

• 44:21Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Okay. So pesticides is number one. I want to say, I just want to say one quick thing about pesticides. Also, if your gardener that you have, or say you live on a golf course, is using pesticides for the grass and the plants, definitely talk to them about changing to a non-toxic form of whatever they're using. There recently was a study published, you probably be aware of this. The rate of Parkinson's goes up. Like like by thirty percent or exponentially when you live close to a golf course.

• 44:48Speaker 01

  My aunt Merrily actually has worked with a few men, one story in particular where he, his Parkinson's and Alzheimer's, it was so bad, but he was, he was basically a lifetime golfer. And so it kept him off, you know, the golf course because he was just so disabled from it. And once he got off that golf course, started working with Merrily, removing the pesticides from his home. Almost all of his symptoms went away. Now, did he go back and play golf? I don't know. But it's, it's, it is a sad thing. And, and listen, the alternatives that they say are non-toxic, which are basically the permethrin-based pesticides, are not much better. And I do think there's going to be a day when those are banned. Right now, they're touted as safe. They're in the mosquito misters at my next door neighbor's yard. She says, oh, they're just permethrin-based. You know, they're like spraying my kids in the face.

• 45:33Speaker 01

  And I'm like, just permethrin-based? I'm like, this is going to be the next, name it, asbestos, fill in the blank. You know, we're just not there yet. So.

• 45:40Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And, you know, you and I talked about this, was worth mentioning on the podcast, is I don't think the government is there to save you from these things. It's actually doing the opposite. They're allowing everything out into the environment.

• 45:51Speaker 01

  There's no precautionary principle.

• 45:52Dr. Darshan Shah?

  None. They have that in Europe, but we don't have that in the US.

• 45:55Speaker 01

  Totally. We have tort law. They're basically saying, okay, you're mad, you're, you know, injured, sue us. Well, it's a David Glenn story. You know, their pockets are so deep. We can't rely on tort law. We can't rely on the government to advocate for our children.

• 46:08Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And they just passed a law, I think, protecting Monsanto from lawsuits, right? And so, I mean, it's even worse than tort law. Like, you really can't do anything, which is really ridiculous. Except I have a couple of patients that found, we found a ton of glyphosate actually in their urine.

• 46:24Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 46:25Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And they both lived at the same golf course here in LA. And they went to the, they went to the people that run the, you know, run the country club and showed them this. And they did their research and they found out it was coming from the people that are groundskeeping. And they demanded a change. They all, all the members got together, demanded a change.

• 46:43Speaker 01

  They're using, that's crazy.

• 46:44Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I don't know what it is, but something changed and, and they were really happy about it because of their, the group came together.

• 46:50Speaker 01

  That gives me so much hope. I love that. Cause I know there's alternatives. It's just a matter. Matter of how do we get that in the mass market and accepted by, you know, places like country clubs?

• 46:59Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, I think number one is being aware. Number two, like obviously this country club didn't want to lose its membership.

• 47:03Speaker 01

  Totally. I get their side. I do. You know, you understand when you do something a certain way for so many years and you're making money and members are relying on it. I mean, listen, you, you, you're kind of between a rock and a hard place.

• 47:14Dr. Darshan Shah?

  But the country club didn't even know, like the people running the country club, they were just as alarmed. They're like, wait, what are you talking about?

• 47:20Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 47:20Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And so they all got together and made a change. So I think it's awareness is critical here, right?

• 47:25Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 47:26Dr. Darshan Shah?

  So, okay. So number one was pesticides. Number two was household cleaners. And I learned something really incredible from you, which was, you know, we went to the store by furniture cleaner and a glass cleaner and then, you know, bathroom cleaner, like all these cleaners.

• 47:39Speaker 01

  We're convinced we need a different cleaner for every different job.

• 47:42Dr. Darshan Shah?

  It's not true, right?

• 47:43Speaker 01

  It's not true. I mean, when I'm, I'm on the other side of it, it's like Wizard of Oz, like a peek behind the curtain. You're like, okay, guys. Like the game's up. I mean, it's just, they're not that, your oven cleaner, your toilet bowl cleaner are not that different. I mean, in the end, it's, it's a bottle of water that has some drops and some toxic chemicals and preservatives. And for so many years, we relied on supanified plant oils, lye, you know? Now we have these more gentle surfactants, like products like Ranch Basics, and there's other companies that are doing, I mean, even like Dr. Bronner's, you know, you have the concentrated soap. Like this is how even the CDC has said during COVID, removing germs is way more effective than killing. Because what people don't realize is when we disinfect, if you read the fine print, you're disinfecting.

• 48:27Speaker 01

  A product only works after a surface has actually been cleaned. So first you're supposed to clean. Then you're supposed to spray the disinfectant and then there's a dwell time. Well, we just get our disinfectants out, we spray and we just think it's all done.

• 48:38Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Spray and wipe, done. It's not even doing his job.

• 48:41Speaker 01

  Exactly. And let's say it does do its job and it kills 99% of the germs. What's that 1%? The strongest ones. And what are they doing? They're multiplying and replicating and they're the ones that leave us resistant to antibiotics. They're the ones that create these superbugs. We might as well remove if you have, you know, a germ or virus, like they, it has a negative charge. You have a microfiber cloth that has a positive charge. It's like a Magnet. So if we can just go back to basics, spray a surface like we used to do in the olden times, you know, wash our hands with soap and water instead of just on the on the go spraying it with a sanitizer, you know, take that extra step, take that extra time. And that's really how you can create a safe environment.

• 49:20Dr. Darshan Shah?

  It was a microfiber cloth also helps with it because of the charge difference.

• 49:25Speaker 01

  The charge difference. It really, it makes a huge difference. Otherwise, you're kind of displacing.

• 49:29Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, just kind of moving stuff around.

• 49:30Speaker 01

  Exactly. It's like dusting, you know?

• 49:31Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And can you just say like how you guys do this? Because you know, you have one product that you just put into three different bottles of different concentrations, right? What is that product?

• 49:39Speaker 01

  Exactly. So we, we have a non-toxic cleaning concentrate. It's human safe. And it's in a 32 ounce bottle and it is a liquid form, you know, of a mild surfactant. So it has, you know, the coconut oils, the decal glucosides, chamomile. So we don't use any of the harsh preservatives that you would find, even in like the green cleaning aisle of say, Whole Foods or Target. We are in Target, but most of our competitors are using preservatives that we never would allow in our formulation process. So it took us over 100 iterations over 18 months to come out with our current formula back in 2016. And it's because we refuse to give in to the methyl ethyl thiazolinone and the potassium sorbate and the phenoxyethanol and the sodium benzoate. I mean, these are

• 50:23Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I'm so glad you did that work because I don't even know, I have no idea what you just said, but, but I'm glad that you figured this out.

• 50:29Speaker 01

  That, that work took me a while, about 10 years ago. And now it just kind of rolls off my tongue. But, you know, again, the epigenetic shows the small amount. So even though it's the last ingredient on the list, you know, we used to think, oh, we put rats in a lab. Is it between zero and 50 or 50 and 100 that they're reacting? It's between zero and one, you know? And so it does those small ingredients, especially when they're in the daily use items, they add up. And so we did not want to compromise on any of that. So we have it, like I said, a concentrated soap and it's so multipurpose that you can then put it in our empty bottle. So we have an empty all-purpose bathroom spray streak free, which is for window and glass. We have a foaming hand wash and we have a laundry bottle, all being used with the same concentrated, different dilutions.

• 51:12Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Which is so It's such a game changer because you just buy this one bottle.

• 51:16Speaker 01

  Right.

• 51:16Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And then you have your empty bottles of the, uh, to fill in and you just do different concentrations.

• 51:21Speaker 01

  Yes, and you think there's no way this is gonna work. It's fragrant free. That's a really big thing for us. If you want to add essential oils, we recommend highly, you know, high quality, wild crafted, no solvent, but you can add essential oils to our product. Um, and then we actually have an oxygen boost, which is like a sodium percarbonate based solution that whitens and brightens grout and toilets and porcelain, you know, um, sinks and you can put it to your laundry, in your laundry, get stains away. We just came out with a laundry powder because people did not like using the liquid and the boost. There's two steps. Everyone wants one step these days. We're like, okay, fine. But our laundry, our laundry powder kicks butt.

• 51:58Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, yeah, we use all your laundry stuff. So that was, I would say that's number three is like what you're laundering your clothes in.

• 52:04Speaker 01

  It's so big. You don't escape it. I mean, the only time you think you're escaping it is when you're naked in the shower and you have a washcloth. You don't, you don't ever escape it. I mean, it's in your, it's on your pillowcase at night. I would say if you made one change besides the pesticides, go to your laundry room.

• 52:18Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, yeah, get rid of all the stuff you're using. I mean, the worst of the worst of those little like packets that come with like three different colors of stuff.

• 52:25Speaker 01

  They're full of phthalates, which give them that staying, sticking power. So they're literally designed to impregnate into the fiber of your clothes, your sheets. I mean, they're in your sheet rock, your upholstery. I mean, I can walk into a home and I know if they're using toxic detergent.

• 52:40Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, yeah. And so that's, that's like a, and like how many times are you gonna change your detergent, right? Like, once you find the non-toxic detergent, just, you just end up using that forever. Cause you get used to it. It works great. There's no diminution in quality of how well it works. Like, in fact, I feel like it works better to use a non-toxic stuff than the toxic stuff.

• 53:00Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 53:05Dr. Darshan Shah?

  This episode was also brought to you by Vitaboom. Vitaboom is a revolutionary company that sends you a custom supplement protocol based on your needs using blood-based biomarkers. You could either send them your latest blood test, or they will send you a finger stick test for blood analysis. Vitaboom then curates and ships you an extremely convenient monthly box of daily supplement packs that have your custom protocol in them. What's great is that they also provide all the best brands like Timeline, TruNiagen, and many others for your custom daily packs. I love mine especially for travel, since I don't have to bring 10 bottles of supplements with me

• 53:47Dr. Darshan Shah?

  and just open up a daily pack for every day that I'm taking my vitamins and supplements. Go to vitaboom.com and check it out.

• 53:58Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Okay, so laundry, change your laundry detergent, right? Let's talk about dishwashing.

• 54:03Speaker 01

  Yes, that's a big one. We think about the plasticizers, we think, and again, once you switch, you could be using, I'm not going to name names again, but like the most conventional dish soap, right? For your dishwasher. And you never think twice about it. You switch to a product like Branch Basics, or even like Seventh Generation, or you know, some of these cleaner brands, and you go back home to your parents' house where they're still using the stuff from childhood, and you can taste it on your food. You're drinking water and you can smell the dish, the dish liquid. Or like, you know, I just, I had to borrow a baby bottle for my baby from my neighbor across the street. And I'm trying to remember the situation. But anyway, I had the baby bottle at my house and I was like, I cannot have my son drink out of this. I mean, I could smell it, you know? So I think that's a huge one because there's microplastics

• 54:48Speaker 01

  and there's those, you know, synthetic fragrances. And then next I would say food storage. I think this is a huge one, you know? And we're so caught up on this BPA-free trend. But guys, if it is plastic, if it's, there's no BPA, there's BPB, there's BPS, there's BPF. They're, they're going to go down the alphabetical list of bisphenols.

• 55:10Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Exactly.

• 55:10Speaker 01

  Because there is not a plastic that's truly safe. They're all plasticizers. They, all plastics do not adhere tightly, they're not tightly bound. So they're going to ingress into whatever, you know, thing that they are touching. You even have things like free bisphenols, which is like the powdery stuff that comes off of a receipt. But even the hard plastics, like they are going to ingress into your food, especially if your food is hot, if it's acidic.

• 55:35Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Any food, sitting around, you can't have your food sitting around in plastic containers for storage and you definitely cannot heat up the plastic containers because that's going to release even more of these chemicals into your food.

• 55:46Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 55:46Dr. Darshan Shah?

  So the solution here is just throw away all your plastic containers. Don't even.

• 55:50Speaker 01

  There's so many great alternatives.

• 55:51Dr. Darshan Shah?

  We have ceramic.

• 55:53Speaker 01

  Stainless steel, ceramic, glass. I mean, it's, they're everywhere. To me, there's really not an excuse to store food in plastic anymore.

• 55:59Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, and definitely not heat up and don't use those plastic utensils in your home.

• 56:04Speaker 01

  Cutting boards.

• 56:05Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Especially to cook with.

• 56:06Speaker 01

  Cutting boards are a big one. I think people don't talk about that and what they're cooking with. You know, the Teflon. So, you know, and again, this is where it can get overwhelming. We have a toss the toxins course that's now free.

• 56:17Dr. Darshan Shah?

  That's on your website, right?

• 56:18Speaker 01

  It's on our website. It's broken up into 12 modules and we go through everything from, like I said, pesticides all the way to emotions because listen, the fear of toxins can be more toxic than the toxin itself, right? We do the best that we can. People ask all the time, well, how do you go into a restaurant or a gym or, you know, all these things that you can't control? It's like, you don't worry about it because you know you're coming back home to a home that is free of toxic chemicals because that's what you can control. Your liver and your gallbladder, they clear at night. Your kidneys, I mean, your organ health really has so much to do with where you're sleeping at night. So make your home a safe haven and do not give in to the toxin of fear about the things you can't control.

• 56:58Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right. I totally agree. It's all about the Pareto principle, right? There's 20% of actions you can do to detoxify 80% of your life and those 20% of actions are at your home. And then 80% of your life is detoxifying. And guess what? For most people, your physiology can handle the rest.

• 57:13Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 57:13Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Your body is made to detoxify.

• 57:16Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 57:16Dr. Darshan Shah?

  But you just can't be living in it constantly, right?

• 57:19Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 57:20Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Get it out of your, you know, your home as much as you can. You have full control over your home. And then maybe you have some control over your office and where you spend some of your leisure time too, right? And so we can, we can work on all of those.

• 57:31Speaker 01

  Or your golf course. I mean, listen, I mean, we don't know until we ask.

• 57:35Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right, right. Okay, so let's go down. Okay, so that's, I think we're on number five now. What's another one that we can do?

• 57:40Speaker 01

  Oh, my goodness.

• 57:40Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Let's talk about the shoes, wearing shoes at home.

• 57:43Speaker 01

  Shoes are big. I mean, honestly, just taking your shoes off and, and that alone, we think about filling up with gas at the gas station. I mean, walking through grass, the pesticides, playing golf. You know, I think about men, sorry to stereotype, but I do think about men on a golf course all Saturday and then coming through their home, walking into their kids' bedrooms that are. With carpet that doesn't usually get vacuumed with a heck of a vacuum. I mean, you are literally bringing that golf course into your child's nursery or into your bedroom, or whatever it may be.

• 58:13Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Exactly.

• 58:13Speaker 01

  So I think that's a really big one is removing the shoes, opening the windows just 10 minutes a day.

• 58:17Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Okay, that's number six. Open your windows.

• 58:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 58:20Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I think a lot of people don't realize is in general, for most people, the outside air is so much cleaner than the air that's trapped in your home, right?

• 58:28Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 58:28Dr. Darshan Shah?

  So get your windows open.

• 58:30Speaker 01

  Even in cities like Los Angeles and my city, Houston, these studies are done in major polluted cities. And they're saying our indoor air is up to two to five times more toxic than our outdoor air. It's because of the furniture. I mean, if you're going to start going a little more extreme, but if you have the resources to make sure that your furniture is, you know, I would say that those, the flame retardants are some of the biggest ones too.

• 58:53Dr. Darshan Shah?

  The VOCs.

• 58:54Speaker 01

  The VOCs. And there are amazing certifications that are now coming out, even places like Pottery Barn and IKEA and Crate and Barrel are starting to rise up and get these flame retardants out. When we think about our children's car seats, I mean, there is no need in my mind to choose a car seat that uses flame retardants. There's no need. I mean, we don't, there's not even a law that forces these manufacturers to use a flame retardant to meet fire standards. They're only using it because it is the ease of manufacturing. You can use wool and different sorts of blends of fabric to meet that fire standard rating versus spraying down these car seats with flame retardants.

• 59:30Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Okay, I love it. Okay, that's, that's, that's, I think, number seven that we're on, which is, if you're going to replace your furniture, or you're going to buy a car seat for your child, make sure you insist on the next time you buy furniture, it does not have chemicals.

• 59:42Speaker 01

  Exactly.

• 59:43Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And it's super easy nowadays. Just go on the internet and research what you're buying.

• 59:47Speaker 01

  Totally.

• 59:47Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And just switch it. And you'll find a lot of times that the couch that you, without the chemicals on it, is cheaper and looks better than the couch with the chemicals on it, right?

• 59:56Speaker 01

  That's exactly right. I mean, okay, so if you had to start with one piece of furniture, what do you think I'm going to say is the most important piece of furniture in your house? The mattress?

• 1:00:03Dr. Darshan Shah?

  The mattress, right?

• 1:00:03Speaker 01

  I mean, guys, if you think about it, all those chemicals we can't control, like I said, our liver and our gallbladder are clear during the night. That is how God designed our bodies to work. And so if we are spending the night breathing in a mattress with toxic fumes and foam. Our liver or gallbladder is going to spend its energy doing just that. Instead of clearing all the things that we were exposed to during the day, it's going to have to expend its energy on the dryer sheets and the mattress and things like that. So really making sure your bedroom, especially your bed, is the safest you can be. Invest there first.

• 1:00:36Dr. Darshan Shah?

  A hundred percent. And people should be changing the mattress every couple of years anyway.

• 1:00:39Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:00:40Dr. Darshan Shah?

  It just, you get better sleep anyway. Mattresses fail after a couple of years. And so next time you change your mattress, I'll buy one that is a hundred percent.

• 1:00:46Speaker 01

  Yes, and I'll tell you what, if it is a hundred percent organic mattress, you don't have to change it as often. And so you really are making a huge investment. And it's, yeah, you just don't have that kind of turnover because the integrity of the materials, the wool, the, you know, the hundred percent cotton. I mean, wool is naturally a pesticide, you know, mite deterrent.

• 1:01:06Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yep.

• 1:01:07Speaker 01

  And so, yeah, and antimicrobial, it's, it all is naturally inside the wool. So you just don't, you're not going to attract the dust mites. You're not going to have the same issues.

• 1:01:15Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Okay, I love that.

• 1:01:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:16Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Okay, so since you just mentioned wool, why don't we make number nine your clothing, right? How should we think about what clothing?

• 1:01:21Speaker 01

  Okay, before clothing, before clothing, I would say going into your bathroom and looking at personal care products.

• 1:01:27Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Oh, my gosh.

• 1:01:28Speaker 01

  Because you're a guy, so you don't think about this. But I mean, most women, I mean, every morning, I, I probably have nine different products on my body right now. You know, and that is a daily offender. We think about our mascara, we think about what's on our lips. I mean, again, Ilia and Tups and Co. and RMS. I mean, there's so many makeup, clean makeup brands that are doing it right. There's no reason to reach for the conventional makeup anymore. That's high in the heavy metals, high in microplastics, endocrine disrupting chemicals, when the alternatives can do just as good of a job. So I think for women, I think that's a really big one. Deodorant, you know, things like that for men, that's huge. I mean, you're putting it directly into your lymphatic highway every single day. No need to have any sort of aluminum-based deodorant anymore. Primally Pure, shout out, is the best.

• 1:02:12Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Okay, I'm gonna get that one.

• 1:02:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's amazing. They're, they're made here in California. And then I would say for clothes, it's about what you sleep in. Listen, I can't sit here and tell women to go wear all synthetic-free stuff during the day. I mean, some of it's just too cute. We gotta reach for our synthetics when we leave the house, okay? But there's no reason to sleep in synthetic materials.

• 1:02:32Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, makes total sense.

• 1:02:33Speaker 01

  Cotton, silk, wool, linen. I mean, there's a plethora of beautiful brands out there that are doing it right. And so I would say, clean up the way you sleep.

• 1:02:41Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, such a great piece of advice. I mean, that's eight hours a day.

• 1:02:46Speaker 01

  Yes, well, your body gets to breathe. Again, your skin is your largest organ. And so we, the absorption rate is really high. So we are going to soak in whatever it comes into contact with, especially our children. The synthetic polyester night gowns, no need for them.

• 1:02:59Dr. Darshan Shah?

  No need for them. Okay, on number nine too, by the way, I just want to mention, what I did for all my products was I just scanned them with the Yucca app.

• 1:03:08Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:03:08Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Or Think Dirty, there's a couple of apps.

• 1:03:10Speaker 01

  EWG, Ken Koch has a great one with the Skin Deep database.

• 1:03:13Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Skin Deep, yep, exactly. And it's so easy. You just scan the barcode.

• 1:03:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03:17Dr. Darshan Shah?

  It tells you how toxic it is. It gives you a replacement.

• 1:03:20Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:03:20Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Buy a couple of the replacements and try them. And whichever one you like, that'll be your product from now on.

• 1:03:25Speaker 01

  Absolutely. Yeah, it doesn't have to be overwhelming. It's really kind of a one-time finite process. I would say the most overwhelming part of switching to a clean lifestyle is probably your food. Because that is a daily choice you're making every day. What snack am I having in two hours, you know? But when it comes to what you're cleaning with, what you're shampooing with, your sheets and stuff, that is a finite, it is not hard, it is worth doing the extra research.

• 1:03:46Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And it's a one-time thing, and then you switch, and then you know what you, what is clean for you and your body and your family. And that's what you, that's what you use from now on. It's, it's such a game-changing advice, mainly because as we said at the beginning of the podcast, once you switch, now you've switched for every day, every week, every month, every year of the rest of your life.

• 1:04:06Speaker 01

  And your family, you know, usually, not again to stereotype, but like the moms are really the biggest decision makers in the home. You know, if you're just living in a kind of standard American household, and so you, your whole family is benefiting and they don't even have to get involved. They don't have to say, oh, gosh, mom's on her clean craze, throwing everything out. No, just make it fun, make it easy, find some fun alternatives, you know?

• 1:04:28Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right, exactly. Probably most families won't even notice when mom makes a change anyway.

• 1:04:33Speaker 01

  Totally, totally. You start messing with the kid's snacks, they start noticing. But do everything else first and then go to the pantry.

• 1:04:39Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right, so true, so true. You know, I think we have to add number 11, just real quick, is all the home fragrances, they need to be eliminated, right?

• 1:04:46Speaker 01

  Yes, well, honestly, that's kind of part, that's partly in that number two category. Like this all of the, I mean, really, there is no need to have a synthetically fragrant candle in your home. If you, I mean, just sitting there without being lit, it is contributing to the toxic load in your home and your body burden. But once you like that, I mean, you could speak to this more than I can, but those particulates in smoke form are so dangerous for our lungs. And like I said, they're, they contain such high levels of phthalates, which give them that staying power, that sticking power. And that's how they're embedding themselves into, like I said, our sheet rock and our upholstery. So there's no need to have those synthetic fragrances in your home.

• 1:05:26Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Right. Those plug in fragrances, those are all terrible. And in your car as well, you don't need the little hanging trees. Those are

• 1:05:33Speaker 01

  Oh, my goodness.

• 1:05:34Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Terrible.

• 1:05:35Speaker 01

  They're so bad. Uber, I wish I could just get ahold of them. This is why I pay more for Uber Black because my, or a taxi. Because the track record is when I do pay more, they, I don't get those trees. Every time Uber rolls up with one of those trees, I'm like, oh, no.

• 1:05:48Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Oh, my God. I was just outside of the country and we were taking an Uber and this Uber had 20 trees in their car. Like it was, why, why do you have 20 of these? It smelled horrible. I, I had to like, I had to like

• 1:06:03Speaker 01

  You rolled down the window?

• 1:06:04Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I just didn't get in. I'm like, I can't do this.

• 1:06:06Speaker 01

  I, I, I will say that's happened to me three or four times where I've like opened, or sometimes I've smelled the Uber as I'm approaching it. And I'm like, I can't do it. I'll make up something like, oh, actually, I'm so sorry. I actually have something else.

• 1:06:17Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I'll pay the cancellation fee. Sorry.

• 1:06:19Speaker 01

  Totally.

• 1:06:20Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I can't do it.

• 1:06:21Speaker 01

  Totally. Yeah. So I have a funny story about that. A few weeks ago, I took an Uber and I was late for my flight heading to Minneapolis for our team retreat. And I got in this Uber, someone had spilled cologne that had ridden before me. And I realized, okay, there's no way I can get another Uber. I'm going to miss my flight. So I just sucked it up. It was like a 40 minute drive. I have the windows down, but I'm wearing a, like a cashmere, a very like absorbent, you know, outfit. I go through the security line and I set off. They did a, they did a pad down with me because I opt out of the large scanner. A surprise, surprise. They're doing a pad down and they, they do the thing where they, you know, get, I set off the machine. And so I set it off three different times. I had to get their manager to come out.

• 1:07:03Speaker 01

  And after I set it off the third time, they said, ma'am, we have this issue when it comes to women who really like fragrances. They wear strong fragrances. It sets off our machine because of the toxic chemicals. So you, you should try not wearing fragrances next time. I thought, if you only knew who you were talking to. It was my Uber. My Uber set off the security system at the airport.

• 1:07:23Dr. Darshan Shah?

  That's horrible. That's just mind blowing. Yeah. Of all people this happened to is you.

• 1:07:29Speaker 01

  I literally have a company that teaches people not to wear fragrances.

• 1:07:33Dr. Darshan Shah?

  I love it. And you know, um, we talked about a lot in this last hour and it might seem overwhelming to people. So what's like the one message you want to leave to people?

• 1:07:41Speaker 01

  Yes. Okay. My one message is start where overwhelms you the least and what actually gets you excited. Because it's contagious. Like you'll start feeling better and you'll want to know the next thing. Wait till then, you know? My personality is once I know something, I'm not going to wait till I finish my toxic lotion till it's done to buy the new stuff. I'm like, first of all, I wasn't a lot of pain. I was miserable. So either I'm going to continue to get steroid injections and take my hydrocodone and be miserable, or I'm going to throw out all my toxins and I'm going to feel better pretty much overnight. But some people that may not have those symptoms are not as motivated, right? So they're like, well, listen, I mean, I believe you, but where do I start? And this is sounds expensive. Start opening your windows. Get rid of all the products you're not even using that are collecting dust in the backs of shelves and stuff.

• 1:08:24Speaker 01

  Those are creating, like I said, that low level toxic soup that is undermining your entire family's health and showing up in different ways. Asthma, eczema, you know, afternoon slump, stuff like that. So start where excites you. If it's your pantry, if it's your fridge, if it's your emotions. Like I said, we have our 12 module program and you don't have to start in order. We found that if we opened up all the modules and let people start where they wanted to, what if it's food storage? You know, there's a sale at Target now and they're selling the Elo brand, uh, the glass Elo brand. So maybe go take advantage of that. Start with your food storage, you know? So start wherever least overwhelms you and remember that we cannot control everything. And we have to trust that our bodies are made and they're designed to be exposed to these things.

• 1:09:08Speaker 01

  They're designed to detoxify. Be gentle on ourselves. Don't give into fear. It's toxic. But know that if you have been diagnosed with something, you do not need to own it. If you are breathing, there is room to heal. There is room to improve.

• 1:09:20Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah, that's such a great message and gives people so much hope. And I think the awareness is so critical and I really appreciate that you're not just out there selling these products, what you're really trying to do is educate the public and the 12 module course is fantastic.

• 1:09:35Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:09:35Dr. Darshan Shah?

  And I really appreciate you coming on this podcast and talking. You're such an incredible expert in this.

• 1:09:41Speaker 01

  Oh, thank you so much. I'm so honored. I'm all over our social media too. My best friend Kelly and I, we run our social media and we're just constantly getting on stories and showing day to day, you know, things that are real and relatable. So that's been a really fun way to connect with

• 1:09:55Dr. Darshan Shah?

  What's your social media?

• 1:09:57Speaker 01

  Just Branch Basics on Instagram.

• 1:09:58Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Yeah. And then the website's branchbasics.com.

• 1:10:02Speaker 01

  And we're sold at Target now. So our concentrate is just under $10. Our pre-filled all-purpose bathroom and streak-free sprays are under $5. So their price point's really great at Target. Target.com as well.

• 1:10:15Dr. Darshan Shah?

  So incredible. Thank you for changing my own life, the life of my family and for everyone listening to this podcast.

• 1:10:22Speaker 01

  I love being your cleaning lady. I'm honored.

• 1:10:25Dr. Darshan Shah?

  That's awesome. Well, I can't wait to have you back someday when we have more to talk about.

• 1:10:28Speaker 01

  Thank you so much.

• 1:10:29Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Thank you.

• 1:10:33Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Before we wrap up, here are five key takeaways that I had from today's conversation with Allison Evans. Number one, the ocean of toxic threats. This include obesogens, carcinogens, endocrine disruptors, asthma gens, and neurotoxins. These are hiding in everyday home products from soap, sprays, to laundry detergents and fragrances. Number two, your normal symptoms? They're not normal. Cramps, fatigue, brain fog, skin issues, constant headaches? These are often signs of toxic overload. Some people spill over earlier than others, but everyone is affected internally. Number three, your home air is more toxic than outdoor air. Even in polluted cities,

• 1:11:15Dr. Darshan Shah?

  open your windows, take your shoes off at the door, and rethink your cleaning products. Disinfectants and synthetic fragrances are major offenders. Number four, pesticides are the number one health disruptor. They actually settle in your fat, especially. Especially in the brain and are strongly linked to neurological diseases like Parkinson's. Removing pesticides and disinfectants is the single most impactful first step that you can take. Number five, you don't need disinfectants. Microfiber cloths physically remove germs better than disinfectants, which kill bacteria but leave behind harmful chemical residues. Removing germs is much better than killing germs.

• 1:11:58Dr. Darshan Shah?

  Thank you so much for listening to the podcast today. Please remember to subscribe if you like this episode and give us a good review and share a link with your friends. It really helps to support all of our efforts. I also want to remind you that the information shared on this podcast is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Please consult with your healthcare provider or physician before making any decisions or taking any action based on what you hear today, especially if you have any underlying health conditions or on any medications. Your doctor knows your personal health situation the best and it's always important to seek their guidance.