(By Brian Yang, LAc and Grace Rollins, LAc)  When seeking to recover from complex health issues, it's often worth looking at multiple ways to optimize the way the body is interacting with its environment. Sleep, physical activity, and nutrition are among the obvious ways to optimize and are always major priorities. Common chemical exposures is another, but as important as it is, this one doesn't always land on the radar. All the same, chemical exposures create a physiologic wild card, and many chemicals that are permitted to enter personal care products, foods and household goods have documented impacts on our health, even down to the expression of our DNA.

If the idea of this makes you want to throw up your hands at this toxic modern era, don't despair. There are many ways we can avoid unnecessary chemical exposures, once we are empowered with the knowledge of what, why and how. Here are three major ones found in consumer goods that you can place under consideration: Bisphenol-A, artificial "fragrance," and glyphosate. Clean out the not-so-friendly B.F.G., and you'll have drastically reduced your body's ongoing chemical burden. 

​BPA
Bisphenol-A, also known as BPA, is a chemical found in many plastics and resins. Consumers are mainly exposed to it in products like disposable plastic bottles, and in nearly all canned foods and beverages (BPA is usually in the epoxy resin lining of these cans). It was previously commonly found in baby bottles and various other baby products; however, the major producers of these products have largely eliminated it, due to the detrimental impact on the health of the infants.