31: From Cancer to Clean Beauty: A Mom’s Fearless Journey

Narrator

How would you like to improve your health and keep your family safe? You're listening to the healthy home hacks Podcast, where we firmly believe enjoying optimal health shouldn't be a luxury. healthy home authorities and husband and wife team Ron and Lisa will help you create a home environment that will level up your health. It's time to hear from the experts. listen in on honest conversations and gain the best tips and advice. If you're ready to dive in and improve your well-being and increase your energy, you're in the right place. All right, here are your hosts. Baubiologists authors, media darlings, vicarious vegans and avocado aficionados, Ron and Lisa Beres.

Ron Beres

Did you know only five to 10% of all cancer cases can be attributed to genetic defects, whereas the remaining 90 to 95% have their roots in the environment and lifestyle. This is according to a study published in Pharmaceutical Research. Another study in the journal, Nature, concluded that 70 to 90% of cancers are caused by diet, lifestyle, and environmental factors.

Lisa Beres

Add to this fact that according to research by the National Cancer Institute, cancer will affect one in two men, and one in three women in the United States. And the number of new cases is set to nearly double by the year 2050. Our guest and busy mom of five Amy Kiernan is a 14-year survivor of stage three neuro endocrine cancer, something you may have never heard of before. But turns out it's the same cancer Steve Jobs and Audrey Hepburn died of Amy discovered the cancer she bravely fought has strong environmental origins. And the more she looked for answers, the more questions she faced, especially when it came to the skincare industry. So, she began asking questions like why should a lipstick contain led? Should a foaming cleanser release formaldehyde or carcinogen? And why is the cosmetics industry the least regulated in the United States with no laws requiring the FDA to monitor the ingredients of cosmetics? Let me repeat that. The Food and Drug Administration admits no legal requirements exist that require cosmetic companies to test their products for safety. In fact, over 10,000 chemicals that can be used in cosmetic formulations, a mere 11 have been restricted or banned by the FDA. That's a stark comparison to the 1400 banned by the European Union. Did you know that GMOs, genetically modified organisms, parabens, heavy metals, petrochemicals, carcinogens, nanoparticles, p G's, polyethylene glycol, synthetic perfumes and dyes can be found in many over the counter beauty brands�legally.

Ron Beres

Amy didn't give up searching for the best way to care for her skin. And she was frustrated with the lack of truth about the beauty products and how they affect our health. So, she partnered with a botanical chemist. And instead of wasting boatloads of money on plastic tubes filled with carcinogens, reproductive toxins and empty promises, she took beauty in our own hands, figuratively, and literally, the results, a fully transparent, high end natural plant based skincare line that's good for the earth, and your skin, Authentic Skin remedies was born. And I want you all to stand by here because wait till the end, we're going to be giving away over $238 worth of Authentic Skin Remedies products to our fabulous listeners. And you'll have two chances to win. So, hang tight for the details right at the end of this. And let me start by saying Amy, welcome to the show.

Lisa Beres

Welcome Amy. I know we have so much to cover. And we are so happy you're with us today.

Unknown Speaker

Thank you so much.

Ron Beres

I'm so happy to have you. You have to tell us what prompted you to start your own nontoxic skincare business?

Amy Kearnan

Well, back in 2008 I was diagnosed with cancer. It's called neuroendocrine system cancer. The acronym is NET. And you know I was 35 years old and obviously hearing the words you have cancer over the phone are probably the three most profound words. Hearing those words, brought to me to my knees and stopped me dead in my tracks. I had my mom next to me and I can remember bawling in her arms and telling her that I didn't want to die. I'm too young, I had two babies. And at the time, I had two boys, I had a three-year-old and a four-year-old. And the doctor told us over the phone, I was already stage three.

And so, based on the CT scan, we went in the next day, and they took my appendix, and then probably a controversial decision to this day, I actually opted to forego chemo and radiation. And I decided to do something called debulking. And what that means is that they proactively removed 58% of my colon, it's called the right hemicolectomy. And they took 28 lymph nodes, the lymph nodes that was in my small vessel, lymphatic invasion is what they called it. So, they took the lymph nodes, because statistically, my odds of surviving using chemo and radiation were not in my favor. When they found I had the cancer, I was given a 75% chance. I would be stage four before my 40th birthday.

Lisa Beres

Wow. Amy, did you go in to get checked to begin with? Like, how were you having pain?

Amy Kearnan

Yeah, you know, unfortunately, and this is a story I hear all too often. I didn't have a regular doctor. As a mom, I had a gynecologist. I didn't have a regular doctor. So, whenever I had a symptom or a problem, yeah, I actually just would go to urgent care. Okay. And I went to urgent care for fevers and I had fevers and pain probably for two years off and on, lower back pain, and I just would take antibiotics. And it wasn't until that probably one day we were at a I was my mom's 60th birthday. And we were at an overnight at a beach and I had 104 fever, and my mom was livid. And she said, I am taking you to the hospital. And she took me and again, I didn't have a doctor. So, we went to my gynecologist for a CT scan. And that's where we found it the next day.

Lisa Beres

So, whoa, listeners, I hope. And men are really bad at this.

Amy Kearnan

Listen to your body

Lisa Beres

Yeah, listen to those signs. It talks to you all the time.

Amy Kearnan

You know, after my surgeries, and I had you know, complications, you know, and they take half your colon. What they told me is I would have to have a colostomy bag, which at 35, and you know, still wearing bikinis that was like, horrific.

But, you know, luckily, I didn't need one. And I recovered from the surgeries but I realized that I had no other option but to get strong and fight. You know, I had these two little boys. And you know, from being a mom, I realized that when you go to the doctor for your kids, no one advocates for your kid�s health better than the mom. Right? So, I approached my own health kind of the same way. And I decided I was going to research as much as I could. Because my cancer it's actually a somewhat new cancer in the last 20 years, it's gone up 500% Wow. Yeah. And so, it has very strong environmental ties. And so, I knew I had to take an inventory of my life and my diet, my exercise, obviously lack of my stress levels and then you know, I discovered my skincare regime. So I didn't give myself cancer per se but I had to take ownership that the advanced stage of my cancer was due to the internal environment that I created by my personal lifestyle choices and I was going to set out to reverse that environment yeah and actually a quote by Dr. Oz is your genetics loads the gun your lifestyle pulls the trigger Ah, love I think this Yeah, the statistics at the top of the show that Ron mentioned because a lot of people just you know want to give their power away and say well you know, it's just inevitable they're going to get cancer No, I mean, that that those stats those are studies those are on PubMed you can look those up those are you have the power that's the good news guys is your lifestyle does play such a huge part in cancer and all in our immune system is such a powerful, beautiful thing. And I think right now we have this instant gratification society where it's like just give me a shot or give me a pill. No, yeah, it's not it's a lifestyle. It is a choice you every day, make a choice. What you're going to eat if you're going to exercise. I mean, at the time of my diagnosis, I was literally living off bagels, right, which is like horrible. I was living off by bagels, frozen dinners, and coffee, and then whatever my toddlers dropped off the high chair like.

Ron Beres

Like goldfish and mac and cheese. Will you force some of these drops off from your kid?

Amy Kearnan

So, I have spent the better part of my 20s in a really high stress corporate sales job. And I found myself in fertile at the age of 27 when I started trying to have a baby. For four years, I struggled with infertility, and I ended up taking many hormones inducing fertility drugs over that four-year period. So, I started to question, you know, why that tumor? It was larger than 95% of people who got it. So, my tumor when they gave me the size of it, they said, you know this, this thing's huge.

Lisa Beres

Can you put in perspective? Was it a grapefruit? Was it an orange?

Amy Kearnan

Well, it was my appendix and it had overgrown my appendix, my appendix was like triple the size. So that's when I knew there was something going on. And it actually had ruptured. And it was leaking into the various appendiceal fat which is a cancer conductor. And then it was in all my lymph system. So, it, it had been there a while. And that was probably what was causing the fevers and causing, you know, me to have all the pain. But when I also started to look at my internal environment and see what role did, I play in this, and I actually realized that back in my teens, I had taken a very famous acne pharmaceutical. It was sub subsequently, at the time dealing with very large lawsuits. In fact, I probably could have gotten money based on the amount of time I had taken this pharmaceutical. You're supposed to take it for six months, and off and on. I took it over 10 years. Wow. So yeah, so the lawsuits were showing that it was actually you know, there's different lawsuits, but it was actually not correlated to cause but cause, like, that's, that's where the lawsuits and the three diseases were Crohn's disease, and ulcerative colitis, and then of course, NETs. So, it started making me wonder, yeah, the neuroendocrine cancer.

Lisa Beres

Yep. Now, were you told about these side effects when your dermatologist prescribed you this?

Amy Kearnan

Absolutely not, you know, and neither was my mom. I mean, you know, we just took it and my skin looked great. Right. And, you know, I would just ask for another fulfillment. I don't even know if I needed it for 10 years off and on. But you know, and, yeah, so, I mean, then I also realized I was on antibiotics as a child for chronic ear infections. Another thing they would just give me antibiotics. They eventually took my adenoids and tonsils out. But before doing that, they just constantly gave me antibiotics. And then I also realized, as I started to look at antibiotics and the role that they play in your microbiome, and candida overgrowth, and you know, disease, I realized that I had also been using a product called Cleocin-T on my face, which was also a topical antibiotic. And that kind of got me to wonder, well wait, if you put it on your skin, it's getting into your body in your bloodstream, and it's causing gut issues like, yeah, that was a big eye opener for me. But again, you know, it's back to, you're disrupting our, our endocrine system is so sensitive, especially as females, and then of course, our gut microbiome is so important to our health, the gut is so critical to our immune system. So, you know, years of this topical oral antibiotics, I feel like I had wiped out the balance of the good bacteria, and I had, after you know, researching, I realized I had something called candida overgrowth, and I was able to connect a lot of my long term symptoms of fatigue, I had migraines I had brain fog, and fertility, and you know, and I decided you know, what this is, this is the environment I created and just like I created it, I could change I could make.

Lisa Beres

I love that. Yeah. empowered, self-empowered. You know, the famous quote, Virgil, �health is the greatest wealth� and you know, on the outside everything looked good for you, you know, you're traveling you're you've got you know, this high end job, you're busy, your skin looks great and the inside all these like, you know, horrible things are happening to your body and just how in society we're so focused on the exterior, you know, appearances not just physical but even the are you the good Mom, are you juggling? Are you doing this or you're doing this? And Amy I actually suffer from bad acne in college as well. was also prescribed the same drug that you are referring to. Thankfully, I wasn't on it long, but it's linked to severe birth defects, even if taken for short periods. And ironically, it's linked to skin rashes and inflammation, which kind of defeats the whole purpose of taking it as well as suicidal tendencies. Not exactly a good trade off. I wasn't told about. I was told not to get pregnant. I that was the only thing I wrote. Yeah. Yeah. Which was not the plan. I was in college. No. Amy, like me, and like so many of our listeners, you had a very toxic body burden, which is really common today.

Amy Kearnan

Absolutely. And, you know, I started looking more into that type of cancer, right, you know, and obviously, Steve Jobs is one of the most famous net patients. We have some other famous ones. But I said, you know, whoever his doctor is, that's where I'm going.

Lisa Beres

So, you live in the same area, right? The bay area.

Amy Kearnan

A shout out to him. His name is Dr. Edward Wallen, and he is an absolute Angel. He's one of the top NET specialists in the world. At the time, he had, you know, seven 800 patients. But, you know, I started looking at the similarities with this, because when you think about the endocrine system, and like you said, a lot of these cancers are not genetic, you know, what is it about our diet and our lifestyle? So, breast, cervical, and uterine cancers are on the rise, right? breast cancer 50 years ago, was one in 50,000 women. And as of now, it's one in eight.

Lisa Beres

Like, there's probably nobody listening to this podcast that doesn't know somebody that's had breast cancer. Or three people.

Amy Kearnan

Yeah, it's a and I know you guys have a very personal story with that. And I'm so sorry, Ron, about that. And I, I just I feel like, you know, this is this is, in 50 years, we jumped to that kind of level, what's it going to be like in the next 20? Or 30? You know, sure.

Lisa Beres

Well, and even the quote that I mentioned at the top that from the National Cancer Institute, that one in two men and one in every three women will develop cancer in their lifetime. Like, that's right. And then yeah, it's one in three. That's right. That's today. That's the stat today. Yeah. So, but the power, the point of this and the point of having you, thank you for being so generous, and sharing your story and being so vulnerable with sharing that with everybody, you know, Amy's going to tell us how she, you know, got healthy, and she's such a success story. And you can be too, if you're listening like you can be to let you know, take those actions, we're going to talk about so much of that today. Be proactive with your health. If you have people around you who are like, Oh, you're, you know, you're overreacting, or you're you know, you don't need to be using organic this and that, you know, this is you, this is your body, you're the one that's going to live with the consequences. So, you have to tune out the noise and do what you know, in your gut and heart is good for you. And your family.

Amy Kearnan

Yeah, and you know, and one thing that was interesting for me is, you know, when I started looking into, you know, the 1000s and 1000s of chemicals, or synthetic chemicals that are in skincare, you know, it's only been this wasn't these chemicals weren't in your parents skincare. In fact, you know, it's probably only been in the last 30 plus years. And one of the main reasons is because of patenting. You know, you can't patent a plant just like you can't patent food, right. So, you know, I remember way back in the day, Julia Roberts and Martha Stewart were suing each other over, you know, there are recipes because you can't patent it.

Lisa Beres

Yeah, right, right now, unless it's genetically modified, then you can patent it.

Amy Kearnan

I mean, you know, and, and the unfortunate thing is, you know, you've got, I don't want to name you know, big brands, but I'll just say Johnson and Johnson, for example, you know, and they put lavender in their baby shampoo. It's a synthetic lavender. And then, you know, let's say a vino or some other company has to come around if they want the patent, and they have to create another synthetic lavender and then all of a sudden, you've got all these synthetic lavenders floating around.

Lisa Beres

Which is such a great point. Because I know there are a lot of people listening, they're like, Wait synthetic lavender? I don't think people realize that. They can make a synthetic version of any natural set of anything. If you see the word lavender, that doesn't mean it's a lavender scent, you have to check the ingredient, you have to know what to look for, be a label reader, or just stick with brands that you know you can trust.

Amy Kearnan

Yeah right. So, you know, I think that the sad part is, is that now we're in a lifetime, you know, in my daughter to where you actually have to check stuff. I don't think we had to check stuff 40 years ago, you know, we didn't have there was no GMOs. GMOs, I think started in 1996. Right. So, this is all new, like we're in a world now where we do have to check. There are endocrine disruptors in products called fake phthalates. And you know, you posted a lot of stuff about that and You know, I don't know if you want to chime in on that, but that that's one of the most prevalent ingredients that cause illness today. I mean, it's in everything from our cleaning. You know, hand sanitizers. I mean, it's in a lot of things.

Lisa Beres

It's also in our food, it gets in our food, through the packaging. Even in poultry. They showed very high levels of salads in chicken because of the bags that the chicken feed was stored in that they were getting phthalates. Yeah. So, you know, that's transferred. Obviously, the shower curtain - anything vinyl. So, anything, it softens plastics, so it can off gas; it's semi volatile. And so, it can get into the air that you breathe via, like I said, a shower curtain and vinyl flooring and kids toys and it like you said it's in. It binds and makes the fragrance linger in a lot of products.

Amy Kearnan

Yeah. And you know, one other thing, BPA kind of in that similar vein, one shocking thing I realized about BPA, because I was making sure my baby bottles and sippy cups didn't have BPA. And that was a big thing when I was having babies. And I learned that in cans in cans, right? It's aligning that kind of like, rubbery lining that's in your canned goods is BPA.

Lisa Beres

So, yeah, it's not easy to find BPA free cans, either we go out of our way run and I have to share it with three different stores. Because Oh, this store has organic beans, but they're, the can has BPA in it. Yeah, you've got it, that's an extra thing. And that's a huge way of exposure to BPA.

Amy Kearnan

And then you a couple things you could do. So, you don't want to use tomatoes, I think there's a few things you just don't want to do because it's going to Leach the BPA, but because of the acid, but you could rinse the beans and corn and things like that. But that's that will get some of the BPA out if you rinse it but it's better to just buy frozen corn or you know, make your own beans.

Lisa Beres

It all comes back to making your own food because like even with the frozen you still have the plastic packaging. Right?

Amy Kearnan

Right. So yeah, you know, and again, like, you know, figuring out like hormone disturbers, parabens, carcinogens, and again, all of that stuff is in our daily grooming over 12,000 not regulated ingredients that, you know, you're putting on your body's largest organ, you know, 70% of that gets absorbed into your bloodstream. And there's no you know, unlike food, when you eat food, your stomach acid, it goes through the digestive tract, and it kind of leaves your body whereas you're putting this stuff on your skin, it's there's nowhere to go, you know, it's, it's in there 60% of what you put on your skin, which is your largest organ. Yeah, people don't think about that with lotions, and perfume and body wash and shaving. And all of that. Not at all. I mean, so I discovered a couple books I want to share because they're basically the two books I buy for someone when they tell me they have cancer. And the first one was called Anticancer: A New Way of Life and it's by a guy named by David Servan-Schreiber MD PhD. And he had terminal brain cancer, he was a doctor, he kind of like me, you know, when you read the book, he's like, I lived on, you know, vending machine food and pizza, I was a doctor, I didn't, you know, even take a break. And he literally was stage four, he was given six months to live. And he said, you know what, I have this theory, and he had had it for years and years, that had to do with what he was eating. And he also had known, you know, over the years that there were certain countries that were really low, and let's say breast cancer or really low in colon cancer, so he decided to kind of just start studying this and doing you know, this hypothesis. He's like, I have six months to live, I'm just going to, like, dive into this. And so, he started this animal study where he injected these mice with his brain cancer. And he would then come up with these cocktails and feed them, you know, these cocktails of like, you know, certain diets, right. So the Indian, you know, cocktail would have, you know, cumin and garlic and cinnamon and, you know, low meat and low dairy and then, you know, he would feed them, you know, foods that were from the Vietnamese diet from, you know, the Polish diet, etc. And, of course, the US diet. And in those months, he kind of based on his hypothesis, he believed that the Indian diet was the best diet for cancer. And so, he started eating that way.

Lisa Beres

The turmeric, right? There�s lot of turmeric in Indian food.

Amy Kearnan

So, they're antifungal antibacterial ingredients in the very low-end meats and very well, their meats don't have antibiotics. I mean, if it's traditional Indian food, there's very low antibiotics. There's very low dairy, so the mice that he fed the Indian diet, the tumors actually shrink. And the mice that he fed the American diet, which were very high, and pesticides and corn syrup and bleached flour, and, you know, GMOs, etc. The mice within days were dead with the I mean, and there's photos in the book where the tumors are just like, they're riddled in tumors. Right. So, at the end of this book, I mean, you have to read it. But basically, he determined that there's three number one causes of death in the US tend to be corn syrup, or sugar induced. And so those are heart disease, cancer, and diabetes.

Amy Kearnan

So, all three of those can be linked to sugar. And so, sugar feeds cancer. It does cancer does need sugar to survive. You know, interestingly enough, the three top court comorbidities of COVID death, heart disease, diabetes and cancer.

Lisa Beres

Right? Yeah. He cut out, you guys that was that was processed sugar, corn syrup, and bleached flour was that?

Amy Kearnan

Bleached flour. So yeah, you can get unbleached flour, but you know, bleached flour, corn syrup was so shocking to me, when I had my third baby, it's in pretty much every formula. Like I could not find a formula. I could not find a formula with corn syrup as the number one ingredient, meaning that is the predominant ingredient in that formula. I actually know this was back in 2012, I actually had to mail away for formula.

Lisa Beres

I didn't know that that's um, get those kids addicted to that sugar.

Amy Kearnan

That's right. And then, and then look at every baby vitamin, any gummy vitamin that's out there on the market, corn syrup. Number one.

Lisa Beres

Ketchup, I know you and I had had some conversations, Ketchup and barbecue, sauce, all of those sauces. And they contain high fructose corn syrup. And by the way, you guys, that's HFCS. A lot of people might not know what that is.

Amy Kearnan

So, the second book I read that I read that kind of brought me on to the path that I'm on is a book called Not Just a Pretty Face, and it's a book by Stacy Malkan. And I was already beginning to volunteer for the Environmental Working Group. They had an offshoot called the Breast Cancer Fund, which I started volunteering for. And I went for a weekend to learn how to be what's called a strong voice and what I liked about this organization; they're now called breast cancer prevention partners. They changed their name. But what I like about this organization is they are 100% about prevention. Yeah. Which Look, there's greenwashing and pink washing and all kinds of stuff where you put a pink label on something, you know, I mean, I just think it's really ironic that you have these chemically written products that have a pink

Lisa Beres

Yeah, they're like, we're going to give you cancer and then we're going to support. We're going to support with products that try to hide it.

Amy Kearnan

Right. And you know, and I actually volunteered for another cancer organization where they had candy for cancer, like a booth candy for cancer. Last year, I volunteered for them.

Lisa Beres

I love Breast Cancer Prevention Partners I've been following them for years.

Amy Kearnan

They're absolutely fabulous. And you know, I got, I went for a weekend I met this woman Lanie. And we hit it off and her and I just, we became power partners. And we just hit the road and started, you know, as this when you're a strong voice, they give you all the documentation. And they do these like campaign in a box. So like Luna fest is one of them. So, if you ever want to throw Luna Fest, they'll give you the movies, you have to obviously find a venue and you have to sell tickets and all that kind of stuff. But they'll give you the movies, they'll give you all the marketing materials. You know that they even had people come and you know, the last event that we did, we had over 300 people. Wow, fans raise it. We raised 17 grand.

Lisa Beres

Congratulations. Yeah. Luna Fest, is that the Luna bar people?

Amy Kearnan

Yep, it is.

Lisa Beres

That's what I thought. Yeah.

Amy Kearnan

Yeah. What ended up happening is, I decided, you know, kind of talking to people meeting people at these events. I met a couple chemists that work with skin deep. I met Stacy Malcolm a couple times. And I said, you know what, I think I want to create my own line. And one of the reasons I decided is I thought you know, I started using natural products, you know, those natural deodorants back then and they just I felt like, you didn't really want.

Lisa Beres

A sweat ball. A dripping ball.

Amy Kearnan

Yeah, don't wear a white shirt because it's going to be yellow by the end of the day. Yeah, I felt like, you know, what got me into this mess was acne. And so, I kind of started to say, you know, are there good acne products out there that are, you know, organic and you know, some of them would leave my skin itchy and dry. And then I you know, I was starting to get into my 40s and I thought, you know, I want something anti-aging, I want something luxurious. And, you know, I also have high end taste, right? Like I remember when I first started formulating the line, and I would send it back to the chemist and go, I want four seasons coconut and he's like, coconut and I'm like, isn't it and you know, finally he came up with this Tahitian coconut it was started coconut from Tahiti and I was like, got it. There you go. That's four seasons coconut, you know, so I wanted something that was luxurious. And that worked. And you know, so I just kind of decided to come up with the line myself.

Lisa Beres

So, Amy, are you open to taking a question from a caller?

Amy Kearnan

Absolutely. We have a caller?

Lisa Beres

We have a caller on the phone. Caller, can you tell us your name?

Caller, Corrina

Hi, I'm Corrina.

Lisa Beres

Hi, Corrina, welcome to the show. Thank you for being here. Did you have a question for Amy?

Caller, Corrina

I do I do. I'm concerned about the products I use on my skin. And I want to know what her advice would be to get to determine if the ingredients I use are safe as her products.

Amy Kearnan

Great question. Good question. Luckily, there are actually iPhone apps that you can use now, which make it a lot easier than way back when I started developing the line. The first one is near and dear to my heart. And it's called EWG Skin Deep. It started. Gosh, back in 2004. Around the time when I, I probably started developing a line in 2008-ish. And back then there were very few products, I think now they have 80 to 90,000 products on there, maybe even more. And so, you can actually take it with you. If you download the app, you can take your phone with you to the grocery store or you know, I don't know Nordstrom, wherever and you can zap the barcode. Oh, wow. And the scores. Yeah, so you want to kind of stick to scores three and under. Sometimes a three may not necessarily mean a bad thing. I mean, the highest score I have on my products is a three and it's in my refine and which is a fruit enzyme. And it gets it a three because it could cause irritation because you know it's a fruit.

Lisa Beres

And to just to pick up on that it gives a score from one to seven, seven being the most toxic one or zero, I think you can get a zero, right? Zero being zero, no toxicity. Yeah, zeros are no toxicity. And then seven, you don't want you don't want like gaming. So, you don't want anything about three, you don't want three, four or five, threes, okay, but you don't want 4, 5, 6 or seven.

Amy Kearnan

And good to know. You know, and I also, I also think, you know, you can treat on a few things like if it's on the ends of your hair type of thing, or, you know, I mean, if it's eyeshadow, maybe you're not going to worry as much as like an actual serum or something that's getting absorbed. So, you know, use your best judgment. I mean, and you know, you don't have to throw everything away all at once. I think that's really overwhelming for people. I think just as you're throwing it out, just replace it with something safe.

Lisa Beres

That's a good, that's a good point. And something else that a lot of listeners might find useful. If you look on the Skin Deep Database on EWG�s website and put in your product. And it's not there, say the scientists haven't added it to the database yet, you can actually create a product I've done this a couple of times, where you just take the ingredient label of your bottle, enter all the products and it will calculate a score for you. And then you now are adding to their database to with that particular product. So, it's really cool. So, you there's no excuse not to find out the toxicity level of anything that you're using.

Amy Kearnan

Right. And I think you want to you want to focus on antiperspirants, deodorants, sunblock. there are certain things that you just don't want to seven, you know. And then the other things I'll say is another app that I love, and it's a funny name. It's called Think Dirty. Very similar.

Lisa Beres

Amy, you know were talking about skincare? No, I'm just kidding. I have that Think Dirty app.

Amy Kearnan

Yeah. And yeah, so yeah. And again, like I think, if you can't, if you can't pronounce it, you can't pronounce the ingredient. You have no idea what it is. You may just want to check the product.

Lisa Beres

Yeah. Corrina, does that answer your question?

Caller, Corrina

It does. Thank you so much. It�s great information.

Lisa Beres

Yeah, and one more thing if you hang on till the end, we are giving away Amy has generously offered to give away some really amazing gifts to our listeners. There's over $238 dollars� worth, an Acne Detox Kit and also an Armpit Cleanse Kit. So, we're going to talk about that later. But yeah, make sure to follow us after the show so you can enter for two chances to win.

Caller, Corrina

That's great. I'm excited. Okay.

Lisa Beres

Thanks for calling. But you know, just for anyone chiming in right now, I do want to do like a little recap, you know, why is this show important? Because I'm not going to name every worrying chemical and its nasty side effects found in mainstream personal care products. But I will list a few such as cancer, skin allergies, reproductive issues, hormone imbalances, and learning disabilities. The hidden truth about the beauty and chemical industry you guys is downright scary.

Ron Beres

Great point. In fact, you know, listeners may not be aware of the average woman uses nine to 12 products containing 168 unique ingredients every day. And teens are using like 17 every single day. And men. We use six products daily with like 85 unique ingredients on average. So, I had no idea until we embarked on this health journey.

Lisa Beres

I think the teens using 17 is scary. I mean, I know when I was a teen there was like nothing maybe lip gloss. But listeners, we�re talking about personal care products laced with dangerous cancer causing and hormone disrupting types of nasties, including - I mentioned some at the beginning but aluminum parabens � those endocrine disruptors, formaldehyde, toluene - those are carcinogens, sodium lauryl, sulfate, propylene glycol, synthetic fragrances and lead that you use without even realizing it every single day. So, let's recap. We should spend money on artificial fragrances and colors, synthetic preservatives, heavy metals, toxins, and an ingredient used in antifreeze and brake fluid to make us look and feel younger and more beautiful. I don't think so.

Amy Kearnan

No, no, thank you.

Ron Beres

Amy, I think I have a good idea on this. But you know, what was your goal on purpose behind creating your business?

Amy Kearnan

I mean, I think I said, you know, I really, I was a beauty junkie. I mean, I, I had so many products, it was very painful for me to go through my medicine cabinet and throw things away, I'll tell you, I had an arsenal of beauty products. But you know, I wanted them to be high end. And I think, you know, there are high end products out there now. But back then, you know, it was a lot of the products where it was, they weren't created for function, they were created to be organic and healthy. So, I wanted to make it high end, I wanted to make them obviously natural, meaning force source from nature, so land or sea, I wanted them to smell luxurious, like I talked about the Four Seasons coconut. I mean, it's a smell, you can't you know, like I said, coconut, you can, you know, smell it a synthetic coconut on a, you know, sunblock, and it's horrible, you know, and I remember telling people that one of my body butters was coconut, and they're like, I hate the smell of coconut. And I'm like, wait.

Right. So, you know, another thing that I thought I came up with is, you know, what's wonderful about when you're using natural products, a lot of them have multi use just built in, right? So, you know, you think about it, you're going to reduce your toxic load, you're going to reduce the cost, and then you're going to reduce your carbon footprint. So, each one of my products has three to eight uses. I always challenge people and I will challenge people today if you come up with a you know, a use for one of my products. I think one of my the most uses, it's actually more than eight uses is my soothe anti-inflammation mask, and it started as an acne mask and it's turned into beestings sunburns. A guy wrote in for chafing when a bike's woman had rashes when she shaved, you know, just I mean it's one of those products that you just have in your medicine cabinet. And if you ever have a skin issue, you have suit.

Lisa Beres

So that's going to be given away in one of the kits.

Amy Kearnan

Yeah, it's in the detox kit. It's in the Acne Detox Kit.

Lisa Beres

Yeah. And if you have acne and you're listening, skip those drugs. Me and Amy, we've been there. done that. Don't do it.

Amy Kearnan

I have I have two 17-year old�s and a 15-year-old and trust me we go through that sue the mask. Like we you know, probably.

Lisa Beres

What a great gift for teens, you know, yeah, but think about that extra little self-care.

Amy Kearnan

I mean, it really is you know, and you know, my gloss is the other one that I it's my top seller and it's basically eight uses. It's your hair serum, your makeup remover, it's an oil cleanser. Which is a hot thing right now. Bath oil shaving oil for men. Men love it as they're shaving oil. And it's under 40 bucks. And so, you know, I, when I travel, I actually, a lot of times when I can't pack a lot of things, I'll just bring gloss. And that's like my one product that I bring. Nice.

Lisa Beres

You are zipping through the TSA screening line. Right?

Ron Beres

So, listeners, I want to remind you, please stay till the end, because we're going to give away $238 worth of Authentic Skin Remini products to you, you have two chances to win. So, hang in, and we'll tell you the details right at the end of this podcast.

Lisa Beres

Yes, super exciting, guys. You don't want to miss that. So, Amy, what are a few of the most interesting facts that you've uncovered on your green journey about the beauty industry while you were developing the line?

Amy Kearnan

Well, one of the things that I think your listeners are probably confused about is there are so many buzzwords surrounding the green beauty movement, I wanted to make sure that my products chop checked off as many boxes as possible. And you know, see which ones are the fluffy, you know, nonsensical buzzwords and which ones really are actually important. So, I'll go through a couple of them just so that everybody knows that there's a lot of differences, organic skincare, you'll hear a lot. So, via the National Organic program, only if the label says 100%, organic, or all the ingredients in a product organic. So, labels that state organic, are permitted to include up to five non-organic ingredients. So, if you say made with organic, that's 70% of the ingredients are in organic,

Lisa Beres

That's that organic labeling through the National Organic program via the USDA, a lot of people don't know about it, of course, I mean, that's a little confusing to remember. But just as a general rule of thumb, look for the logo, the USDA logo that's 100% organic, but even if it says made with that's, that's good, and just the word organic, so it's confusing. I don't know why they couldn't have made it easier. But anyway.

Amy Kearnan

It�s also very expensive. And I'll be honest, my products are made with organic ingredients, but it's super expensive to get those, you know, certifications. And so, I just, I just haven't done it.

Lisa Beres

But you know, and that goes for food, too. We talked to a lot of manufacturers of food that say the same thing, say it's a wine or, you know, whatever. Oh, we're organic, but we just we just can't when we're little vintner. Right, and we cannot pay for that. So, you do, that's where the label reading is important.

Amy Kearnan

I'll tell you the reason why a lot of these products, they have a very low profit margin, because the ingredients are super expensive, you know, especially if you're doing small batches, you're paying top dollar for these ingredients. So, the other one you hear a lot is green beauty. And that kind of means more natural skincare. So true to nature. It also has a strong focus on using sustained, sustainable and renewable resources, clean beauty, you hear a lot that's avoiding ingredients that are considered toxic. And that's either scientifically confirmed or controversial. So, it's not proven, scientifically toxic, but it's controversial, you won't, you know, they tend to stay away from those ingredients, anything that has carcinogens harmful to the environment. So unfortunately, by definition, not all synthetic ingredients are harmful, not or I don't mean to say unfortunately, by definition, they are not harmful. So that's actually okay. Right, if it's not harmful, and you can use it in this less stringent definition of green.

Lisa Beres

That's a good point. Amy, that is a good point. You know, we're not saying like 100% natural, sometimes we're going to get a synthetic in there.

Amy Kearnan

I mean, if it�s not causing problems, who cares, right?

Lisa Beres

Ron and I in our other podcasts where we interviewed scientists, we learned that, you know, they give a hazard score to a chemical and if the chemical is a low hazard score, then you know, it's okay. So, we're not saying like, banish everything. Of course, green chemistry is, you know, green chemistry is like amazing, and it's coming up with so many innovative things,

Amy Kearnan

The two that get intertwined, and I know you guys are vegan, so you know more about this than I do, but it's cruelty free is one of them and vegan. So, cruelty free means that it's not tested on animals.

Lisa Beres

Right? They don't test on animals for the ingredients themselves. Yeah. The ingredients themselves cannot be tested on animals. Right?

Amy Kearnan

Right. Exactly. And being vegan means that no animal by products whatsoever. So, in developing the line, I learned some pretty shocking Animal by products used in many popular beauty products. So, gluten free is something I didn't really think about when I was developing the line. But as I started researching, you know a lot of ingredients contain wheat, barley, rye or other grains, even if they're, you know, vitamins, right. So, so basically, I made sure that my products, by definition by those definitions are green, clean, cruelty free, vegan, and gluten free.

Lisa Beres

Okay, that's, that's amazing. That's awesome. Now we are vegan. In fact, today the date of this recording is our five-year veganversary.

Amy Kearnan

Congratulations. You know the day?

Lisa Beres

Oh yeah, we know. Are you kidding the day? Because I mean, we don't eat. A lot of people don't know what vegan actually is. It's no animal products whatsoever. So, it's a no dairy. People go, but do you do dairy? No, we're vegan. Okay, so no, no eggs, no cheese, no milk, no chicken, no seafood, no meat. Nothing that comes from an animal. Honey. Our producer just asked about honey. Yes, you have to be careful of honey, because that's unless you're a beegan. If you're a vegan. You're beegan. You don't want honey. Anyway, yeah, honey is obviously made from bees. So, you wouldn't want that. But you know, since going vegan, it's a lifestyle choice. It's something that you it's part of your beliefs and your core values. So even vitamins like we talked about gelatin, you don't want gelatin in your vitamins and things like that. But Amy, I know that you have the list of like crazy shocking things you've come across in beauty products that people probably are going to be blown away when they hear what are some of the crazy things you found that are in common beauty products.

Amy Kearnan

I mean, there are so many I'm going to I'll give you some of my top. The ones that when I tell people they're like super grossed out. The most shocking for me is called am ambergris. It's otherwise known as whale poop or whale vomit.

Lisa Beres

You can have either one? That's disgusting.

Amy Kearnan

Yeah, so it's used and many high-end perfumes due to its unique smell. It's known as gold of the sea because it actually costs the same weight as gold. So, a pound of ambergris is the same cost as a pound of gold.

Lisa Beres

It�s in major name brand perfumes, right?

Amy Kearnan

Oh, yeah. Yeah, that one? Yes. One of my favorites. Yeah. It is a unique smell. And another one that may you guys may want to plug your ears because it's something called tallow. And it's animal fat. And it's in a lot of lipsticks, and I makeups and foundations. But it's made in this kind of gross process. And I've seen photos of it, but you actually have to boil the carcass in water, and then the fat that kind of like bubbles up on top. You've kind of scooped that. And that's the tallow and that's in a lot of foundations, then then you put it right onto your face. Wow. And then the other one you and I were joking about is it's called Castro Ram. And it's also in perfumes. And the label calls it perfume. And it's a secretion that's found in the anal glands of beavers.

Lisa Beres

Isn't that Musk? Musk�s I think come from the glands of beavers.

Amy Kearnan

Yes. And then Ron, you knew you knew one. Ron, why don't you share the one that you knew about?

Ron Beres

Oh, wait, we talked earlier. So, I had heard that certain beetles are crushed for a particular color.

Lisa Beres

Yeah, the red carmine. I mean, carmine, something like that. It's crushed beetle blood. And it's in a lot of lipsticks. So, going back to that you're not going to see. Like you just mentioned, we're not going to see these always necessarily on the label because he disguised maybe as perfume or fragrance. That word gets hundreds up to 400 different ingredients. So, when you see perfume or fragrance, you're like, oh yeah, this is just great. Okay, you might not know that these things are getting in there.

Amy Kearnan

Let alone all the chemicals. Right? So that's when you look for vegan. That's something important to you, you know.

Lisa Beres

And it should be I mean, listen, you should know if you're going to be putting that on your body, period. You should have full disclosure; you should know that. If you want to put the whale poop.

Amy Kearnan

Right. And I think that's another thing that I want to make sure that my brand is transparent. So anytime like I do like Instagram post or anything like that. Talk about a product I actually put the ingredients because I feel like you know, I just want to make sure I'm very transparent.

Ron Beres

Yeah, it's so refreshing.

Lisa Beres

All the ingredients are listed on the labels and on your website? Yeah. Okay. So, there's nothing to hide.

Amy Kearnan

They�re on the website. Absolutely.

Ron Beres

Yep. very transparent. So, so how did the market you know, initially react to your products when they came out? So, were they received well? What was the initial feedback you got?

Amy Kearnan

You know, I think what was my magic sauce was really my passion and my story and the why in those early days, I, you know, I didn't sleep, I went on this whirlwind for probably four or five years, I was considered an early innovator and disrupter. At the time, you know, I mean, people, they, they didn't really understand the whys, and it didn't matter to them until, you know, the people that were coming to my events, their mom had just gotten breast cancer, or they were infertile, or something had to have happened to them, to make them even question it, you know, a lot of these big brands, they weren't out at the time, you know? So, I think, you know, I, I started being a speaker, and it's one of those things where, you know, you just speak at an event, you know, I spoke at Relay for Life, one, you know, as a keynote, and then it just started opening up these opportunities. You know, I started speaking at beauty colleges, I did this course called the ugly side of beauty. And I went, you know, to different beauty colleges. And, you know, what was lovely being an, you know, working with the Environmental Working Group, they gave me the slides, you know, they gave me the stuff to pass out. And so, it wasn't, it was really easy for me to do. And so, you know, then I got into Whole Foods. And, you know, they were one of my big distributors. And so, you know, I started doing events there and you know, in the parking lots or you know, things that they were done again, I brought up Luna Fest, that's something that's near and dear to my heart, I did seven years in a row. And you know, I think being an educator and a knowledge expert, was one of the key ingredients in the success in those early years.

Lisa Beres

Education because you have to people have to be educated, they're not going to spend the extra money or value even buying organic food, let alone organic skincare and natural skincare. If they don't understand why and then once they understand why you can't go back, you can't unlearn what you know, you can't make poor decisions, once you know how much these things are harming you.

Amy Kearnan

Or you can but at least you're doing them knowing. Right. And I think that's another thing. You know, some people tell me, I know Coca Cola is bad for me, but I drink it, you know, and that's, that's a conscious decision that you make, because you know, right, you smoke a cigarette, you know, right. Yeah. And you know what the other funny thing that I learned over the years is that a lot of times plants smell better and work better. Right?

Lisa Beres

The power of the plant.

Amy Kearnan

Food, right, like a strawberry that, you know, is a GMO strawberry tastes as good as an organic strawberry. I beg to differ.

Ron Beres

Yeah. Okay, Amy, what are your plans for business today? And are we going to see you on Undercover Billionaire anytime soon?

Lisa Beres

Love that show.

Ron Beres

I love that show.

Amy Kearnan

Lofty goals. Um, you know, money would be absolutely amazing, right? Like, I have a day job. I've got five kids. You know, I'm not I wouldn't say no to money. But it actually was never what drove me with this business. I've seen it more kind of as a passion project. It's, you know, something that kind of is my why it brings me joy. And it gives me a way to give back the gratitude for the good health that I was given. And, you know, honestly, and I told Lisa, this, I have tried to shut this business down/

Lisa Beres

It said no. It said, No, Amy.

Ron Beres

You have a handful of children using your product and you are too so you can't close?

Amy Kearnan

I will tell you some of my top loyal customers have been with me since the beginning and they have stuff on auto ship. And you know, I just feel like it. Something always inspires me, especially what's going on in the world right now. It's actually gotten me even more fired up. And, you know, look with any passion. It's not a choice, but it's the truth. I mean, I can't not do this.

Lisa Beres

Amen, sister. Oh my gosh, that is so true. And you're 100% right. This is needed. Now more than ever. The world is getting sicker, not healthier. And we've got to be our own advocates, our own health advocates and we have to be proactive and be knowledgeable. Seek that knowledge out. Thank you, Amy. This was so fantastic. guys. I hope you learned a ton today. Remember up to 60% of what you put on your skin is absorbed into your body and this goes for antiperspirant and deodorant. As we mentioned, one in eight women today will be diagnosed with breast cancer in her lifetime. This is not okay.

Ron Beres

That's why we're working with you. We're giving away an Armpit Cleanse from Authentic Skin remedies, valued at $80. Yes, and this is amazing and essential before you ditch the toxic brands for natural deodorant. And that's not all. Amy has generously offered to give away. An Acne Detox Kit valued at $158. Friends, listeners, this totals over $230 worth of nontoxic, safe, natural skincare goodies, head to www.RonandLisa.com/podcast to enter for two chances to win.

Lisa Beres

Yes, you don't want to miss that guys. And to learn more about Amy and her extensive line of plant based vegan gluten free, cruelty free skincare products. Please visit Authentic Skin remedies on Instagram, MeWe and telegram and shop the line at www.AuthenticSkin.com. Tune in next week guys to find out how to live your best and most vibrant life.

Ron Beres

By everyone!

Amy Kearnan

Thank you.

Narrator

This episode of the healthy home hacks podcast has ended. But be sure to subscribe for more healthy living strategies and tactics to help you create the healthy home you always dreamed of. And don't forget to rate and review so we can continue to bring you the best content. See you on the next episode.