How to Switch to a Non-Toxic Home + Body (Without Fear, Guilt, or Overwhelm)

by Genesis Tallow
If you have ever gone down the Instagram rabbit hole of how to switch to a non-toxic home, you were likely met with one of two messages.
  1. Either everything in your house is supposedly poisoning you, and the more you read, the longer the list of things that could be harming you gets.
And/Or

2. You need to throw away half your belongings immediately and start over with a list of expensive alternatives, including $1300 air purifiers, a $2000 organic mattress, and the entire line of non-toxic house cleaning products from Betty’s network marketing company.


No shade to Bettys. We love a Betty. But, for those of us who just want to feel better in our bodies and support our children’s growth and development without completely distorting their hormones, the fear-mongering and overt capitalism are exhausting. And we get it, we run a business too.

Switching to a more non-toxic lifestyle doesn’t need to be stressful, it doesn’t have to happen overnight, and it absolutely doens’t need to break the bank. For most families, especially mothers already carrying the invisible labour of running a home, we need some supportive resources that are based around ease and health, not stress.
The truth is, our family is not 100% non-toxic. We do what we can, when we can, in the areas of our lives that need it the most. And anyway, a non-toxic lifestyle feels best when it happens slowly and sustainably. A truly supportive transition respects your nervous system, your budget, your season of life, and your capacity.
For example...

It’s taken us a full 5 years to mostly switch from polyesters to natural fibres.

For the record, you don’t have to start here. This is just a great example of an easy switch we, as a family, have gone through. Running a skincare company, I’ve learned a lot about forever chemicals and our skin barrier - it wasn’t long before plastic clothing and the chemicals that go into manufacturing them hit our radar. Instead of panicking, we started thrifting and took it slow, which is great, because clothing is where many people realize just how unrealistic overnight change can be.

Polyester, nylon, acrylic, and other synthetic fibres are petroleum-based materials that shed microplastics during wear and washing. Not only that, but the chemicals that go into manufacturing are insane. Studies show that synthetic textiles are a major contributor to household exposure to microplastics (Napper and Thompson, 2016). Here’s what we did, and no, it didn’t include a closet purge, guilt over existing clothing, or expensive shopping sprees.

Instead:

Year 1: Stop purchasing new synthetic clothing whenever possible. When buying new, prioritizing natural fibres in clothing that sits right against the skin is a must: start with underwear, bras, exercise clothing and sleepwear.

Year 2: Replace worn everyday basics with organic cotton, linen, or wool, often thrifted. A win you should know: even if the clothing we find at the thrift store isn’t 100% natural, studies show significantly fewer chemicals after clothing has been used for a while.

Year 3: Keep going. Slowly replace what’s worn and continue reducing or eliminating synthetic purchases.

Year 4: Slowly upgrade outerwear and seasonal pieces - again, we thrift the vast majority of our outerwear, and because of this, it doesn’t need to be all natural.

Year 5: We’ve realized most of our wardrobe has naturally shifted without stress.
Now I may still have an old pair of Lulus I wear around the house, but I’ve found enough thrifted pieces that I’m no longer exercising in polyester; the everyday clothing our family wears is natural, and I didn’t actually have to think too hard about it. Nothing wasted. Nothing rushed. No financial strain.

This is what a non-toxic transition looks like in real life. So what about the rest of it?

We’ve put together some steps you can follow for a slow and meaningful transition to non-toxic living. Whether you’re an absolute beginner or if you’ve been on the journey a while, we think you’ll like them.




Start here: A Step-by-Step Transition Plan to Switching to a Non-Toxic Lifestyle

If you are wondering how to switch to a non-toxic home and reduce the toxic load of your body without overwhelm, start with the areas that create daily, repeated exposure, and hold this list with an open hand. Your life might not look exactly like ours. Take from this list what makes the most sense for you and your family

Think first about the frequency, duration, and location of exposure, not full body and home perfection.

Step 1: Personal Care + Skincare

Your skin is your largest organ, and products applied daily provide consistent exposure pathways, particularly when they remain on your skin for extended periods or in high-absorption areas.
Start with:
Just like in our clothing example, this doesn’t need to happen overnight. You might feel that the high-exposure areas are most important to you, so switching to a non-toxic deodorant or a clean lip balm might be your priority. Or maybe you’re a new mom, and you want to safeguard your baby's skin for as long as possible - this is a great opportunity to purchase clean, non-toxic baby products right off the get-go without having to switch anything out!

Again, it can be as simple as switching out a product you already have, or using up what you’ve got and making different purchase decisions as you run out, if that feels more in line with you.

Our point - it doesn’t need to be stressful!


Step 2: Laundry Products

Laundry detergent touches nearly everything you wear and sleep in.
Focus on removing:
  • Synthetic fragrance
  • Optical brighteners
  • Harsh surfactants
Fragrance mixtures alone can contain dozens of undisclosed chemicals linked to exposure to indoor air pollution (Steinemann, 2015). A simple unscented or naturally scented (as in therapeutic-grade essential oils) detergent is one of the highest-impact early swaps you can make. Now we may have you covered with skincare, personal care and a growing list of tallow makeup, but here are some clean laundry alternatives you could try:
  • Molly’s Suds
  • Branch Basics
  • Blueland
  • Tru Earth
This is a relatively easy swap because, at some point over the next season, you’re likely to need new laundry detergent. So skip the bounce sheets and try an alternative!

Step 3: Kitchen Contact Surfaces

Next, address what touches food daily. Our bodies are actually amazing at cleaning out what it doesn’t need through our digestive system, so maybe organic food isn’t quite in the budget yet (honestly, we go back and forth - sometimes I wonder if people forget you can actually wash your fruit!). The key is to eliminate the forever chemicals your body can’t handle.

Gradually transition these kitchen staples:
  • Plastic food storage to glass or stainless steel
  • Non-stick cookware to cast iron or stainless steel
  • Plastic utensils to wood or metal
You do not need to replace everything immediately. Begin with items used for hot food, since heat increases chemical migration from plastics (EFSA, 2020). Do we need to reiterate that this can be a non-stressful process that spans years and can 100% be done solely through thrifting if you want or need to?

Step 4: Cleaning Products

Contrary to marketing, most homes do not need aggressive disinfectants for daily cleaning.
Simple alternatives often include:
  • Castile soap
  • Vinegar solutions
  • Baking soda
  • Alcohol-based cleaners, when necessary
Indoor air quality improves significantly when volatile cleaning chemicals are reduced (U.S. EPA Indoor Air Quality research). Just like with laundry detergent, switching to a fragrance-free, unscented, or naturally scented product has a significant impact on both air quality and the toxic load build-up in you and your kids.

Step 5: Textiles and Clothing

Return to the long-term mindset - this is where you could follow our family's slow 5-year transition example I shared at the top of this blog. The key:
Replace items as they naturally wear out:
  • Bedding
  • Towels
  • Children’s pyjamas
  • Frequently worn basics
Natural fibres breathe better, regulate temperature more effectively, and reduce synthetic particle shedding. Again, this is a multi-year transition.

You Do Not Have to Be “Hyper-Crunchy”

There are a lot of great educators on Instagram; chances are you’ve come across some of them. To be sure, some of them are the real deal, and so much of what we see on Instagram from non-toxic influencers isn’t often reality - keep in mind the amount of affiliate links and brand partnerships many of those influencers are including in their content. Your life doesn’t have to look like theirs, and I know that sounds like “no duh, of course it doesn’t” but if there’s even a tiny part of you that’s comparing your journey to someone elses, or if you think someone would judge you if they new what products were in your home - I really want you to hear that.
You can:
  • Shop at regular grocery stores.
  • Own synthetic items.
  • Use conventional products sometimes.
  • Care about health without making everything from scratch.
A non-toxic or low-toxic home and body is not an aesthetic; it’s simply a series of thoughtful decisions made over time, and we don’t want to encourage trading toxic chemicals for toxic obsessions or unrealistic standards.
So if you’re at the beginning of this journey, you are not behind, and you absolutely do not need a perfectly non-toxic home to experience meaningful benefits or small swaps.
Every finished bottle replaced thoughtfully is a step forward, and every small upgrade compounds.

You’re already doing an amazing job.

For skincare, personal care, and makeup, you know is 100% clean and non-toxic from source to skin, check out our shop at the top of the page.

With love,
The Genesis Tallow Family


PS. Here are some resources if you're feeling academic and want to go deeper:

  • Landrigan, P. J., et al. (2018). The Lancet Commission on pollution and health. The Lancet, 391(10119), 462–512.

  • Napper, I. E., and Thompson, R. C. (2016). Release of synthetic microplastic fibres from domestic washing machines. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 112(1–2), 39–45.

  • McEwen, B. S. (2007). Physiology and neurobiology of stress and adaptation. Physiological Reviews, 87(3), 873–904.

  • Steinemann, A. (2015). Volatile emissions from consumer products. Air Quality, Atmosphere and Health, 8, 273–281.

  • European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). (2020). Safety assessment of substances used in food contact materials.

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