You may be thinking “does how I wash my dishes really matter?”, but if you’ve started down the track of going toxin-free, you’ve probably thought…

Is my dish soap safe? or maybe…

Is dish soap bad for the environment?

Let’s think about it -

• Our plates, flatware, pots and pans, basically every item in our kitchen that touches food, is cleaned by some sort of dish soap or dish washing detergent.

• When we do the dishes, our hands come in contact with dish soap.

• And… everything we put down our sink and plumbing impacts the water and ecosystem.

Dirty Dishes- it’s time to clean up your dishwashing act

What should you look for when choosing a safe dish soap or dish washer detergent?

These are the red flag ingredients that I avoid and why:

• Fragrance

  • A proprietary term that kind hide up to 3,000 different chemicals

  • Analysis of the “fragrance” chemicals by the Environmental Working Group (EWG) found that one in 20 are rated as a “high hazard”

• Colorants

  • Not essential to the effectiveness of the product

  • Often contaminated by heavy metals

  • Often derived from petroleum which can be contaminated with carcinogens like

  • Can dry out and cause irritation to the skin

• Ethoxylated ingredients - ethoxylation happens when ethylene oxide, a known carcinogen, is combined with another ingredient to make it less harsh to the skin.

  • This process can create 1-4 dioxane as a bi-product. If not removed through a vacuum stripping process, the 1-4 dioxane will contaminate the product.

    • FDA studies show that 1-4 dioxane can penetrate the skin and while it can be removed there’s no way to know if it really is.

    • Even if 1-4 dioxane isn’t listed on the label it’s a potential contaminate within these ingredients:

      • PPG

      • PEGS, like PEG-40

      • Polysorbate

      • Word ending in -eth, like laureth, steareth, ceteareth

• Preservatives: can cause skin and respiratory irritation

  • Benzisothiazolinone

  • Methylchloroisothiazolinone (MCI)

  • Methylisothiazolinone (MI)

• Formaldehyde and formaldehyde releasers (the ingredient can produce formaldehyde over time)

  • Formaldehyde is a known carcinogen and can cause contact dermatitis, allergic reactions, and suspected of causing genetic defects

  • Look for:

    • Methenamine

    • Quaternium-15

    • Diazolidinyl Urea

    • DMDM Hydantoin

    • Imidazolidinyl Urea

    • Sodium Hydroxylmethylglycinate

    • 2-Bromo-2-Nitropropane-1,3-Diol

What about what we wash our dishes with? How eco-friendly is the typical kitchen sponge?

I’ve seen a statistic that the common green and yellow sponge can last up to 52,000 years in a landfill. I searched for a source for this number and couldn’t find one, but I do know that these sponges are made with synthetic fibers take a long time to break down and end up in our oceans and waterways. Cellulose sponges, loofahs, and natural fiber cloths are better options.

So what IS safe?

This question is exactly why I decided to create Detox by Design | The Box. To make it easier to go toxin-free without stressing about what is and isn’t safe.

The Dish Box will include everything you need to detox your dish washing routine: dishwashing detergent, dish soap, an eco-friendly dish washing cloth, and a beautiful towel to dry those dishes!

What else do you want to know about safe dishwashing? Put your questions in the comments!