I was at a meeting last week in Chicago

I was at a meeting last week in Chicago, talking to a woman with an eleven year old step daughter. She was so moody, the woman said. But, she said, she supposed that had to do with the fact that it was her time of the month.

Her what?

Her time of the month, she repeated. I gaped. The girl is eleven. ELEVEN. When I appeared shocked, the woman informed me that it was quite normal these days. She casually explained that it is all of the hormones floating around. In our drinking water. In our food. In our baby bottles. Hormones are everywhere, or more precisely, hormone disrupters and hormone mimics are everywhere, fundamentally altering the way our bodies function.

Two words. Holy Shit.

I am beginning to sound like a downer, but really, I am not usually.

Perhaps I should end every other sentence with an exclamation point! Maybe even two!! That might convey the fact that while this is not an especially cheerful post, especially for those of us with little girls, I am not usually a Debbie Downer. I could also insert smiley faces randomly throughout the post so as not to have people wander away from the blog in a depressed fog. Would that work?

As I wrestle with Tabasco’s diagnoses, I wonder what, if anything, I could have done to prevent it, or protect him. Cancer rates are on the rise. Is that because we are paying closer attention, or because we are actually seeing rises in cancer rates? The evidence points to the latter. And while I fully support our “Race for the Cure”, I support even more our race for the CAUSE. What is causing all of this cancer? Is it something we are doing to ourselves?

The evidence seems to be mounting to a solid “YES.”

So I did some research. In part because I didn’t believe the woman in Chicago, in part because I didn’t WANT to believe her. And what I found was study after study that backed her claim. For instance, in a study recently published in the journal Pediatrics, researchers found that girls as young as 7 and 8 were reaching puberty at rates higher than those 10 to 30 years earlier. Most notably, they had breast development, at these ages, significantly increasing their chances for developing breast cancer later in life.

Plastics and other manufactured chemicals seem to be at the heart of this erupting science. Bisphenol-A, or more commonly known as BPA, is a common additive in a host of consumer products: sippy cups, baby bottles, water bottles, store receipts, canned food linings, juice box linings and more. It has properties that make it especially attractive for making clear plastics that are nearly shatterproof (like most of our Nalgene water bottles) and for making the coatings for linings of thermal receipt paper, canned food and sodas, and water pipes. But it is also, alarmingly, an endocrine disrupter. It has been linked to cancer, earlier rates for puberty in females and brain development in fetuses, among other things.

Another study, done by the Environmental Working Group, researchers ran chemical analysis on four mothers and their daughters. It found that each of the eight women's blood or urine was contaminated with an average of 35 consumer product ingredients, including flame retardants, plasticizers, and Teflon- and Scotchgard-related perfluorochemicals found in stain-proof coatings. These mixtures of compounds are found in furniture, cosmetics, fabrics, and other consumer goods, and have never been tested for safety, but are linked to endocrine disruption and cancer, among other health problems.

So, yes, it is everywhere. I get a little hyperventalatey when I think about it all. Where do we even start? It’s in our Teflon pans and our bank receipts, in our Lazy-Boy recliners with Scotch Guard and in our canned beans. What I believe is that we need some strong, solid and free of industry bias federal legislation to curb the perpetual influx of toxic pollutants into our bodies. But that will take some time. I did find some hope over on Diane MacEachern’s blog, Big Green Purse, when she posted on this topic recently. Here, stolen blatantly from her blog, are some recommendations for what we can do to protect ourselves in the meantime:

* Eat more organic food, and feed organic food to your kids, too. Yep, most of the time it costs more. But would you rather spend money on healthier milk and organic vegetables, or training bras? And honestly, if you're still buying bottled water, now's the time to stop and shift your spending to food that's actually worth the price.

* Eat less meat. Unless you're buying organic meat, the beef, pork and poultry you're eating and feeding your family are probably laden with growth homones. A diet made up mostly of fruits, vegetables and whole grains is a lot healthier, overall. Just in case you're still on the fence about this one, here are a few more advantages to limiting or eliminating meat in your diet.

* Look for BPA-free everything. Nowadays, no one should be buying anything made from plastic unless it clearly says "BPA-free" on the label. Baby bottles? Rubber duckies? Water bottles? Make-up containers? If it's plastic and doesn't say BPA-free don't buy it.

* Use fewer personal care products, both for yourself and for your kids. Babies are born with perfect skin - why do we insist on slathering them with lotion? As for ourselves, most women put more than ten different products on their skin every day. While no one of these products poses an imminent threat, over time, the multiple exposures we suffer add up. Limit what you put on yourself and your kids, and choose products that contain mostly natural plant ingredients rather than synthetic chemicals.

* Exercise, and exercise your kids. The Pediatrics study showed that early breast development was more likely in girls that were overweight. Keep your kids active. Turn off the tv and get moving!

-Taken from Dianne MacEachern's Big Green Purse, “Little girls are worrying about bras when they should still be playing with Play Dough.”

I am trying to maintain a level of cool headedness in the swirling scary news of the nefarious chemicals that surround us. I hope I didn’t depress anyone, but maybe motivated some folks to take a closer look at what’s in their house and what’s surrounding their babies. But for those of us who don’t like an unhappy ending, I’ll lead a charge: Let’s do something about this for our daughters, for our sisters, for ourselves. We all deserve better. Let’s dump these toxins out of our lives and out of the lives of those we love. Let's do it for her and for all of the other little girls we have in our lives, so they can grow up healthy, strong and cancer free. (Smiley face, double exclamation point)