Our physical health and learning how to take care of our bodies have played a large role in our growth of the years. In the beginning of our marriage, we dealt with sexual issues and after 4 and a half years living with those problems we finally discovered what we believe was a major contributor to those problems. We began replacing our toxic products with non-toxic products and almost immediately found healing in the area of intimacy. We have had many people over the years ask what kinds of products we use now and so in this episode we share a little of our journey and the products we like to use. Pleas enjoy!
PRAYER
Dear Lord,
Thank you for our bodies. We pray we would be good stewards of our bodies and consider all that goes on them and in them. We pray we would be willing to take the time and research the items we use on a daily basis, using things that help us and not hurt us. Lord, we ask that you would give us wisdom as we navigate living a healthy lifestyle. Help us to make good choices and be on the same page in marriage so that we can enjoy the benefits of living toxic-free. Please help us not to be overwhelmed by the process of learning, but rather, help us to be humble and willing to learn so that we can choose what is healthy for us and be advocates of healthy living for the sake of others. We pray living healthy would not become an idol in our lives and would not hinder any of our relationships. May we be people who don't just consume, but who are about our bodies and take care of them.
In Jesus’ name, Amen!
Some things mention this episode.
http://Parentingprayerchallenge.com
https://shop.marriageaftergod.com/products/the-unveiled-wife-embracing-intimacy-with-god-and-your-husband-by-jennifer-smith
https://ENG.org
https://unveiledwife.com/oils/
https://norwex.biz
Dr. Bronner’s - https://amzn.to/2vRCQ91
https://www.bendsoap.com/
Native Deodorant - https://amzn.to/2VXpWkz
Bert's Bees - https://amzn.to/3cPJkpN
Burt's Bees 100% Natural Moisturizing Lipstick - https://amzn.to/3aKRNs7
Ancient Minerals Magnesium Lotion - https://amzn.to/2TQu6YT
READ TRANSCRIPT
[Aaron] Hey, we're Aaron and Jennifer Smith with Marriage After God.
[Jennifer] Helpin' you cultivate an extraordinary marriage.
[Aaron] And today, we're gonna share with you our favorite non-toxic products. Welcome to the Marriage After God Podcast, where we believe that marriage was meant for more than just happily ever after.
[Jennifer] I'm Jennifer, also known as, Unveiled Wife.
[Aaron] And I'm Aaron, also known as, Husband Revolution.
[Jennifer] We have been married for over a decade.
[Aaron] And so far, we have four young children.
[Jennifer] We have been doing marriage ministry online for over seven years through blogging and social media.
[Aaron] With the desire to inspire couples to keep God at the center of their marriage. Encouraging them to walk in faith every day.
[Jennifer] We believe that Christian marriage should be an extraordinary one. Full of life--
[Aaron] Love.
[Jennifer] and power,
[Aaron] That can only be found by chasing after God.
[Jennifer] Together.
[Aaron] Thank you for joining us in this journey as we chase boldly, after God's will of our life together.
[Jennifer] This is Marriage After God.
[Jennifer] Welcome back everyone to another episode of Marriage After God. We are happy to have ya, and today we are just going to share some, it's kinda like a funner episode, where we're gonna share, not just our non-toxic products, but why we choose those, and part of our story.
[Aaron] Yeah, and well, we've had a lot of people over the years, kind of, 'cause we've talked about our journey with health, and we talk about products we use, and you have people often asking, "Well, what do you use?"
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] And so--
[Jennifer] A large portion of my first book, "The Unveiled Wife," you know, talked about our journey, you know, figuring some stuff out, and so, we'll probably start there.
[Aaron] Yeah, but it'll be fun. We believe that it's good to have a healthy life, I mean, everything we talk about it spiritual, but there's something to be said about, taking care of our bodies, and being careful with what we're putting on, being thoughtful, we even talk about, yeah, we talk about this often in our books, we talk about it in our life. We actually try and live it also, doesn't mean we're perfectly healthy in every aspect, but what's been awesome about it also is, we actually have less stuff, which is cool. So we'll talk about that a little bit too. So first, before we get into that, why don't you give a little update on baby Edith?
[Jennifer] Yeah, is everyone as anxious as I am to meet her? I'm--
[Aaron] Some people are probably like, "They're having another baby?"
[Jennifer] I know,
[Aaron] Yes we are, number five.
[Jennifer] Yep, I'm 38 weeks, and just starting to feel like way more ready and prepared, mentally,
[Aaron] Some of that pre-labor stuff
[Jennifer] Yep, and my body, but also, just in our home, I feel like, we are all kind of getting to that transition point where, I don't know, we're just, we're just ready.
[Aaron] So I'll say this, if you don't hear of any more podcasts coming out, after this one, it's because we had the baby.
[Jennifer] But, I haven't ever gone that early, so--
[Aaron] Yeah, you--
[Jennifer] I don't know.
[Aaron] We're usually like, I should say, you're usually right on the dot.
[Jennifer] I will say this, usually nesting kicks in, and I you know, look forward to, just utilizing that energy, that extra energy to clean the house, and get every nook and cranny, and this time I didn't get that way at all. I had to like, really rely on the Lord, and just um--
[Aaron] Well I'll say this, I think you did have the desire to nest, but you didn't have the energy this time.
[Jennifer] Yeah, I had the desire for sure.
[Aaron] You're like, "I just can't get up off the couch, "I just, I don't feel like I," So, there was all these things that you wanted to do, but it took a lot of my helping, it took a lot of like, extra stuff that you didn't have--
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] and so, but that's just unique for this time.
[Jennifer] But we got some stuff checked off our to-do list this weekend and now I feel ready. So thank you Aaron, thank you for your help with that. Yeah well, I'm sure we'll have a little bit more stuff before the baby comes.
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] Gettin' the house ready, just gettin' some things off of our plates, so that we can enjoy little baby Edith,
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] when she's here.
[Jennifer] What I did do, was I got through Olive's old clothes, and got like a drawer ready for her, and all of her clothes are ready, so,
[Aaron] Oh, we also moved all of, 'cause right now we have all of Truitt's clothes, in our bedroom, like right below the changing station, so that we can like change him, and put clothes there, but we moved those. Now he's got his clothes in the boys' room.
[Jennifer] Yeah,
[Aaron] I'm imagining, we're probably gonna move him into the boys' room soon, right?
[Jennifer] Soon, yeah.
[Aaron] And then he's gonna be one of the big boys.
[Jennifer] Uh?
[Aaron] I know
[Jennifer] Everyone's growing up too fast.
[Aaron] Who in the world?
[Jennifer] Elliot feels like he's seven feet tall. Doesn't he feel so big?
[Aaron] Yeah, he's gonna be a tall one.
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] But it's awesome, seeing them grow, we were just talking tonight about if we would have had children earlier, which kinda goes into a little bit into our story, but if we would have started, day one, we'd have a 13 year old.
[Jennifer] Yeah, just recognizing, how long we've been married and--
[Aaron] And we probably have 13 kids. So,
[Jennifer] At our rate.
[Aaron] Yeah at our our rate, yeah. Hey, I just wanted to also bring up something that I've been doing lately, and maybe you can chime in on this, Jennifer, as well, but for the men listening, something I've been trying to do, I know not everyone has our situation. We totally understand that. We get that. But Jennifer and I both, I would say I work the majority of the time, it used to be much more equal, but as we've had more kids, Jennifer's desires, and our desires has changed to, you spending a lot more time homeschooling,
[Jennifer] My work just looks different
[Aaron] Totally looks different, but the idea is that we're keeping things going, but what I've been doing lately, is letting you have Fridays to yourself, often that's so you can get, you know, the work that you need to get done, done. But sometimes it's just to go.
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] To get into the Word. To meet with a lady
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] From the church. To just have time to yourself, or a little bit of both, like you get some work done in the morning, and then you have like a hair appointment, or you have a meeting with a friend,
[Jennifer] Yeah, I try and use that time to schedule appointments--
[Aaron] Yeah.
[Jennifer] But um, I will say this, I've really enjoyed it, and it's been super beneficial in a lot of ways, but I also recognize that change is coming, with having the baby and post-partum, and all that. So it'll be something that we reevaluate, come very quickly.
[Aaron] Right 'cause we go through seasons, and ebbs and flows, and we have to adjust our schedules and our way of living to the situations in life. But, I just wanna encourage the men out there, that even if you're not in a situation, where maybe your wife works with you, or works at home, or maybe, I don't know, like your situations are gonna look differently. The idea is being intentional, to let your wife know that, especially if she doesn't have like, a regular nine-to-five job if she is at home with the kids, if you have a similar situation in that aspect, is giving them time. It may not be every week, maybe it can't be every week, but if it's once a month, if it's every other week, if it's for a couple hours, there's times like, "Hey why don't you, "I got the kids you get out of here--"
[Jennifer] And maybe it can't be during the day, but it's at night or, if it can't be during the week, it's you know Saturday morning or something like that.
[Aaron] Yeah, there's always going to be a way to just let your wife know that you're thinking about her time, and also, as men who are leading our wives, spiritually, giving them time specifically like, maybe it's at home like, "Hey, why don't you just go lock yourself in the bedroom? "Open up the Bible like, read, journal, "go take a bath, and listen to some worship music." Giving them time to themselves, time to recharge, regenerate. I know some women probably recharge around people, not alone, but, whatever it is, maybe they need to go be with some friends. Just, keeping that in your mind, something we've been practicing, like we said, it's a it's a seasonal thing. So it's not necessarily that it's always going to be this way, but currently Fridays have been your day, and you've been enjoying them, we've been slowing down on that with the baby coming.
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] Also 'cause, you're having less energy, and you're like, "I just wanna be home."
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] But, it's been a cool thing.
[Jennifer] I think it's a really good encouragement, and I think it's good for husbands to hear, that when it's even spontaneous, 'cause this was something that we kind of scheduled out, and looked at our situation, and said, "This needs to be happening." But even when it's at random, you know, spontaneous, it's a huge encouragement to the wife's heart to know that the husband is thinking of her like that. You've done that for me plenty of times over the years and so, I love that you're bringing this up. I think it's cool.
[Aaron] So hope you're encouraged by that. One more thing before we get into our, our list of our favorite non-toxic products is, we just want to invite you to join the Parenting Prayer Challenge. We created this prayer challenge, it's very similar to the Marriage Prayer Challenge, where you get 30, 30 some-odd emails everyday, reminding you to pray for your children, and giving you a topic to pray for over them. and you can actually sign up for one for a son, or one for a daughter, or you can sign up for both, which is pretty awesome 'cause some of you probably have a son and a daughter, or just sons, or just daughters, or just one or the other, but you can go, you go to parentingprayerchallenge.com, all one word, and you sign up, it's completely free, and we just pray that God blesses you, and your prayer life for your children, because praying for your children is so important. Just like praying for your marriage. Just like praying for your brothers and sisters in Christ. Prayer is so important. God wants to be praying people, and so this is just a fun challenge. It's a way of being a catalyst for your prayer life, for your children. It's parentingprayerchallenge.com, it's completely free.
[Jennifer] Okay, so for some of you listening you may have already read "The Unveiled Wife," if anything we talked about today, you know sparks interest and you haven't read that book yet, that was our first book that we came out with, you should go check it out, just because it shares more in depth of our journey, of kind of coming to this place of like, being aware of healthy living, and living a healthy lifestyle. But we're going to kind of summarize it. Just to kick off this episode, just so that you guys can, just get some background into Aaron and Jen. How about that? Okay.
[Aaron] Let's see how quick we can make this summary.
[Jennifer] Okay so I would say that when we first got married, Aaron, we didn't really, we didn't have a strong foundation of what it look like to live healthy. We grew up on fast food, and and home cook meals, but there was no,
[Aaron] We didn't have an awareness of healthy living at all.
[Jennifer] Yeah, and so we didn't really care about looking at ingredients on products, or you know reading the labels of things. I would say that you know I used all the all the really good smelling lotions and body washes, and if you didn't have more than three or four in your shower, it was like, "What are you doing?" You know, that type of thing. Fragrant candles, the kind of laundry detergent that you just never think about, you just use it because your parents used, or that's what so-and-so use. I remember using MAC makeup. This one, actually, I didn't really ever talk about this one, but this was one that affected me, in my teens because I was caking on the foundation, but I was using it to cover up acne,
[Aaron] Which that made more acne.
[Jennifer] Which made more acne. And I was actually allergic to something that was in it, and so I stopped using that, even probably around like 18. But anyways, the point that I'm getting at is that we didn't care about what was inside of these bottles that we were using to put on our skin, you know, the soap that we use, the body wash, the lip balms, the hairspray, we just consumed it.
[Aaron] Not internally necessarily.
[Aaron] We were consumers. We bought what we liked, we didn't have any consideration of what it was, and I actually think, back then, not very many people did. There was movements of it, but social media wasn't a huge thing back then, so not a lot of people were talking about it. Like news wasn't talking about it, like it was just, you got these products, and it wasn't until there was some sort of, big blow up or news story about something that people were aware of something, but I think with, now looking back, everyone is much more considerate about what's in products, people care about it, but back then we didn't have that experience. No one was telling us to, like, "Oh, do you know what those ingredients are?" Can you even understand what there, like, we just figured, like, "Oh, that's what they put in everything.
[Jennifer] Yeah, and then, on the side of like, I'm not gonna go too much into this, but medicine, it was kind of just like, the Benadryl, Tylenol, like, whatever you could get over the counter type stuff. And I wasn't raised with a really big awareness of homeopathy, or how to, you know, use what you have at home.
[Aaron] Right.
[Jennifer] To help through sickness or things like that. Or to even just look at what's the root of the problem here? Of whatever symptoms you have.
[Aaron] Or having an understanding of what those, why those symptoms exist. How fevers work, and how, like, why are you coughing, and sneezing, and these kinds of things.
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] Rather than just, medicating the symptoms, which we're not totally against medication.
[Jennifer] No, I'm just saying this is kind of like, where we came from.
[Aaron] Yeah.
[Jennifer] So we get married, and I, you know, it was just like a normal thing people talked about, to go on birth control, so I did that. 'Cause I thought that was--
[Aaron] It's what you do. You get married,
[Jennifer] What we were supposed to do.
[Aaron] birth control, wait.
[Jennifer] Yeah, wait. And I only on it for about two to three months, and it like, drastically effected my body, and so that was the first thing that I noticed should go. And so we did that. But that was also in conjunction with trying to find a solution for what we were dealing with in our marriage, which started immediately--
[Aaron] Physically, yeah.
[Jennifer] And for those of you who don't know, Aaron and I, we struggled with intimacy right off the bat, like, zero, none.
[Aaron] Like sex, specifically we couldn't have sex. It was very painful for you, and we've talked about this in the past, there's a few episodes where we talked about our story, and in your book you talk about it, we talk about it in our new book, "Marriage After God." We talk about it so much because it was such a influential season in our life, and how it brought us to our knees before God. Because, it drew out of us, so much other sins, and frustrations, and bitterness, this situation we were going through. Which is often when we go through things that are hard. They often will draw out those negative things in us. Which is cool, because then God gets to deal with them. But that was, yeah, we didn't know it, you would go to see doctors, and they would say, "You're young."
[Jennifer] "You're fine.
[Aaron] "You're fine--
[Jennifer] "You're really great."
[Aaron] "there's nothing wrong, "this should be working just fine." And then we'd go home and cry, because it's not fine, it doesn't work, nothing's changing, it hurts you.
[Jennifer] Yeah, it was like at least if you told me that something was wrong, I can work with that. I can't work with nothing. But moving on, so year four of our marriage, we had a conversation with some friends, we were being really transparent and honest with them about our struggles, and they kind of like, I remember them sitting across from us, just looking super confused, like, "How--
[Aaron] Dumbfounded, or like, "Are you serious?"
[Jennifer] "Yeah, is this really happening?" but she goes, the girl, she goes, "The only thing I can think of to help relate your story, "to someone else's that I heard is, "a friend of mine has PCOS, and she changed out all "of her products to be more organic, "and just cleaner, and three months later, "she ended up pregnant." Which people with PCOS, it's a hard thing to do, and they weren't even trying to get pregnant. She was just trying to heal some of her other symptoms. And we quickly disregarded that because we thought, "Well, we're not trying "to get pregnant, we're just trying to start off "with the first thing, which is--
[Aaron] Yeah, how do I have sex?
[Jennifer] "sexual intimacy." And we didn't think about it again for about five, six months. And then what happened, Aaron you share.
[Aaron] Well, I would just, it got worse of course, 'cause we're like, "There's like no hope, "like this in never gonna change." You know, it started off with a lot of hope, like, "Oh, it'll get better, it'll get, "but it can't possibly keep going the same way." And it just did, and you know, I'm praying through this, God was working in our marriage. There was a, if you read in our book, in both of our books, actually, there's this moment that God gets ahold of my heart, and just totally convicts me of my wrong heart, towards my wife. Not just over the situation about our sex, but about a lot of things. And it brought me to my knees, I repented, and I just said, "Lord, I'm gonna obey you. "I'm gonna walk with you, "and I'm gonna love my wife, "regardless of if I ever get what I think I deserve, "or whatever she owes me, or whatever. "I'm gonna love her. "The way you've called me to." And that was the beginning of a lot of transformations, in our marriage, in our life, and our being. But how, I don't know how, it was like.
[Jennifer] It was shortly after--
[Aaron] It was like that weekend, maybe,
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] or the next weekend, or that week, 'cause it was at church that this you know revelation that God gave to me happened. And I'm in the shower, and I'm just praying, 'cause I'm still like, "God, there's gotta be something, "that's gonna fix this." 'Cause even though, I've totally committed my heart to say "I'm gonna love my wife,"
[Jennifer] You still wanted change--
[Aaron] I still want a change, right? But my heart was totally in a different place now. And I'm just praying, and I'm like. "Lord, what is it? "It's been since before we were married, "like this is, since we've been married, I mean, "and there's gotta be something." And I looked down in the shower actually, and there's a face wash in there, and I just immediately remembered this story about the PCOS, and the girl that got rid of her stuff, and I just asked myself, I was like, "Is it possible that there's something reacting "with my wife's body?" And then I started thinking like, "What has there been, that you've used, "ever since the beginning, of our marriage?"
[Jennifer] 'Cause shampoo and conditioner changed out, body wash changed out, a lot things changed, in those four years, but my face wash was the one main thing that I always was consistent with.
[Aaron] And so, I said, I just yelled from the shower, I remember like, "What have you been using "since before we were married?" And you were like, "My f-why?" You were like, confused. Anyways, I take the face wash out of the shower, and I hop onto our computer, and I just start researching every ingredient on the thing. And there was like, first of all, like, half the ingredients were, I went on this site, and it talks about the toxicity level, of ingredients, right? You type the ingredient in, and it just tells you what the level is.
[Jennifer] Had you ever done anything like that before?
[Aaron] Never, never done like that before. Didn't even know it existed, I had to Google, and I'm searching like, how do you figure out, I'm typing these, and then this site shows up. And like half the ingredients in this thing, were--
[Jennifer] It was EWG.
[Aaron] Toxic.
[Jennifer] EWG.com.
[Aaron] EWG.com, I don't even know, is it still a thing?
[Jennifer] I think so.
[Aaron] Okay. So half the products were toxic at some level. And then there was several of the ingredients that had specific terms that it said it was, that the affect. Specifically the endocrine system in your body. Then I looked up, I was like, "What's the endocrine system? "I'll just start looking it up." I'm getting all technical, and we're not scientists, we're not biologists, we don't know, like, I'm not gonna try and diagnose people, but all I know is the Lord lead me to something.
[Jennifer] We were putting pieces together.
[Aaron] I started researching, and regardless if it has any effect, the fact that it had all these toxic chemicals, and I'm like, "Maybe she should, regardless, "she probably shouldn't be putting this on her body." and the endocrine system something that's, it's super important to the whole reproductive system. To the normal function of the woman's body. Like secretion of normal hormones, and I was like, "Dang, that sounds like a lot "of like the things that we deal with." And so it--
[Jennifer] The specific thing that you're talking about is parabens.
[Aaron] Parabens, yeah.
[Jennifer] So there's four, different types of parabens, in this specific face wash.
[Aaron] Methyl, propyl, like all these different kinds.
[Jennifer] And this was before parabens was a thing,
[Aaron] Yeah, like no bottle said paraben-free, back then.
[Jennifer] Nobody was talking about it yet, but it soon became a thing, shortly after that.
[Aaron] A few years later.
[Jennifer] I mean, I remember a few years later, you'd go into like, Ulta, or Sephora, and you'd start seeing, you know, makeup lines that say, paraben free this, paraben free that.
[Aaron] Which is interesting because back then, no one cared. I should say no on knew. And then we're like researching this and finding this out, and I don't wanna say, like started move, we actually didn't start anything. Other people are already trying to get this moving, but because of social media things like that, that it exist. Things were a lot slower. I think things are way faster now. But I was just like, "Hey. "I want to be with you, physically." And in this is a big deal because Jennifer has been using this forever, she believed that without it, she was gonna have acne. And be, and feel ugly, or whatever it was, and I remember I was like, "Hey, would you get this up?"
[Jennifer] I said no.
[Aaron] And she was like "No!" And I'm like, "I'd rather you have acne and us be able "to be together, than you have clean skin, clear skin."
[Jennifer] And then I was like, "Well maybe there's something, okay. "I'll just do it 'cause you asked me."
[Aaron] So you did, you chose to put it away. And now, I'm sure everyone's thinking like, "Yeah, I'm gonna go use this to get my wife, "or get someone to stop doing something." But, I, my heart was not just to get her to stop using this. I actually had never thought about it until this moment, and I was just like, "Would you be willing to experiment with me?" Like, "Let's just delete this from your life."
[Jennifer] Yeah, it was an experiment. And here's the thing you guys, three days later, three days later, I was at work and I remember just feeling different, and I called Aaron and I was like, "I don't get too excited but, I feel different, "and I wanted you to know that my body feels, "it feels like things are changing." And I feel like it was just like two more days after that that we had sex for what feels like the first time.
[Aaron] Yeah, in four and a half years.
[Jennifer] Like pain free.
[Aaron] Pain free. Not just pain free, but like it was enjoyable.
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] Like it was, like we were like, "Whoa. "Like that's what it's supposed to be like.
[Jennifer] There was nothing else that was gonna convince me, that what we stumbled upon, was the thing.
[Aaron] Right, and I would also say, we, God lead us a new place, in our hearts toward him. We had been repentant, of things that were going on, and I think that the Lord revealed thing to us, so I would say I definitely think that there is certain things are engaging, or interacting with your body. I mean we know over the years that you're sensitive to certain things, I'm sensitive to certain things.
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] But I also think that the Lord, was like working in us. So I'm not trying to over-spiritualize it but, I don't wanna take away from what God was doing.
[Jennifer] Sure.
[Aaron] And he revealed this to us--
[Jennifer] Well and I think, he's the one that revealed this to us, and it was really awesome, and so the next step was, "I'm getting rid of all parabens." Like parabens became this like,
[Aaron] We literally threw
[Both] Everything,
[Jennifer] And I am telling you guys,
[Aaron] All of our shampoos, all of her makeup.
[Jennifer] It was it!
[Aaron] My makeup too. I'm just kiddin'.
[Jennifer] It was in everything. It was in so much stuff. People will message me on Instagram, and they're like, "So you know, "You talked about parabens in the "Unveiled Wife," "and what kind of stuff did you have to look at?" It was like,
[Aaron] Everything.
[Jennifer] I tell 'em, "everything." And so what's funny is that, I look at our shower now from what it used to be, and it's like you had mentioned earlier,
[Aaron] There's two things in there.
[Jennifer] Yeah, which is one of the reasons why I wanted to do this episode. 'cause we just thought it'd be fun to share with you guys, some of the things that we use now, but this indecent, this thing that happened over something as small as face wash, is what stimulated our hearts to say, "Hey, what were putting in our bodies. "What we're putting on our bodies, "is important because it has an effect on us."
[Aaron] And I mean it's definitely not our main focus, I mean everyone that listens to our podcast would know that this is not, we're not like a health and fitness--
[Jennifer] Freaks,
[Aaron] Podcast. No, we just know, that there's a holistic view that God has of us. He wants us to love him with our minds, our souls, our bodies. Like so, when we look at the world it's not just, "Oh, we can be unwise over here, "as long as we're wise over here." we look at idea of, what we, we gotta be wise in every aspect. And we seek God on that. So what's wrong with just, caring about what goes on our body and in our body? Not out of a, like, not putting something on my body and not putting something in my body is not making me more holy. It's making me more healthy.
[Jennifer] It's taking care of yourself.
[Aaron] it's taking care of the body that God's given me.
[Jennifer] Yeah, and I will say this, back then, it felt a little bit harder to know what to switch to, because--
[Aaron] Well, there was also less things, I think.
[Jennifer] Less cleaner things available and so I just wanted to make that clear, that, you know, anyone who wanted to make a switch today, like if they want to go to their products or--
[Aaron] There's a million products now.
[Jennifer] be more healthy in this way, there are so many good products out there and so, it's a lot easier, I would say. But another thing that triggered our healthy lifestyle, was doing the Sugar Busters diet, which we--
[Aaron] This was long time ago.
[Jennifer] that was just a couple months, after all of this, and we made the commitment to do it together. We even took a class on it do you remember that?
[Aaron] I do.
[Jennifer] And they taught us how to read labels--
[Aaron] It was at the church.
[Jennifer] Yeah, it was at our church.
[Aaron] The church put this like health class on. It was cool.
[Jennifer] Yeah so, it taught us how the read labels, and so I remember going grocery shopping with you, and we're looking at the back of like pasta sauce--
[Aaron] Well, everything we bought, had added sugar in it. Every single thing.
[Jennifer] But we were like, amazed, we were like, "And this has it too!"
[Aaron] I was like, "Bread doesn't have sugar in it." and every loaf of bread, was like, the second ingredient was sugar. And we're like, "Okay, what's going on here?" So anyways,
[Jennifer] And then you had to go with a list of what are sugars called? because there's a lot of--
[Aaron] All the different names of sugar, yeah
[Jennifer] Different names, for it. But that was another one, when we talk about eating, like that was what stimulated our healthy movement towards eating healthier and just buying things so that we're aware of what we're putting inside of our bodies. It doesn't mean we don't consume sugar, and we don't, you know, we'll have Chick-fil-A, we'll go out and--
[Aaron] No, but that education, the learning about how to read labels. What are ingredients, you know, how they order the ingredients, that's important, I can give a little tip on that. Even though we don't still do Sugar Busters, that month or how many? It was a couple months maybe.
[Jennifer] It grew a muscle in us, We now, that's how we shop. When we go grocery shopping, of course there's gonna be stuff that we grab that has added sugars to it, but for the most part, we look at the ingredients in almost everything we buy. Everything, now especially with you, you need to be gluten-free. We look at, we actually buy less things that have wheat in it period, because of that, but it was a good tool in our tool belt, as we talk about in "Marriage After God," to just help us be healthier, help our kids be healthier. They enjoy things, here and there, we just had icecream tonight, so we're not like, sans sugar in our life, we're sans sugar all the time.
[Jennifer] I was gonna say, we try and make the best opportunity, or we take every opportunity, when we can, to be healthy, eat healthy, and you know, choose the right thing, but it doesn't mean that we don't get,
[Aaron] We also enjoy things.
[Jennifer] Yeah, we also enjoy things, so,
[Aaron] In moderation.
[Jennifer] in moderation. That's good.
[Aaron] So, Oh I wanna give that quick tip real quick, 'cause people are probably thinking like, "Well, what about the ingredients?" Just a quick tip on ingredients, the order of ingredients on the box, so like starting from the first, to the second, to the third, the higher up an ingredient is on the box, the more of that ingredient is in the product. So if sugar is in the top three ingredients, that means there's a lot of sugar in that item. So if wheat's the first or water, that's how they order the ingredients, based off of amount of ingredients.
[Jennifer] So here's another one, it's really random, but I've been seeing a naturopath for my thyroid issues through this last year, and one of the things she asked me is if we use Weed and Feed. And I didn't even know, 'cause you usually do--
[Aaron] For the lawns? Yeah.
[Jennifer] the lawns, yeah. And that was just one instance where she was like, "Well, instead of using that, "why don't you just pick the weeds?" like--
[Aaron] Or leave the weeds.
[Jennifer] or leave the weeds. So there's a lots of things in our life that we can look at and evaluate, and say, "Oh, we should probably make change." It doesn't have to happen all at once, but it is something that we should be aware of, to go, "Hey what's happening to this exposure "that we're doing to our bodies. "And how can we maintain a healthy body?'
[Aaron] And the Weed and Feed was important because was saying, "You guys walk on "that grass all the time." And like, it goes into your skin, and you're going to be affected by it. Because you're you're working with your thyroid and all of these things, effect that. Which is interesting because, we knew back then that you were probably sensitive to some stuff, and now we know now, you are definitely sensitive to things. Your body's gonna react, maybe differently than someone who, has normal functioning thyroid, or endocrine system or all that.
[Jennifer] Right. Okay so, we we're just going to get into kind of a list of our non-toxic products because--
[Aaron] These are literally things that we use, pretty much on a regular basis.
[Jennifer] Two reasons, one we just thought it would be fun to share these things, and if you guys you know want to know more, you can reach out to us on Instagram @marriage--
[Aaron] Reach out to Jennifer about the
[Jennifer] I was going to say @marriageaftergod.
[Aaron] Ah there ya go.
[Jennifer] or @unveiledwife We also know that everyone's always looking for, you know, new things or ideas or inspiration so, we just hope that by sharing these, it's an encouragement to you, and give you some information.
[Aaron] And I'll also let you guys know that we're not like necessarily sponsored by any of these people. We're just we're literally going to share with you guys the things that we love--
[Jennifer] Now I will say,
[Aaron] and use.
[Jennifer] that some of these things that I put on the list, and we've been using Young Living Essential Oils for
[Aaron] Several years now.
[Jennifer] about four or five years now. And we did just recently, just be more open to sharing the business side of things on social media. You may have seen that, maybe not. And so I know you said that we're not sponsored by this, but we,--
[Aaron] But we use it.
[Jennifer] but we do use Young Living, and we do believe in what they have to offer, and and have really fallen in love with their products. So, I just wanted to put that out there, just so that people know and we're clear about that.
[Aaron] We're not trying to be tricky or anything, we just, these are literally products we love and no one's asked us to share about them. Except for us, wanting to share about them.
[Jennifer] Okay so when it comes to cleaning I really love the Thieves Spray, which in the beginning I was using wrong, because I didn't know it could be diluted. I literally would just put the spray cap--
[Aaron] And everything was just like slimy and had like, film all over the
[Jennifer] Uh yeah, like a residue.
[Aaron] We had residue everywhere.
[Jennifer] On the countertops.
[Aaron] Oh man, there was no germs I bet.
[Jennifer] Ah, probably not. So the Thieves container comes, and then you dilute it, and it lasts a long time. But it smells really good, and I can use it for--
[Aaron] Everything.
[Jennifer] I feel like every, one product, I feel like I can use for so much.
[Aaron] And what's awesome is like, if you sprayed it on food by accident, I'm not saying you should eat it, but it's not going to be like spraying Lysol on something. Like you spray the table, you spray the the highchair, you spray, you're not worried about this, you know hurting your children. Which is awesome. It's an added benefit to this kind of cleaning product.
[Jennifer] Another awesome cleaning product, is by a company called Norwex, it's really awesome you guys, they do these microfiber cloths, but they're like--
[Aaron] Aren't they infused with like silver?
[Jennifer] Yeah, they're infused with silver, and they just, I don't know what about it is, but like, when you go to clean the stove, you barely have to even scrape, it's just like,
[Aaron] Reusable
[Jennifer] It like makes you want to clean. The window rag, you just you put water on it, and just wipe your window down, and they look crystal clear. I bought these mitts for the kids that have, they're just really easy slip-on gloves, but they're good for dusting,
[Aaron] So that they can help clean?
[Jennifer] So that they can help clean. Oh and our mop, I use the Norwex mop, and it's just really nice. It's good, I like it. I like their stuff.
[Aaron] I wouldn't say those are necessarily, healthy products, they're just good products that we love using.
[Jennifer] Oh yeah.
[Aaron] On that specific one,
[Jennifer] On the Norwex side of things.
[Aaron] I did wanna go back, and just real quick, the Thieves Spray, we just talked about, I wanted to say it like it what it replaces. Because I think, as we go, we should just remind them, also, what it replaces like, it replaces Lysol spray, it replaces window spray, it replaces like toilet cleaner, it replaces all these things that you'd use to clean your countertops, or your floors, or your tables, or your, it does all of those things.
[Jennifer] So for all you minimalists out there,
[Aaron] You get one thing, and it does all.
[Jennifer] It'll make your cleaning closet, or cupboard very pretty looking.
[Aaron] It also smells really nice.
[Jennifer] It does, that's true. For laundry, again that they sell Thieves Laundry Detergent and we've really liked that. And I just noticed that, there's a drastic difference when washing towels and washcloths. They're just so much cleaner.
[Aaron] And they smell fresher, and they feel nicer. I've been really liking that, as well. This is this one's kind of like for me. So Jennifer, actually, doesn't use the the Thieves Laundry Soap for me, because I'm really sensitive, my skin, if we, if there's any laundry detergent that has any sort of dyes or perfumes or anything, I get like a rash, on my whole body.
[Jennifer] If I even think about changing it, he breaks out--
[Aaron] Now, it happens, we've gone, we've stayed at hotels in the past, and I wake up in the morning and I'm just like red, and I go down and I'm like, "What are you guys washing your stuff with?" And they're like "We don't know, why?" And I'm like "I like I need something else." It's like horrible 'cause I'm like sleeping on these blankets and pillows, and so the only thing that we found work, we've actually tried venturing out, into other things, is the Arm & Hammer Sensitive Skin laundry detergent.
[Jennifer] But it's fragrance-free, it's clear,
[Aaron] Dye free. I'm sure it's got a couple of bad things in it, but literally, it's the only one that I've been able to use and not like break out in a rash on my body. But that comes in a huge bottle and we use it for me so.
[Jennifer] Okay so earlier, we mentioned the shower, and just how the bathroom is much
[Aaron] less cluttered,
[Jennifer] Yeah, less cluttered. So we use dr. Bronner's for just about everything when it comes to washing our bodies.
[Aaron] Body wash, shampoo,
[Jennifer] I use it in the kids hair, I throw it in their bath and they have different scents, and they come in big bottles
[Aaron] I like the rose scented one.
[Jennifer] I will say this, the first couple times that we used it, do you remember how it felt like, really different, almost oily, but then once you got out of the shower it was like,
[Aaron] Yeah, 'cause it doesn't suds the same way, as like a regular shampoo and also, you have to dilute it. And so you if you use too much, it's like everywhere but it comes off really easy. Doesn't leave any residue, but it's, we love it we use it for everything. Apparently you can use dr. Bronner's for like, laundry soap,
[Jennifer] Yep. and dish washing soap
[Jennifer] You can use it for a lot of stuff.
[Aaron] We use it mainly in the shower, but yeah, you can
[Jennifer] I use it for my face wash now, face and body wash,
[Aaron] You can use it for everything. We wanna make a note that, the company that that owns dr. Bronner's, they write a bunch of weird stuff on the packaging so we're not necessarily endorsing what is written on the packaging, but we love the product.
[Jennifer] When it comes to my like, lotions and things like that, Cetaphil is pretty bland, there's not very much stuff in it. I've used that for years now. I love the orange blossom and ART brand from Young Living when it comes to face moisturizer. The Genesis lotion is also really great, especially because, well, it smells clean and fresh, but it's not super fragrant. That one's good, just an overall lotion, I use that one for the kids. But also, Aaron,
[Aaron] Yeah, there's a lotion that I, I hate lotions, like I don't like putting anything in my hands, even though, like right now, my hands are so dry because it's so dry out. But I hate feeling like greasy and the lotion I love the most is from Bend Soap Company, they're actually right here in our hometown. And they make this goat milk lotion, they make goat milk soap, they make a lot of really awesome things. So if you have really sensitive skin, like eczema, things like that, their soaps are amazing for it. That's actually why they started the company, 'cause one of their sons had issues with skin like that.
[Jennifer] What I like is their milk bath, it comes in these like shavings,
[Aaron] Oh yeah.
[Jennifer] And it's just, you toss it in the bath with the kids, and it's just so fun.
[Aaron] So just go check out Bend Soap Company, I can't remember the domain, but just Google Bend Soap Company. And their lotion, does not feel greasy. Once it's rubbed in, it's like, it smells nice, it feels great.
[Jennifer] You don't have to go wash your hands
[Aaron] It feels soft, yeah I don't have to wash my hands afterwards.
[Jennifer] For toothpaste we do use Young Living. The Thieves whitening, specifically, is really good for us. And then we use it the kid's ones for the kids. But for the deodorant, this was a big one for me, because I feel like every time I try to use like, a natural deodorant, it just felt weird
[Aaron] They don't work.
[Jennifer] and didn't work
[Jennifer] Yeah, but there's a new company out I'd say a fairly new. They're gaining ground, they're like in Target now,
[Aaron] Yeah, they actually have some body washes now, I saw.
[Jennifer] Oh really?
[Aaron] Yeah, I almost bought a bottle of it.
[Jennifer] Oh you should, I'll have to try it.
[Aaron] But I like my Bronner's
[Jennifer] I know. It's called Native. And they have great scents, it goes on smooth, almost silky like, and it works. Someone asked me, "Do you think it'll work during postpartum?" And I'm like, "That I haven't tried yet, "so we'll know this time around." But I've really really enjoyed Native.
[Aaron] Yeah, it doesn't have the heavy metals, or nothin' in it,
[Jennifer] Paraben-free
[Aaron] So it won't necessarily protect you from perspiring, I should say. It's not an antiperspirant, it's a deodorant. So it protects from the smell, but--
[Jennifer] I don't, really notice--
[Aaron] Yeah, well, it's winter right now, so I don't know, sometimes.
[Jennifer] I've been using it for a while though.
[Aaron] But I like it a lot. It smells great, it feels good, and deodorant is another one that's really been a, hard one for me because, like, pretty much any deodorant I use, I used to use the Arm & Hammer deodorant, but that has some metals in it, and so I've since switched to Native, but Arm & Hammer and Native are the only ones that don't give me rashes on my arms. And they're painful, you've see them.
[Jennifer] Yeah,
[Aaron] Like, I they hurt. And I've loved their deodorants.
[Jennifer] Another good product for chapstick, is Burt's Bees.
[Aaron] Yeah that's good. Especially their vanilla brand,
[Aaron] I think a lot of people are like, "yeah, I like that." Burt's Bees, they've been pretty synonymous for chapsticks.
[Jennifer] That or coconut oil. Which coconut oil, you guys, you could used for literally everything.
[Aaron] Yeah, we should do an episode on that.
[Jennifer] Dry skin, lips--
[Aaron] intimacy, oh we're gonna talk about it.
[Jennifer] Lubricancy, or, lubricancy?
[Aaron] Lubricancy
[Jennifer] Whatever that is.
[Aaron] It's like, new word.
[Jennifer] Okay before we get there, supplements, some things that I've been taking his last year, Nordic Naturals--
[Aaron] You've been, just real quick, you've been getting a lot, into the supplements, just because of your--
[Jennifer] Thyroid.
[Aaron] your thyroid. So you've been learning a lot about these.
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] Because we're, we're trying to avoid going with other stronger, methods, we're trying to do the natural way,
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] and you've been, pretty consistent with this.
[Jennifer] Yeah, and just as a testament, after being on the supplements, I have actually, my numbers have gone down, and in my symptoms have pretty much dissipated, but I've also been pregnant the last nine months.
[Aaron] Which does change things, yep.
[Jennifer] So it does change things. But Nordic Naturals has a really great, strawberry flavored, omega-3. Which I love. And I've been taking--
[Aaron] So it doesn't just taste like fish? It tastes like strawberries? That's good.
[Jennifer] Yeah. We've taking D3 a lot. Young Living has a great line of supplements that we use, like the vitamin C, the vitamin B, Multigreens,
[Aaron] Yeah, I've been loving their Master Formula. It's like a pack of like five little supplements, and vitamin B, C, D3, all these different ones. I've been taking that, pretty much regularly, every day, I really enjoy that one.
[Jennifer] Cool. Okay so for pregnancy and post-partum care, my friend recommended ancient magnesium lotion for restless legs, and it works.
[Aaron] Do you get restless legs when you're pregnant?
[Jennifer] Yeah, mostly towards the end,
[Aaron] I'm being facetious, because I know.
[Jennifer] I know, Aaron does the massaging, with the lotion,
[Aaron] Yeah
[Jennifer] Thank you, Aaron.
[Aaron] You've had pretty bad restless legs this time.
[Jennifer] Yeah,
[Aaron] And the magnesium lotion--
[Jennifer] It's been good.
[Aaron] And lavender, on your feet.
[Jennifer] Yep.
[Aaron] Has been, really helping you.
[Jennifer] Yep, that's true.
[Aaron] 'Cause I can tell, 'cause then you fall asleep.
[Jennifer] Yeah. I've love it. And then the other thing that helps, has helped me during this pregnancy is the Young Living Deep Relief roller and I don't necessarily put it on, but like I smell it, like especially when I'm nauseous, or anything like that.
[Aaron] I personally don't like this one because of how cold it feels. It's like all this--
[Jennifer] When you put it on, yeah.
[Aaron] Like the peppermint in it, I just can't.
[Jennifer] The cooling effect.
[Aaron] But it does work, but it's too cold for me. So you brought up makeup in the beginning, I remember you used to go to the MAC store and you were like, "We have to go to the mall, I need some MAC." And I was like, "Are you serious? "You look beautiful." I've never liked you wearing makeup. You remember this? I was like, "You don't need to wear makeup." But you've used since not used makeup, the MAC makeup and for a long time, you didn't use almost anything, because we couldn't find anything. What do you use now? I'm sure some of the women are like, "What kind of makeup do you use?"
[Jennifer] Yeah, so I would say, like my everyday would be, a primer from Urban Decay, which just kind of holds the eyeshadow on, and the eye shadow is also from Urban Decay. And I just like it, they're neutral colors, easy to put on really quick, and the times that I do use foundation, it's a powder foundation from Young Living, it's called Savvy Minerals, it's like a mineral makeup. And it goes on super light and so,
[Aaron] But that's rare.
[Jennifer] Yeah, it's like on Sundays.
[Aaron] I would say you used to use a lot more makeup, and now it's like, you do a little eyeliner,
[Jennifer] Yeah,
[Aaron] You do a little mascara,
[Jennifer] I don't use eyeliner actually.
[Aaron] You don't use eyeliner?
[Jennifer] No but my mascara, Smashbox has been a really good favorite, paraben-free, and Clinique.
[Aaron] Clinique,
[Jennifer] Yep.
[Aaron] So no eyeliner, but mascara, okay, and then you use some lipstick sometimes.
[Jennifer] Every once in a while.
[Aaron] Yeah.
[Jennifer] The Burt's Bees tinted is really nice.
[Aaron] 'cause it's kinda like lipstick, and it's moisturizing
[Jennifer] Yeah.
[Aaron] Yeah, so I'm just making a note that you wear way less makeup than you use to
[Jennifer] Oh yeah.
[Aaron] And I think you're beautiful.
[Jennifer] Thank you.
[Aaron] Yeah, well, I'm not lying. I've never been a fan of a lot of makeup, and because of this, you've since found contentment in just a very little.
[Jennifer] Yep.
[Aaron] Which I think is really awesome.
[Jennifer] Okay so when it comes to intimacy, you guys we ditched pretty much, well, we did all lubricants because of--
[Aaron] And we've tried a lot of lubricants 'cause,
[Jennifer] We've tried a lot
[Aaron] 'cause, things didn't work.
[Jennifer] But there were so many of 'em that had parabens in it.
[Aaron] All of them.
[Jennifer] Every single one,
[Jennifer] We didn't even know,
[Aaron] Had parabens, yeah.
[Jennifer] And then other things on top of that that were just not good for you, so, we stuck to coconut oil for a really long time.
[Aaron] So, tip, coconut oil's amazing, for that, specifically, and it's so good for you too. And it feels good. That was a little side note, for the adults in the room. So, I guess what we wanna get at, and I'm sure there's like a ton more things that we--
[Jennifer] I know,
[Aaron] we use that are healthy, and we could probably, make a whole other list, but we essentially, wanted to show you that we've simplified, we found the handful of products that we love, and that we know what's in them, and we just, what's really awesome about this is, we it makes shopping easier, it's actually cheaper 'cause we're not buying a bunch of stuff and always experimenting, we're not always saying like "Well, let's try this new thing." We just say "Nope, we love this product. "Let's just go with it, we know it works." And so it makes, we don't think as much about those things. We know that we're minimizing the amount of chemicals we're putting on us, on our kids. And so we can have some peace of mind, and just one less thing that we have to think about, in our home. And we can put more intention into the spiritual growth of our family, into our careers, into our children, into each other, and we're not like worried about these other things.
[Jennifer] Yeah, or when you say, "don't put as much "thought into them," I would say initially we do, because we do look at ingredients. We look and we do our research and figure out what we want to use, and we're in agreement when we choose things, but then, once we know what it is, it's kinda like that going back to that spaghetti sauce, once we found the one that didn't have sugar in it, we just stick to that one.
[Aaron] And it's great. We love it.
[Jennifer] And it makes it easy. It makes it so easy when you know what you are good with.
[Aaron] Well, and grocery shopping's hard. I don't know if everyone who's listening is like, "Yeah grocery shopping's hard." Like, for us it's hard, like, so once you, instead of trying to reinvent the wheel every single time, we've kinda, we slowly over time with built, our list of things that we like, "Oh, these are the things--
[Jennifer] Stick to the basics
[Aaron] "that we can, "we're just gonna go to those things." And some of them are a little but more expensive. But what's awesome is we don't get as much of everything, like we get those handful of things and I was just at the grocery store the other day, and I was just thinking how awesome it is, that we have these habits on the things that we get. There's just the staples in our home, there's things that we get often. We've already looked at the ingredients. We know we enjoy them. We know that we like them. And it just makes these normal, everyday things so much more enjoyable and easy. They're less stressful like, all around like, this this this way of thinking, is just good for our everyday life. To simplify, to know the things that we like, and we create the good habit. And then that habit is there. So we don't have to reinvent the wheel, every single time we walk to the grocery store. Or every time we are shopping for something for our home, and for our kids.
[Jennifer] And we also gotta know when we do choose that organic, clean, non-toxic, or non-GMO, whatever the thing is, we can't be up so obsessive about it that when we go out, or someone offers us, or brings us--
[Aaron] Right. That's a good point.
[Jennifer] food during, postpartum, or whatever it is, that we're not nitpicky in a way that promotes--
[Aaron] Is this from that specific brand?
[Jennifer] Yeah, let's not be like that.
[Aaron] Yeah, we're not, yeah.
[Jennifer] And I guess what I'm trying to say is we can't make it in idol. I think it's important to be healthy, and do the best that we can, but there's going to be times that we can't, and that's okay. We can't make living out this way, become an idol in our lives, and especially not become a strife point between husband and wife. I think this is something that you guys,
[Aaron] Or friends,
[Jennifer] can learn about together. Engage in together, and agree on together.
[Aaron] That's a really good point, you know it's good to, in general, be making healthier habits in our life, but the point is not just to be healthier, it's too have a good habits. It's to walk rightly and have wisdom. And so is that thing, if those things, are getting in the way of your relationships with other people, they need to be put on the shelf. Not forever, but like you need to check yourself, and say "Am I letting this thing get in the way of them?"
[Jennifer] Yeah, or if you really, truly have a heart to encourage your friends, or family members, or whoever to also, live a healthy lifestyle, be patient with them, because it might take someone else more time, than maybe it took you, or I don't know, I just feel like we need to have compassion for people's learning experience,
[Aaron] Yeah, well and also don't let this, one last little warning, don't let this be the message you preach. It's good to encourage people and say "Hey like, you know, why don't you try this? "Why don't you try some more healthy things? "Here's an idea." It's one thing to share, healthy lifestyle, and to encourage someone, but if that if that replaces the message we should be preaching, the message of Christ, if like we have this opportunity and we're instead, we're encouraging someone to be healthier, and then what were thinking is, holiness comes from that. Rather than encouraging someone in Christ, and making the healthy lifestyle thing, that's an ancillary thing in our life that were like, "Oh and I like to live healthy, "and here's some ideas if you're interested." So the main messages is our life represents Christ and we preach him. 'Cause, we could do that sometimes. I got excited about crossfit, and every conversation I had was about crossfit, and I have to check myself and be like, "Hey, is this getting in the way "of the message I should be preaching right now?
[Jennifer] That's really good Aaron, and I just, you know, just even thinking about this episode, it's little bit fun and quirky, and you know, not very Christ driven, but yet, I think the encouragement here is that we're aware of what we're putting in and on our bodies because, the scripture to tell us about, our bodies being the Holy Temple.
[Aaron] Right, and we're, it's just being wise. Let's be wise with our bodies, and we can't control everything, and we shouldn't try and control everything. But what we can control, with moderation, with wisdom, and with sober mindedness, you know, thinking rightly, I think there's wisdom in that. And walking good, and not just putting junk in our bodies, and on our bodies.
[Jennifer] And it has felt really good, I think you would agree with me, in having the conversations from time to time, about our lifestyle choices, about the things that we're doing, the things that were buying, and it's something that we evaluate often. You know, even when we go to the grocery store and so, I would hope that this episode, encourages couples to do that.
[Aaron] Yeah.
[Jennifer] So I also wanna let you guys know that if you, especially the wife, if you're interested in following me on Instagram, @unveiledwife, there's a highlight tab called toxic, free, healthy living, and you can get more information there. And also if you're curious about more things, if you want to hear more about, you know, the things that we use just message me.
[Aaron] So before we close in prayer, I thought it'd be cool if we let everyone know some of the resources and people that we follow that kinda promote, some healthy living, so what are you share some of those?
[Jennifer] So Dashing Dish, she's a good friend of ours and she is--
[Aaron] She's awesome.
[Jennifer] really good at just like, meal planning, healthy fitness,
[Aaron] Believer, loves the Lord.
[Jennifer] everything you can think of, if you want some inspiration she's a great resource. Dr. Mark Hyman H-Y-M-A-N, is a really great resource, he just talks about the holistic living, like that Aaron mentioned. Carrie Vitt, I think it's a Vitt, or Veet. It's C-A-R-R-I-E V-I-T-T and on Instagram, that's where I follow her, and she talks a lot about thyroid health. So I mention that earlier--
[Aaron] Yeah, which is important to you.
[Jennifer] Yeah, if you guys are interested in more inspiration for thyroid health, she's a great one to listen to, or watch, or follow. Follow, yeah.
[Jennifer] I don't know what it's called. Another one is just.ingredients. She is going to really fun resource, a newer resource that--
[Aaron] Someone shared this with you, yeah.
[Jennifer] someone shared with me, and she does like, Costco overhauls, she'll compare products and it's just been really great.
[Aaron] A note on her, isn't she the one, that she'll say "If you can't do this, "at least do this?"
[Jennifer] Yeah, I think so.
[Aaron] And so she shows you like, if you can't afford this, the best product, here's one that's a little bit better than that other product.
[Jennifer] I know she shows pictures too, of like, comparing products and things like that. So that's just.ingredients. And then another one I've been falling recently, is Purely Parsons. She's a fun one, just a mom, also nurse, who shares a lot of things, and her highlight reel, I mean, so much about birth, postpartum care, flu season, just home remedies, farming, like, anything that you can think of that you want to know more about, she's just a fun person to follow. And I really appreciated, how much time she takes in explaining things, and sharing resources. And then we had mentioned Sugar Busters, but if you want to know more about the toxi, I can't say that word,
[Aaron] Toxicity. of sugar, Dr. Robert Lustig L-U-S-T-I-G
[Aaron] Oh yeah, he's the guy
[Jennifer] he's the guy. And especially on YouTube. Just research him and check out some of his--
[Aaron] He talks about what sugar does in our bodies. and this is not to be an anti sugar talk, we just when we're aware of how things interact with our body, how God created our bodies, it's pretty interesting 'cause it's not normal things to learn, so just wanna encourage you to check that out. So hey, we just want to thank everyone for being here today. As usual, we like to close in prayer. And so just Jennifer, why don't you pray for us?
[Jennifer] Okay. Dear Lord, thank you for our bodies. We pray would be good stewards of our bodies and consider all that goes on them, and in them. We pray we would be willing to take the time and research the items we use on a daily basis. Using things that help us and not hurt us. Lord, we ask that you would give us wisdom as we navigate living a healthy lifestyle. Help us to make good choices, and be on the same page in marriage, so that we can enjoy the benefits of living toxic-free. Please help us to not be overwhelmed by the process of learning, but rather, help us to be humble and willing to learn so that we can choose what is healthy for us, and be advocates of healthy living for the sake of others. We pray living healthy would not become an idol in our lives and would not hinder any of our relationships. May we be people who don't just consume, but people who care about our bodies, and take care of them. In Jesus' name, amen.
[Aaron] Amen. We love you all, We thank you for joining us on this episode. We hope it was enjoyable and educational. Go follow @unveiledwife and check out some of her, some more of her things. She posts about them often. And again, we love you, and we look forward to having you next week, possibly as long as we don't have the baby before then, we'll get some episodes up. See you next week. Did you enjoy Today Show? If you did, it would mean the world to us if you could leave us a review on iTunes. Also, if you're interested, you can find many more encouraging stories and resources at marriageaftergod.com. And let us help you cultivate an extraordinary marriage.
