So, a friend of mine called me a hypocrite recently in a heated discussion about where a new dad should go to register for a baby shower. I told him to avoid Toys R Us and to search out more natural product lines (cloth and wooden toys specifically) and to get an account with WishCentral.com in order to be able to add gift ideas from all over the internet, including and especially Etsy.
Said friend accused me of shoving my opinion down his throat. You can’t win them all. I guess I just thought (hoped) that most educated parents would be aware of all of the risks that plastic toys have, and that any educated person would choose the readily-available alternatives. Don’t ask me where to register if you’re not interested in hearing anything but Toys R Us (which, IMO, isn’t even the greatest place for cribs and strollers).
Anyway, the hypocrite part came from us enrolling Ash in daycare where they will inevitably offer plastic toys for him to play with. So, here’s my stance on that:
I do not buy plastic toys. Clive does on occasion, even from Toys R Us, much to my dismay. But he’s the dad and has a say in what Ash can play with, so I grin and bare it and remind Clive that all of my work to keep toxic chemicals out of the house is basically nullified with a giant plastic Dora the Explorer Diego Jeep that Ash can ride in.
Ash plays with plastic toys when we’re at the library or at friend’s houses, and it’s okay with me. He likes them, it’s not a long exposure and there’s nothing I can do about it. I’m not at playdates freaking out and holding Ash down to keep him away from anything plastic. He will play with them at daycare, and it’s something I accept. It doesn’t mean I like it. It doesn’t mean I’m a hypocrite.
If I had the funds to continue to stay at home, I would. If I didn’t want to get pregnant again and need to go on maternity leave, I would keep Ash at home and enroll him in activities to keep him entertained and thriving, but that’s just not the case. So, I have to go back to work and he has to go into daycare. Those are the facts, that’s the disappointing situation I’m in.
Plastic is not completely banned from my house. Ash’s dirty diapers are kept in a plastic pail while they’re ready to be washed. Last night we ate a pizza from a box and the pizza was wrapped in plastic. I have plastic containers for food (but avoid Tupperware brand: #7 plastic is sooooooooooo bad for you) and it’s #5 and I can deal with it. If I could afford to stock my kitchen with Pyrex products, I would. We make choices with what we can and can’t do, and for me, I’m slowly moving forward with improving the quality of all the products we have in our house to be as non-toxic as possible. It’s a process.
I live in a city and Ash is exposed to exhaust fumes on our daily walk, and even though it makes me really sad, we can’t live in the country because Clive’s job is in the city and neither of us want to commute. There are choices like this that we have to make every day, some of them are not the best, but that’s how life works.
I try to set up our lives so that we can live as non-toxically as possible, and hope that others do too. I think it’s extremely important to try to educate new parents who may not know anything else but a company with an advertising campaign worth millions- but I understand that I can only do so much, even if they’re seeking out my opinion.
Does that make me a hypocrite? No. It makes me human.
From: http://www.breastcancerfund.org/site/pp.asp?c=kwKXLdPaE&b=4956181
San Francisco—A scientific review article published in the International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health shows that a host of chemicals that mimic or alter the activities of natural hormones can potentially increase breast cancer risk…
“Early-life exposures to endocrine disruptors like phthalates and BPA—particularly during fetal development and childhood, but also continuing through first childbirth and breastfeeding—are closely linked to later-life breast cancer risk,”
From: http://www.mothering.com/articles/growing_child/consumerism/toxic_toy_story.html
One of the most frightening, I believe, is the possibility that phthalates may be chemicals that behave similarly to hormones in our bodies. Eight phthalates have been shown to be weakly estrogenic, which means they can cause responses in the body similar to those elicited by estrogen. …
Other Effects of Phthalates:
- DEHP has been shown to cause liver cancer in rats and is considered a potential human carcinogen.5
Rats exposed to DEHP over long periods exhibited kidney damage similar to that which is seen in humans undergoing long-term kidney dialysis.6- High doses of DEHP and di-n-butyl-phthalate (DBP) have been shown to affect reproduction and sperm production in rats, as well.7,8
- In the human body, DEHP is converted into mono-2-ethylhexyl-phthalate (MEHP). MEHP has been found to cause cardiac and respiratory arrest in rats.9
) it would have come off as information sharing rather than preaching. I think you are right that new parents need education, but its all about how they get that education. 
