Debra Dadd: Chemical Crusader

Spreading the Word After Fighting an Environmental Illness

Ten years ago, Debra Lynn Dadd discovered that almost everything in her house was making her sick.

A promising young pianist, she had been disabled by a series of mysterious symptoms: insomnia, nausea, headaches, depression and--most frightening--a paralysis of her hands that came on without warning when she was practicing, or even performing.

She had first sought treatment for her illness in 1978, when her family lived in Contra Costa County, Calif., in what she calls "one of those cancer hot spots" where clusters of cancer cases have been found. Her mother was dying of the disease. As Dadd's symptoms worsened, her father persuaded her to see a doctor who had been treating her mother and who specialized in environmental illnesses. He had seen the doctor testing patient's who had symptoms similar to his daughter's.

The doctor diagnosed her illness without hesitation as "an immune system disorder now commonly referred to as environmental illness or chemical sensitivity." Dadd recalled in a recent interview. But it was two years later that she made the connection between her symptoms and the many household products she now believes are "toxic".

It was Dadd's illness and her research linking it to common household products that led her first to investigate environmental illness, then to write a series of books about how to live without using these products.

On a promotional tour for her latest book, Dadd recounted how she was treated at first with antigens, an allergy treatment. Eventually, she was told that "toxic substances" in the environment were, in effect, poisoning her.

"I said, "what toxic substances?" because we think that the government is protecting us and that they wouldn't allow anything to be "sold" that was toxic.

After her illness reached a crisis in December 1979, Dadd began to focus on what in her home might be harmful to her system.

As she undertook experiments in January of 1980, with one product after another, she made a series of discoveries: There was formaldehyde in her permanent-press sheets. There was chloroform in the steam from her daily shower. Volatile organic compounds were contained in a multitude of basic cleaning products.

For Dadd, petrochemical products were particularly aggravating to her condition. She discovered, she said with a chuckle, that they are in "practically everything".

Once she realized that common products were the source of her trouble, Dadd removed them from the condominium in Oakland where she had moved with her father after her mother's death. She stopped wearing perfume, made a filter for the showerhead, got rid of her bed and ripped out all the carpeting. Her health improved dramatically, she said.

Doctors specializing in environmental illness say some people can develop sensitivity to common chemical substances, which then can be toxic to them even in very small doses. Dadd maintains that some of the substances that made her sick are harmful to everyone, even those who are not chemically sensitive.

When Dadd began serious research on toxic chemicals in everyday products a decade ago, there was little published information about what household products are made of. Dadd called poison control centers to ask, "If somebody swallows a cleaning product what do you tell them is in it?"

Sometimes the centers "don't even know", she said.

She consulted toxicology textbooks and called manufacturers to ask about the ingredients in their products. She explored the thicket of government regulations and became familiar with the requirements of agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency and Federal Trade Commission. She found that fewer than 1,000 of the 48,000 chemicals listed by the EPA have been tested for immediate acute affects on human health and only about 500 for possible long-term effects.

Dadd went to work for a doctor who treated people with similar conditions. She interviewed patients and visited their homes to see what might be making them sick.

"At that time I was pretty sensitive--like human litmus paper", she said. If there were toxic substances in the home she would cough or the eyes would water. For the patient's she compiled lists of substitutes for many toxic household products.

In the course of her work, Dadd developed a long list of products she believed were "nontoxic". Many people who had heard of her work had asked for the list, so she decided to publish it herself in book form--about 200 photocopied pages, stapled and bound. Called "Consumer Guide for the Chemically Sensitive," the book sold 3,500 copies and brought her to the attention of established California publisher Jeremy Tarcher.

The publishing house has published three other books Dadd has written, including the latest, "Nontoxic, Natural and Earthwise" ($12.95 paperback). In these books Dadd analyzes the contents of hundreds of common products, using information from reference materials, government agencies and the manufacturers.

Some manufacturers "will go out of their way to supply me with whatever information I want," while some refuse, saying their ingredients are a trade secret. With some large companies she can call the toll-free customer service number and get a list of a product's ingredients. Others, she said, "have been stonewalling me for seven years."

Today Dadd, 35, has become a vocal proponent of nontoxic living. She has created something of a cottage industry with her books, a newsletter and frequent speaking engagements. She is able to charge $125 an hour for consulting jobs, advising people on how to remove toxic substances from their homes and businesses.

In one recent assignment, a computer company in Silicon Valley asked her to find out why an employee was getting sick in the office. She pointed out various sources of noxious fumes--rugs, partitions, photocopier chemicals, the ink of permanent markers. The company installed an air filter Dadd recommended and invited her back to re-inspect the offices.

As she became more aware of the effect of certain chemicals on her health, Dadd moved from the apartment in Oakland into a house in Inverness, near the ocean north of San Francisco. She made it into what she calls "the epitome of nontoxic living."

But living in a quiet, rural place with clean air made her think more about what was happening to the environment beyond her home, she said. Her first three books and her newsletter, "Everything Natural," had focused on personal health. But by 1987, before the latest resurgence of interest in the environment, she began to think about the broader effects of how she was living.

"I was reading a book about forestry...and it had this thing about water, describing how water evaporates, comes back down to earth as rain and snow, then goes back through earth, is revitalized and mineralized and comes up through a spring."

"I realized that is what nature had provided for us to drink. I felt very, very sad to think that I couldn't drink (naturally) clean water because we had polluted the earth to the point where there was none that I could find."

It then hit her that while she had been evaluating products from a health standpoint she had not considered how they affect the environment.

"I would look at a wood product and say it's natural because it's wood. I wasn't looking at whether it came from a clear-cut forest," she said.

Looking at her own life, Dadd concluded that she was damaging the environment by consuming and wasting too many things. "I was not recycling, I was wasting energy all over the place. I was only looking at how something affected me," she said.

"When you start putting environment issues into the picture, the whole thing changes," she said. "You need to look at a product from cradle to grave. You need to look at where it comes from, what kind of raw material it is made of, whether it is renewable, how the material is taken from earth, the manufacturing process of the product...what happens when you're through using it, how you dispose of it."

Her next move was to "simplify my life," and that meant getting rid of unnecessary possessions.

"I went through my house and had a garage sale. Everything I hadn't used in a year or two, I asked if I was likely to use in the next year or two. Practically everything went in the garage sale."

She sold dishes she had inherited from relatives, books and music she did not plan to use again, the piano she had not played for several months and many nonessential small kitchen appliances--a corn popper, an ice cream maker--that take up space and use energy.

Now she sweeps the floor instead of vacuuming and chops food with a knife instead of a food processor. "If you sweep instead of using a vacuum cleaner it gives you a little more exercise," she said, adding that it seems strange to use convenience appliances to make housework and gardening easier, then spend money to exercise at a gym.

Dadd's new concern with the environment led her to begin research on manufactured and homemade products that do not damage the environment. In "Nontoxic, Natural and Earthwise," she outlines the criteria she uses to determine whether products are "earthwise":

"They are made from renewable natural resources taken in a sustainable way, or made of recycled materials. They do not create pollution when grown or manufactured and can be disposed of safely."

The book rates hundreds of products, tells how to get those she considers acceptable and gives instructions on making homemade substitutes for those that are not.

She has revamped her newsletter and named it Earthwise.

Dadd is enthusiastically putting her new knowledge into practice in the 50-year-old house in Forest Knolls, in the hills north of San Francisco that she recently bought with her husband of two months, Larry Redalia, who owns a tree-trimming service.

When they discovered carpenter ant damage, for example, they declined to have the house treated with pesticide. Instead they found a pest control company that "took out the infested boards and replaced them. For the future, they plan to make the house unattractive to the pests by keeping it dry. In addition, they watch out for carpenter ants and "smash them manually," she said.

"We don't want to put toxic chemicals all over the house because they don't even totally control them anyway," she said.

The couple ripped out the house's wall-to-wall synthetic carpet and replaced it with pre-finished oak floors they installed themselves. They had the exterior painted with a German-made paint made of citrus oils and pine resin.

Plans for the future include solar photovoltaic cells to generate electricity and an organic garden.

Many of the natural products Dadd uses cost much more than those she considers toxic or damaging to the environment, but she maintains that the process of simplifying her life made it possible for her to spend more on things she considers important.

"If you're not constantly trying to keep up with consumerism and the latest fashions...you're not spending so much money."

"I don't buy hair spray or cigarettes or nail polish. I'm not buying packaged foods or soda pop. When you really start looking at all the unnecessary things that people spend their money on--if they would stop spending money on that they could afford these better-quality items."

As for the lack of convenience in homemade products, "How long does it take to fill a spray bottle with vinegar and water?" she asks. Instead of using the chemical cleaning products that line the aisles of supermarkets, Dadd cleans her house with vinegar and water, a powdered cleanser that has no chlorine and liquid soap. Instead of paper towels she uses "99-cent cotton towels over and over again."

Dadd does not fit the stereotype of the drab, humorless environmentalist. For her book tour she wore a dressy violet and green rayon skirt and matching loose-fitting jacket with a green silk blouse. Rayon, she explained, is made of cellulose and silk is made by silkworms; both are better than synthetic fabrics manufactured from petrochemicals.

She uses natural cosmetics, except for the mascara--"you can't get mascara without preservatives, because of eye infections. You keep putting the brush in your eye."

But, hey, nobody's perfect. Dadd has a few vices. The first, she admitted, while savoring a delicate fruit tart in the tearoom of a hotel during her book tour, is "desserts." Next is "long, hot showers," definitely energy wasters.

And, like all good Californians, Dadd is a slave to the internal combustion engine. At last count, she and her husband have four vehicles--a BMW, the tree truck, a Volkswagen Rabbit pickup and "Larry's Karmann Ghia." She bought the BMW, she said, "not because I'm a yuppie," but because German cars are built to last "a quarter of a million miles."

The couple plans to sell a couple of the vehicles, she said, and someday buy a "solar car with solar panels to recharge the battery."

"But that's still in the R & D stage."

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