Considering Coffee Culture

What's your poison?  Are you a Latte lass, a Mocha man, or an Americano afficionado?  Does the thought of starting or getting through the day without your caffeine fix leave you rigid with fear or dread? Have you got one of those t-shirts that says "Give me the coffee, and nobody gets hurt"?

To a lot of people, coffee's not important.  They don't understand what all the fuss about, and why this particular substance has now become the second most traded world commodity (after oil), and that's fair enough.  We can't all like the same things. But to those of us who love it or feel we cannot live without it, coffee feels like the closest thing to the prospect of eternal life.  With more than 20,000 coffee shops and an ever-growing number of branded chains in the UK alone, tea sales are reportedly in free-fall, as coffee officially outstrips Britain's "traditional" drink of choice.

But how sustainable is your coffee habit?  Do you buy your morning or lunchtime fix in a disposable cup that then has to be gotten rid of, or do you take your reusable mug to the shop and get them to fill it for you?  Do you buy "any old coffee as long as it's cheap", or your specific favourite, no matter where it's come from or how it's packaged?  Or are you committed to buying Fairtrade coffee in recyclable packaging? It may not be something you've even thought about, but maybe it's time to start.

Consider this: On average, most of the world's coffee is produced in third world countries, where the coffee farmers receive just 10% of the eventual retail price of all the coffee they produce.  This is largely because the supply chain that governs coffee is so complex.  The result is over 100 million people growing coffee around the world who have missed out, traditionally, on most of coffee's profit potential.   70% of growers are smallholders and, as competition grows, a combination of price reductions and price wars (which are great for us as consumers) has left them exposed to the fluctuations of an incredibly volatile market. Along with the negative impact this has had on their living conditions, the drive for increased output has had a domino effect on their environments as well, and given that most coffee growing regions are also home to some of the most delicate eco-systems on our planet, the potential for serious and long term - if not irreparable - damage is high.

Reports suggest that the biggest source of environmental damage sustained in coffee production happens during the production of the beans themselves. Coffee grown by traditional means has been cultivated under a shaded canopy of trees, providing an important habitat for native animals and insects as well as preventing topsoil erosion and removing the need for chemical-based fertilizers. But the global surge in demand has had a big impact on the growing methods used, with massive implications on sustainability. Market demand has outstripped supply for this form of agriculture to keep pace with, and the result is coffee being grown with no forested canopies, with fertilisers becoming a necessity with a seriously detrimental effect on biodiversity. As a consequence of the need to "upgrade" growing methods to keep pace with demand, millions of acres of forest across the world have been cleared to make way for coffee farming. The WWF have observed that 37 of the 50 countries in the world with the highest deforestation rates are also coffee producers.

Happily, awareness of the plight of these coffee growers is increasing among those who have the power to make a positive difference.  More importers and consumers are beginning to understand that Fairtrade coffee cuts out the middleman, which gives farmers' cooperatives the chance to deal directly with retailers and ensure that coffee is bought at a price in line with what it costs to produce. The extra proceeds the farmers glean are then plowed back into investment in social and business development projects in their local areas such as scholarship programmes, healthcare services and quality improvement training. Fairtrade also provides significant protection against market fluctuations that would otherwise threaten the farmers' ability to make a living wage. 

 According to the Fairtrade Foundation, more than 6.4 million cups of Fairtrade coffee are now consumed each day, as an active consumer choice. Organic coffee sales are steadily increasing and a whole host of new Fairtrade brands have appeared on supermarket shelves, which are providing a wider ethical choice. Nevertheless, Fairtrade's six million cups pales in comparison to the overall total of around 70 million cups of coffee being consumed per day. The message is getting through but at less than 10%, we still have a long way to go!

Fairtrade aside, when it comes to reducing the environmental impact closer to home of a daily coffee habit, more and more businesses are starting to incorporate sustainable practice into the way they do business in general, and are thinking more about the cups they provide to their customers to drink from.  The big coffee chains (and some of the smaller ones too!) are constantly attempting to source disposable cups that are kind to the environment. Your cardboard cup might look and feel recyclable, but think again - many manufacturers coat the inside of these with plastic that effectively stops the cardboard absorbing the coffee but renders the ability to separate the two substances, in order to recycle the cardboard outer, an expensive and complicated process. Manufacturers are finding and starting to offer biodegradable solutions, and the hope is that they will be able to produce them cost effectively enough for the chains to agree to buy them.  It's all about profit margins, of course!

But it's not just about what the businesses are doing.  As consumers, we ALSO have huge power to make a positive difference, through taking fair responsibility for our environment. And, with increasing numbers of us opting to live more sustainably and help to preserve what's left of our natural resources, the bigger coffee chains have started offering customers an attractive retail line in reusable mugs, in an effort to persuade them to ditch the disposable option and go for what's reusable. So have some of the Service stations that offer their own coffee brands aimed towards people obtaining fuel,  It's a lot more common now to see people wandering about with their coffee "on the go", in a properly branded or cheerful, designer or funky mug.  It's an important step forward, in reducing waste, since most disposable cups end up in High Street bins, or office wastepaper baskets, instead of in an appropriate recycling bin or box. It's not always realistic of course, to assume we can carry a reusable mug everywhere we go (particularly if we happen to have a super-small handbag!), but there's no harm in keeping one in the car, and using it when we get the chance.  After all, if we're getting a drive thru coffee, or doing a quick double-park to dash in and get one, it's no hassle to have a travel mug and take it with us, so they can pour our coffee straight into our very own mug.

For those of us who brew coffee at home, there are also some great ways to be sustainable with the waste.  While coffee machines that take metal or plastic cartridges have limited and perhaps questionable opportunities for recycling both the coffee and the cartridges, the good old fashioned coffee plunger or filter machine enables good access to dregs that can be used in a variety of ways. Adding coffee grounds to soil will reduce the pH level and it will turn your hydrangea flowers a beautiful blue. They'll keep slugs at bay, attract soil-enriching worms to your garden and keep cats out of it.  They will also unclog your drains (with enough running water to help them), absorb smells in the fridge, act as a flea repellent for your dog, blend with cream for a great exfoliation treatment, and more besides. Used coffee grounds are so recyclable, it would be a huge opportunity lost, not to use them.

70 million cups of coffee drunk here in the UK every single day is a lot, and however much of that is served up in disposable cups that end up in landfill is still too much.  And those farmers across the world who help to make all that coffee available, and who have yet to get on the Fairtrade wagon, are struggling endlessly to provide for their families as the rise and fall in raw coffee prices leaves them uncontrollably vulnerable to the effects of the fluctuations.

We love our tipple, but we do need to protect it, and bring an end to the unfair exploitation of the people who provide it for us.  We also need to consider our own environment, and the implications of all that landfill.  Our disposable cups don't end up in a vortex that sucks them into some black hole and out of existence.  They stay here on earth, clogging up the landfill sites and taking forever to decompose.  Polystyrene, in particular, is a nasty substance that still awaits a really responsible way to be recycled.  It's less common than it used to be, but it's still out there, and we need to avoid it, so the demand falls to the level where it's no longer an option for production.

Next time you're enjoying a lovely, well-earned cup of coffee, spare a thought for the farmer who brought it to you, and his family, and what feels like well-earned to him.  Look at the cup you're using, and think about where it will go after you've finished with it. We can still enjoy our coffee as much as we ever have, but making responsible choices about the kind we buy, and what we do with the leftovers, organic and non-organic, needs to become an important part of that enjoyment.    

Last Tango In Phoneland

How many of us have old mobile phones hanging around in drawers or cupboards at home, that we once had plans for, but which now simply languish, forgotten and gathering dust? I've just put my own hand up, here, remembering at least two of these old relics, seething with evil chemicals and chock-full of recyclable parts, that have just been lying around 'while I made a decision on what to do with them', and I've simply got busy and forgotten all about them.  Now those old phones of mine (and probably yours as well!) are more or less obsolete, so of no real use as devices fit for modern-day purpose, as far as most users would want. But don't worry - that doesn't mean they can't find another, responsible destiny...

Most of us know that mobile phones have a rough shelf life of two good years, maximum, so its not long before they are replaced, which means that there are an awful lot just lying around.  They also contain a variety of components, such as plastics and metals - some of which are potentially valuable and reusable, such as silver. While that phone lying there at the back of the drawer probably won't make you rich with its silver content, it does have value in any number of ways, to other people if not to you.  Charities such as Oxfam and the Red Cross will accept old phones, as they can get money for them when they send them to phone recyclers.  Friends or family can often be grateful for the temporary use of an "old" mobile phone that still works, if they've broken or lost their own and are awaiting a replacement.  I had a friend come over to stay with me from another country, so she was able to borrow my old phone on a PAYG plan while she was here that worked out a lot cheaper than the international roaming plan she was on from her own country. 

Working phones can be sold on eBay or via the various second hand and pawn shops dotted around in most towns and cities. Your chances of getting the best price are greatly enhanced if you still have the original box, operating instructions and any dedicated accessories that make the phone an attractive prospect, such as a spare battery, good quality earphones, car charger, etc.  Just be aware of what commission you may have to pay in any selling process before you make the deal.  By the time eBay has taken its commission, you might have ended up with a better price from a High Street pawn shop!

But what of the phones that are too old, obsolete, broken, or simply dead for reasons unknown?  Sometimes, unless you have insurance, it's cheaper to buy a new phone than to get an existing one fixed.  What's meant to happen to those? You can of course simply take them to a local household waste and recycling centre and put them into a designated container, but charity shops (and their beneficiaries) will be a lot more grateful for the same sort of effort you would make doing that, to be directed towards them instead, to enable them to dispose of the phones responsibly and derive a little income from doing it. 

Well, aside from the already mentioned charity shops, old dead phones can also be offloaded on freebie websites, since there's always someone who wants to use them for repair practice, working on the basis that they do sometimes get lucky, get them working and make a little profit.  The various internal parts can be valuable to someone who knows what they're doing, for largely the same reasons.  Mobile phones contain aerials, battery connectors, PCBs (printed circuit boards), connectors including gold-coated edge contacts on PCBs, ICs (integrated circuits), keyboards, LCD screens, lenses, microphones, phone housings, screws, SIM card assemblies and speakers. 

When a mobile phone has dished up all its bits of any value, it is then typically ground up, and all remaining useful metal content is extracted, including the metal in the battery. So there's a lot more of value than you first might think.  And someone who knows how to get at the silver, through the dedicated process of extraction, is definitely onto something and will happily run off into the sunset with that antiquated brick you used to love!  The plastic bits are also recoverable, and can be re-formulated to be used as various industrial and domestic mouldings.

The Responsibility

Mobile phone disposal should never be included in the conventional dumping of household waste.  Why?  Because plastic doesn't break down, metals can corrode, and valuable resources that could have been recycled in any number of positive ways are left to languish in the earth.  Even more importantly, mobile phones contain some incredibly nasty chemicals such as lead, mercury, bromine, and cadmium.  Let's take a look at these little lovelies that have been nestling nicely next to your ear for however long...

Lead: research suggests that lead exposure (particularly in children) leads to growth, hearing and concentration problems, along with headaches, dizziness, nausea, vomiting, digestive problems, learning disabilities, antisocial behaviour and even brain damage.

Mercury: long term exposure to mercury can lead to memory problems, double vision or blindness, tachycardia, hypertension, seizures and potentially death.

Bromine: bromine poisoning lowers blood pressure and can lead to brain or permanent kidney damage.  The central nervous system can be affected, and thyroid function can be impaired, leading to memory problems, learning difficulties and hyperactivity.

Cadmium: compelling research indicates that this well known carcinogen can also cause lung inflammation, respiratory failure, gene mutations, DNA breaks and cell transformation, leading to severe and sometimes fatal birth defects.

So, overall, not the happiest of lists then, huh? And not the kind of stuff we'd happily be responsible for allowing to seep into places where it could cause real and serious harm...

More information about the toxicity threat of exposure to mobile phone components can be found by clicking the blue skull!

Left in landfill sites, and not responsibly recycled, mobile phones can leach these and other toxic chemicals into the earth, which can find their way into vital water systems and compromise human and animal health.  Not only is it irresponsible to dispose of mobile phones (and other electronic items too, such as laptops etc) in such a way, it is also a missed opportunity - to reuse valuable resources that are finite on our planet.

So even if you've got an old dinosaur-phone that you don't believe anyone else would want, think again!  And, rather than having it sitting there forever and a day, ageing not-so-gracefully, gurgling away with all its chemicals, attracting layer upon layer of dust or lying forlornly in a forgotten box somewhere under the bed, if it's not heavy enough to weigh down a dead body (in those times when you need that), it probably isn't of any real use to you.

If it has no real resale value and you need to get rid of it, please do think about your local charity shop.  There's bound to be one, not far from where you live, that you could drop it into.  Charity shops need all the help they can get.  They work hard to help the less fortunate, and supporting them by donating your old mobile phone does three significant things: 1) the charity gets a little money for the phone to use to help its beneficiaries, 2) the components are dealt with safely and appropriately recycled to avoid harm to health and the environment, and 3) one more old dust trap is gone from your house! 

Disclaimer: The information in this article has been directly derived from online research publications, and no responsibility can be taken for any inaccuracies thus reported.

Paper Boys and Girls!

It’s funny how often a random conversation or occurrence will deliver a subject for my blog to me, usually when I’m sitting wondering what to write about.  This morning, it was my partner exclaiming over how many pieces of paper he found he had in his hand, as receipts for a one-off purchase at the local garage!  There were three pieces of paper in total – a till receipt, a card payment receipt, and an advice about a special offer.  Three separate pieces of paper, printed with the kind of ink that fades within a day of being touched or left in the sun so it needs to be either quickly squirreled away for safe keeping or instantly binned as irrelevant.

It kind of begs the question – why, in a so-called “electronic society”, do we still need so much paper?  Back in the olden days when we needed a paper trail to account for everything, long before internet banking took over and simplified it all, it made sense to have lots of receipts attesting to what we’d spent.  After all, our accountants used to shout at us if we couldn’t provide hard evidence for every last penny.  Nowadays, our bank statements do it for us, and there are various online systems that allow us to code and channel it all appropriately.  And even if we do still need evidential receipts, why does so much paper have to be involved?  Three receipts?  At the supermarket it is often more than that.  Usually there will be a coupon-shaped receipt informing us of how many pennies we’ve saved at Tesco by not shopping at Sainsbury’s, or vice versa. Half of the coupons for savings are only useful when you buy a certain brand of something, and are therefore only relevant to a small sector of the community who actually likes or wants to try that product.  The rest of us just stuff them into handbags, purses or pockets, to surface later as out of date, unreadable, or fluffy flotsam in the washing machine and all through the clothes.

You may or may not know that it takes roughly 24 trees to produce one tonne of paper, and you also may or may not know that here in the UK alone we are using TWELVE AND A HALF MILLION TONNES  of paper per year.  That’s a lot of trees.  No wonder the forests are thinning out so alarmingly across the world, reducing so many wildlife habitats in the process.  Those forests simply aren’t re-growing at the same rate at which they’re being decimated. And, since recycled paper produces a staggering 73% less air pollution than paper produced from raw materials, it makes more sense than anything else, to do just that.

Happily most recycling centres do accept paper, in various forms, such as magazines, phone books and catalogues, along with newspapers, flyers, cardboard and office paper.  It’s good that we are encouraged to recycle paper through the simple, convenient process of council collection, because if it was much more difficult than putting out the bin each week, we’d all be recycling a lot less.  Who has the time or space to collect waste paper and take it to the right place for recycling?   It needs to be convenient, literally on our doorstep, or we just don’t tend to do it. 

As important as it is to recycle what we’ve already produced, it makes even more sense to cut down on what we produce in the very beginning.  Even small pieces of paper, like till receipts, can start to mount up.  I’ve lost count of the times I’ve cleaned out a handbag and found a ridiculous amount of paper I haven’t so much as looked at since the moment it was put into my hand.  It floats around in the bottom of my bag and by the time I fish it out, most of it is unreadable anyway. Into the recycling bag it goes, if I’m anywhere near one.  If I’m not, it simply goes into a bin somewhere, if I’m out and about and finally sick of not being able to find whatever it is I’m really looking for in my bag, for so much paper being in the way.

Companies are notorious for the chronic waste of paper.  Since I changed to online bank statements and billing systems, I’ve noticed a huge drop in the piles of paper that tend to accumulate around the house, but some companies still send several pieces of correspondence to me in different envelopes, often within a day or two of each other.  Once, from Companies House, I received four separate letters in different envelopes within two days.  I do appreciate that the operating systems for companies and corporations may not lend themselves to compiling correspondence from different departments and sending it all out as one letter in one envelope, but surely there is something that can be done about the sheer volume of mail that gets sent in such a way?  How many more trees will it take?

Junk mail is also becoming more of a problem, and I have now resorted to putting a “no circulars” sign on my letterbox flap to try and stem the tide.  The run-up to Bank Holidays and Christmas are notorious times, when we can expect an avalanche of special offers to come storming through the flap, enticing us to enter their stores with the only type of paper they are interested in seeing – the lovely flash of cash.  And I guess it probably works.  My new sign means I don’t get to take advantage of some of these offers, but I’d rather go and hunt for what I want online and Google the specials, than deal with the relentless deluge of mail that comes marching into my house uninvited. It seems that every week we are throwing out a full bin of cardboard and paper, at least half of which I haven’t asked for and have no interest in reading.  I wouldn’t mind if it was paper bags for my fruit and vegetables, which I buy from the local Farmer’s Market, but they are still using plastic, and don’t get me started here on the perils of plastic, as that’s a whole ‘nother blog!

Overall, despite the electronic technology available to us all, we are still producing far too much un-necessary paper.  As individuals there’s a lot we can do to cut down on the amount of paper we manufacture and consume.  Since shop keepers seem relentlessly determined to foist receipts upon us for every little thing we buy, there’s not much we can do to avoid them, at least until they can figure out a better way of offering us proof of purchase.  But there are ways in which we can contribute to the ongoing regeneration of existing paper.

Buying recycled is a great way to start.  Just be aware that all recycled paper is not the same.  If something goes wrong in the milling process, the virgin pulp is often reused to make a fresh batch, and it is – technically – “recycled”.  When buying new paper, buying 100% post consumer waste recycled is making a significant contribution to the reduction in the number of trees that will need to be cut down for “virgin” paper, which is not necessarily of any better quality.  Toilet paper, printing paper, packaging and other forms of paper and cardboard can be purchased as recycled, with no compromise in the quality.  Some of the packaging on items from supermarkets is classed as recycled, so it pays to look at the labels.  Using reusable shopping bags helps as well, even though they are a bigger combatant against plastic.

Switching to online banking statements and other utility billing will dramatically reduce the amount of paper that comes into the home. So will paying attention to what you order online, because this is a really big factor in how much junk mail you end up getting.  Ensuring you tick the box rejecting unwanted mail from the companies you use, or from their ‘associate compatible’ partner companies, will mean you get fewer unwanted circulars to then have to dispose of.  You can also opt out of receiving telephone directories and catalogues for companies who also offer access to their wares online.

Many home printers now have a duplex function, enabling you to print double sided, which cuts down on the over-use of fresh paper.  When cutting and pasting information, particularly from the internet, reducing the spaces between blocks of text can dramatically reduce the amount of paper you need to use, to print a document.

All this aside, you can actually reuse a lot of the paper that somehow manages to make its way into the home. 

• Buying a cheap shredder will enable you to shred all kinds of paper items and use the shredding for packaging, for bird, hamster or guinea pig beds, and for compost.  Not all councils accept shredder paper for recycling, as its value is much less than intact paper and it creates a lot of mess in the streets if it’s unescured, so you do need to be careful when shredding, that you don’t produce more than what you need. 
• Old Christmas cards can be glued into a “Santa Scrapbook”, and sent to the Children’s Wards of various hospitals.  It’s a nice project for the kids to do over the holidays or on rainy days.  You can also make bunting from the card faces for decorations for their bedrooms. 
• Toilet roll centres can be folded up inside one another until full and then used as “briquettes” for lighting the fire.  They can also be used in the garden to protect young seedlings when they first poke their heads above the soil.  
• Gift wrap, ribbons and tissue paper can be reused. The backs of used envelopes are handy for jotting down shopping lists or notes. The blank backs of non-confidential letters can be cut into four to make note paper. 
• Magazines can be shared with friends, or donated to your local doctor or dentist surgery. 
• Newspapers can be used to make pots for seedlings.  They also act as insulation in a variety of situations.  I remember I once rode a motorcycle in the pouring rain for three hundred and fifty miles with a newspaper stuffed down the front of my jacket.  It kept me completely dry!  I also had one under my coir doormat, which helped protect the porch floor in winter. Just be careful that your newspaper insulation doesn’t become any kind of fire hazard!  

There’s no doubt we are getting more savvy about recycling, and paper is one of the easiest and friendly substances to regenerate.  Councils are helping, but we can’t rely on them to deal with all of it, or provide all the answers.  We need to think for ourselves about how we can reduce the pressure on our environment caused by the over-production and waste management of paper and its associated by-products, and put that thought into action.

I’d love to hear about any paper saving or recycling ideas that people are putting into practice.  Please do share your thoughts and ideas here, because if we can all help one another learn and do, it can only lead to a better world for the future generations who stand to inherit it.  It will be fabulous if they can still have plenty of trees to look at, and to purify the air they need to breathe!   

        

Deadly Nightshade In the Garden of Friends

Many years ago, I stood speechless one day while a friend barged into my house unannounced, wandered over to my china cabinet, pulled out a crystal tumbler and wandered over to the sink to help herself to a glass of water. She did know where the normal glasses were kept, and she knew I only used the crystal ones for dinner parties and other special occasions. I guess she forgot.  As she filled her glass, she told me for the hundredth time how annoying her kids were, how her high-earning husband didn't understand her need to have a spa weekend away from the family, how they’d made a mistake buying such a big house, how much she wanted to throw in her part time job, how angry she was at her parents who had given up their whole established lives and flown half way around the world in their mid seventies to live closer to the grandchildren but who had decided to buy their own flat and not invest in her house as she originally expected them to, and what a pain it was to be her.  Then she asked me if I would have her kids (yet again) the following afternoon in the gap between school ending and her being able to pick them up after work.

I wanted to remind her, nicely of course, that we were renting a small uglyish house, my husband was establishing a new business and cash was incredibly tight so a spa weekend for me was a pipe dream, her two sons were healthy, happy and beautiful, I had just one useless parent (who didn’t give a damn about me at all), I was trying to find a rare part time job myself, I’d had her kids six times in the past fortnight over what was to have been a once a week arrangement, and I’d really have liked to tell her what a pain it was, right at that moment, to be me.

Did I say any of it?  No.  I didn't say a word, because she knew all of that.  She already knew that her life was so much better than mine on almost every possible level. She was my friend, after all.  I suddenly felt a bit sick, so I invented a headache and asked her politely if she wouldn't mind leaving. I knew right at that moment, while she stood there disrespecting me and my property and my life, that she was a toxic friend.

For a long time now, there have been a lot of resources available to help us understand what abusive domestic relationships look and feel like, and there are, thankfully, plenty of support systems in place to help us transcend them. But a different type of abusive relationship that has been flying under the radar for as long as humans have been talking to one another is now emerging as a bonafide hotbed of hurt and confusion .  Friendships can ALSO be portals to abuse of various kinds, principally emotional and exploitative, and while toxicity within these relationships has historically never enjoyed the same level of public discussion, attitudes to what should be kept behind closed doors are thankfully changing and it is becoming increasingly more obvious that abusive friendships are, sadly, just as prevalent as “romantic” or domestic ones.

Until relatively recently, most of us have simply assumed that our friendships would not be portals for abuse.  Whether or not that’s because we’ve traditionally always assumed ourselves to have invested less in them emotionally, or whether our own levels of vulnerability have precluded us from analysing the reality of how our friendships really function, its only since people have started identifying the phenomenon of “toxic friendships” and openly speaking about them, that the rest of us feel legitimate in acknowledging that to be involved with toxic people WHATEVER the relationship, is unacceptable.  It’s a great step forward and personally I give thanks to those pioneers in pain for their courage in speaking out and helping, though that process, to turn this taboo subject into a table topic.

We all know about the guys who beat their wives, and the women who psychologically torture their partners.  “Hen-pecked husbands” used to be a subject of ridicule, but not anymore.  We also know about people who beat or starve their own kids to death, workplace bullies, and the power-hungry’s victimization of the vulnerable.  But our friendships have traditionally been regarded as our “safe harbour”, a safety net, where the same sense of responsibility and serious work that keeps a relationship healthy doesn't apply. Traditionally, it has taken some form of monumental betrayal of one party to a friendship to convince the other that a parting of the ways is warranted.  But a far more insidious form of betrayal or disloyalty can infiltrate a friendship, take root, and cause untold damage to a person’s self esteem, prospects or opportunities and it happens and ends up being perpetuated because the person who experiences the misery simply (but wrongly) feels less justified or validated in terminating the friendship.

Well, newsflash, everyone: If you’re feeling unhappy, anxious or resentful about spending time with someone in your social circle, it doesn’t automatically mean you’re wrong, paranoid, irrational or deluded about the true status of the friendship, even if voicing your concerns prompts others to denigrate them as such.  You may be a little over-sensitive, but you’ll know that about yourself already, and if that’s all it is, it’s probably time for a conversation with the person concerned, to clear all that up.  But, in reality, if there are people in your friendship network who have a negative impact on your mood and/or view of your own life, it’s time to take a step back, reassess that relationship, consider the value of it to your life, and walk away if necessary.  

As true as all this is, it’s also important that we look at our own role in a toxic friendship.  If we’re in the habit of picking bad partners, it’s a pretty safe bet that we may also not make the best choices of who to have as friends.  Many of us have been involved with the bad boys in the hope that we could change them, and ended up heartbroken as a result.  Just as many of us have picked up the lame ducks in the hope that we could fix them, and ended up just as heartbroken as a result.   But here’s another newsflash: in real life, the frogs are simply frogs in our garden.  They don’t turn into princes, no matter how many times we kiss them. 

Consider too, the charismatic, successful, glittery person that everybody loves and wants to spend time with – we might want to be that person’s friend because we think that some of the success, glitter and popularity will rub off onto us and magically transform our own lives.  Since it’s the normal human condition to want what we don’t have, the target of our affection (even as a friend) very likely possesses qualities we wish we had ourselves.  We are naturally drawn to people we perceive as being in a position to fill our lack.  Newsflash Number Three: Such people are often simply a glittery wrecking ball to our self development and sense of self worth. All too often, those princes and princesses we gravitate towards because they have the qualities we wish we had ourselves are actually narcissistic prima donnas; wolves in sheep’s clothing, absorbing the adoration and indulging in the exploitation of others in whatever way works best for them in shoring up whatever they lack for themselves.

None of this is to imply, however, that a toxic friendship is always our own fault. Nobody goes into a friendship expecting or deserving to be treated badly, disrespected, made to feel inadequate or unworthy, or abused in any other way.  Making a mistake is one thing.  Failing to acknowledge it and remaining miserable is quite another, and that is something we DO have to take responsibility for. Its a common thing that people who don't "pull the pin" sometimes feel that they can't face doing it.  The thought of being without that person is simply too awful.  We maybe clinging to the hope that things will improve, the toxic friend will see the light, its "just a phase" that will pass.  There are endless justifications for remaining in these destructive friendships, but the reality is that over time they are incredibly dangerous to both our self esteem and our view of our place in the world.

We’ve all had at least one friend in our lives who has perpetually reminded us that they’re better, or better off, than us in some way.  We’ve listened to them banging on about how great they are and how wonderful their lives are compared with our own, or what’s preventing them from being happy despite their current blessings.  We’ve had friends that have “teased” us in a crowd, with an underlying lack of awareness of how hurtful that can be, or an actual streak of menace, with either disregard being a simple lack of respect for us as people.

                                        

We've also had the “poor me’s” whose lives are like an endless soap-opera of the worst kind of drama, chaos and negativity, who soak up our positive energy like sponges, leaving us dry and depleted.  There’s a great story about the tree and the vine, that I’ll share with you here.  Generally speaking there are two types of people – trees and vines.  Vines will find trees, wrap themselves around them and leach all the goodness out of them for their own survival.  Then, when a tree is dead, what happens to the vine?  Does it die?  Hell no!  It simply goes and finds another tree.  Even some of the most successful people are vines, when it comes to their friendships.  Their own needs and desires simply eclipse anyone else's - even the people they regard as friends.

These are all people who are obsessed with their own real or perceived status: be it success, attractiveness, wealth, power, as well as ill-health, ugly appearance, lack of social interaction, financial destitution, and various other areas of powerlessness or dysfunction.  These people are true toxins.  They don’t want to know about us - not really!  They just want us to empower them to stay where they are in life.  Our happiness is irrelevant to these people. In no way can we class them as friends!

If a friend is genuinely struggling with issues that are overwhelming them, being the best friend we can to them at that time is critically important to ourselves as well as to them.  Knowing the difference between a person who is genuinely in need of our support, and one who’s simply being manipulative and exploitative of us in their own self absorption is critical to yanking out a toxic weed from our lovely garden of friendships and keeping ourselves intact in the process.

When friendships matter to us we absolutely do invest in them: emotionally, financially, practically and with genuine desire to have and be a really good friend, and the thought of losing any friendship we've invested in can be incredibly sad.  But the question to ask is whether or not being in that relationship actually makes us happy.  We’ve all muttered to ourselves in the past “I’d rather be on my own than in a horrible relationship”, when a romantic one goes bad.  Newsflash Number Four: FRIENDSHIPS ARE NO DIFFERENT!

People who take away our joy or positive sense of self have nothing positive to offer our lives.  Friendships that don’t enrich us are not worth having.  Nobody has the right to make us feel less worthy, less capable, less optimistic – especially not someone who’s in our lives wearing the label “friend”. 

Dealing with toxic friendships can be tricky. If the problems have gone beyond being able to talk about what’s upsetting us, or the energy to do so is just no longer there, it’s ok to walk away.  I did that once with someone I went to university with who used me for a long time and gave me nothing in return for my time, money, energy or support.  I lent her some books that she knew were hard to replace, and I never got them back.  I just got fed up with her in the end, and stopped communicating.  She never chased me up, which proved how irrelevant I really was to her, once I’d fallen off her radar of resources.  Another "friend" did something really horrible to me, including attempting to play me off against one of the loveliest friends in my garden, at a time when I was dealing with a lot of scary stuff.  Instead of offering me support she tried to shaft me in her own self interest.  I tried to communicate with her privately about it and she responded in the most savage way imaginable.  I had truly loved her, so it was a heartbreaking thing to find out what she was really like. And that I guess is one of the biggest hazards.  Sometimes toxic “friends” won’t reveal their hand until ALL the chips are down.  We won’t see it coming, and that makes it all the more devastating when such parasites show their true colours.

Sadly, toxic friends (whether obvious or not) are a reality that most of us will have to deal with at some point in our lives.  There are a lot of damaged people out there who are actively seeking to have their needs met, and they won’t care who they choke, sacrifice or step on in the process of making that happen. But we all need our own blood for our own survival.  We can’t afford to be giving it to those who wouldn't do the same for us.

Friendship should be mutually enriching, encouraging, uplifting, positively challenging, affirming, kind, respectful and FUN. A person who brings none of those qualities to your garden of friendship has no place there.  It really IS better to be alone than to be in a bad relationship that chokes your chances of finding a good one.  Even if it hurts, pull the weeds out. Know that who you have in your gorgeous garden of colourful, fragrant friends are beautiful birds, butterflies and blooms who truly deserve to be there!

"Flying" into Summer?

Summer’s almost here, and by the time it comes, most of us are thinking barbecues and garden parties, sun screen and skimpy frocks, floppy hats and footwear, and a host of other fabulous individual things that represent for each and every one of us, the very best bits of summer.     

But the happy sunshine season also brings pestilence in the form of BUGS - wasps, flies, mosquitoes and other insects - that worry or annoy us in various degrees.  The ads on the telly start early, planting the seed that we need be ready to deal with summer pests before they even dare to set wing or crawly foot inside our homes. So the supermarkets gird their loins and brace themselves for the inevitable landslide of people waving money at them for bug spray. 

But what are they buying?  Yes, okay, a pest destructing, bug-busting device in an aerosol can, and there is no doubt whatsoever that it works.  We've all seen flies in their fizzing death throes on the windowsills or bashing at the glass in a vain attempt to get out as their bodies become paralyzed mid flight.  I find it hard to tolerate wasps, flies and other flying/crawling threats to my environment myself, but the idea of condemning them to an agonized death with chemicals is an uncomfortable one for me, and not only because I believe that no living creature deserves to die in agony.  I also know – beyond all doubt – that an aerosol of fly spray, while quick and effective – is potentially lethal to human and pet health too.  Some of the documented effects are almost too horrible to describe.

But, bug-busters, please bear with me while I try. 

The main active ingredient in most of the mainstream bug sprays available from supermarkets is a chemical called Permethrin, a strong synthetic pesticide, which can cause dangerous symptoms in humans with prolonged or excessive exposure. It is is also used to treat human head and body lice, keep crops pest-free and protect animals from ticks and fleas.  The chemicals kill insects by blocking the transmission of messages in the nervous system. The human nervous system is less susceptible to these chemicals both because of our larger size and because humans and many other mammals have detox mechanisms to help rid the body of these chemicals. However, recent studies indicate that prenatal and infant exposure may lead to cognitive and developmental problems later on.

Low-level exposure is (apparently?) not generally an issue, but ingestion and inhalation of large amounts of this substance can be dangerous.  When it comes into contact with the skin, it produces a burning and tingling sensation. If it enters the eyes, Permethrin generally causes an intense burning. In such cases, experts recommend repeated washing of the eyes for a full 30 minutes after exposure and seeking medical attention. Ingestion of this chemical is associated with severe abdominal symptoms such as diarrhoea and vomiting, and inhalation can cause respiratory distress and coughing. Prolonged exposure can have different poisoning symptoms than acute exposure. Those who work with this chemical on a daily basis sometimes begin to experience neurological symptoms with side effects such as tremors, headaches and a tingling sensation in the fingers and toes. If exposure persists, more severe neurological effects, such as memory loss and/or seizures, can occur. Proper precautions, such as the use or respiratory masks and hazard suits, should be taken by all of those who regularly exposed to Permethrin, and that’s all well and good, but the average householder running around with a can of fly spray doesn't usually think about such precautions.  The rationale is that it’s a quick burst of spray.  But whether that constitutes a little or a lot of exposure is debatable, depending on the volume and frequency, and we run the risk of making potentially life-threatening assumptions about individual tolerance levels of different sized humans and animals who stand to be affected by the toxic effects.  In the distant past, as I’m seriously arachnophobic, I've sprayed what some might regard as an excessive amount of bug spray at a spider and almost choked to death at roughly the same speed as I felt my eyeballs being singed and stripped of their membranes.  If I’d persevered with doing that every day, or even just once a week, every week for however many years, maybe I’d be dead by now, or suffering from some irreversible form of neurological damage.  It doesn't bear thinking about.

Although they are modelled on the naturally occurring pyrethrin which is found in chrysanthemum flowers, synthetic pyrethroids are more toxic to animals and humans, and much longer-lasting in the environment.  The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has found that permethrin, as one member of the pyrethroid class in particular, is likely to be carcinogenic to humans. Young children are particularly at risk as they are in constant contact with surfaces that may have been treated and frequently put their hands in their mouths. People can also absorb the chemicals through the skin while bathing a pet or from lice shampoos.

Putting pyrethroids to one side for a moment, bug sprays contain other powerful toxins too, such as DICHLOROVOS, which has been found to contain carcinogenic properties, and various other organophosphate compounds which, through a specific chemical process, cause the flying creature’s muscles to “lock up”, thereby paralyzing its ability to breathe or fly.  As humans, we inhale it and repeated use of it enables the toxic chemicals to accumulate in our body, and the jury is still well and truly out as to whether our biological systems really ARE capable of breaking them down and successfully eliminating them.  So without knowing that we can, why take the gamble? And even if we knew we could, what have our poor little livers done to deserve such a vicious attack?  Why would we put our bodies through a process which is not only potentially life threatening, but completely unnecessary?

There’s also an ongoing debate about whether exposure to fly spray and other home and garden pesticides significantly increases the chance of contracting Parkinson’s disease, which is incurable and neurologically degenerative.  Parkinson's occurs due to a loss of nerve cells in the brain, and the symptoms emerge when around 70% of cells have been lost.  While it’s not known why these nerve cells die, research suggests that people exposed to insecticides in the home are 70 percent more likely to develop Parkinson's than those who have not been exposed.  That’s a pretty high percentage.  And, while no specific guidelines regarding avoidance of pesticides can be given, we do have to acknowledge that this is an area of public health importance that needs to be pursued with additional studies to either underpin or refute its findings, because it’s about human and animal health, and few things are more serious, in reality.  

There is also evidence to suggest that the use of insecticides produces various nerve problems and leukaemia.  A study conducted in the USA in 2002 (read about it here) showed that the use of professional pest control during prenatal or the first three years of a child’s life was at least twice as high for families whose children had leukaemia compared to families of healthy children. Overall, children with leukaemia were almost three times as likely to have been exposed at one of those points compared with healthy children. That is really scary.

So, on lots of levels, there is deeply serious concern about the use of pesticides around children.  One particularly hideous case was that of a newborn baby boy in Spain, who lived with his family in a house with a severe cockroach infestation. The mother used a full litre bottle of bug spray every other day, to try to keep the bugs under control. The father worked in an orchard as a fruit fly fumigator and was careful to change his clothes before he came home from work. The baby boy was born with his bladder outside his body, rather than inside it, and his blood tested positive for Permethrin, the horror we’ve already talked about here. This incredibly nasty substance mimics estrogen in developing female babies and works as an anti-testosterone in developing male babies. When an embryo is exposed to chemicals in this class during the fifth to seventh weeks of pregnancy, the "plumbing" of the urogenital tract fails to form.  The bladder can remain outside the body, and the genital organs may be replaced by an open cavity, even when the child is genetically male. Baby girls can develop normal external genitalia but may suffer reproductive failure later in life.

Most of us adore our cherished pets.  We need to remember that they can’t tell us if they are suffering, they simply have to hope that we notice, and if we’re really busy we may not, straight away.  Insecticides of all kinds, including aerosol bug sprays, are desperately dangerous to pets, including fish, since the sprayed substance floats on top of the water and leaches poison into it. Although dogs can to some degree detoxify these chemicals, cats are more susceptible and can suffer tremors, twitching, convulsions and even death, if pyrethroid-containing products designed to rid them of their own parasites are misused or over-used.  Birds don’t stand much of a chance at all, since their bodies, lungs and membranes are so small and fragile.

And here’s another little nugget: in addition to all this, spraying fly spray in a poorly ventilated area renders the atmosphere explosive, and there are documented cases of people having incinerated their homes by using heavy amounts of fly spray and then having an innocuous spark (e.g. from a computer or light bulb) act as a detonator.  It’s a rare phenomenon, obviously, as there would otherwise be more general knowledge about it, but the fact that it happens at all raises serious questions about the sensibility of having something with that kind of capability in the house, particularly when there are safe and easy alternatives.

So given all of the above, do we seriously want to run this kind of risk, simply to get rid of a few flies? My answer is no.

The other worrying thing that tends to fly under the radar of most people is the fact that empty aerosol cans of bug spray are classifiable as hazardous waste.   Such items can't be thrown in the garbage or down the drain -- the residue just ends up in a river, or other mainstream waterway. And if you're on septic tanks, those chemicals can kill the good bugs in your tanks that effectively process your septic waste. Even if it ends up in a landfill, pesticide can leach out and find its way into drinking water supplies. Burying hazardous waste is also inadvisable, unless you want to turn your garden into a toxic waste dump, especially if you unwittingly combine certain chemicals that have the potential to create an explosive or corrosive compound.  The typical household accumulates, over time, bug spray, drain cleaner, old paint, used motor oil, swimming or spa pool chemicals, old lighter fluid, nail polish and remover, old batteries, rat poison, unused electronic items, compact fluorescent lights (CFLs), and dozens of other ordinary consumer products that are hazardous to people and the environment.  Most of us do accumulate toxic and hazardous material simply by just shopping like ordinary people, and as yet some of it cannot be realistically avoided, so how we use and dispose of it all is a serious issue that needs to be dealt with responsibly.  The easiest and safest solution for the disposal of toxic waste is to gather it up and take it to your local hazardous waste disposal centre every few months. And, obviously, exploring the safer options that currently are available for certain hazardous products makes more sense from the outset.

Flies and bugs are usually in a habit of living and nesting in unhygienic conditions. Keeping your home and the outside area clear of any decaying or rotting material will make a huge difference to the amount of pests that are attracted to your environment. Any leftover food which could decompose should be disposed of quickly.  It can be composted or recycled in whatever other way is possible in line with your council’s recycling policies.  Tea Tree oil combined with water and sprayed around doors and windows can deter spiders, ants and other crawling insects from making an entrance or hanging around.  Fresh basil, bay leaves, lavender and mint grown in pots within the home can repel flying insects.   Plastic soft drink bottles with the tops off, half filled with a solution of sugar and water and placed on windowsills where wasps and fruit flies tend to hang out, will attract them and they will drown in the solution. Sticky fly paper is environmentally friendly, and so are small household electric "insectocutors", which entice files to them to be instantly electrocuted.  If you're big into plants, a Venus Flytrap can be a godsend.  If you have bees in your house, make every effort to guide them back into the garden, or leave windows open to enable them to find their own way out, as these little workhorses are our greatest environmental allies. It’s also possible, for a small but worthwhile long term investment, to get some insect screens for your doors and windows so you can enjoy the fresh air without the creepy crawlies.  Remember though, that not all crawlies are obnoxious. Some do add good value to your home.  As much as I hate spiders, those who can tolerate them are advised to let them be.  I can't believe I'm saying that, but I have to be honest about it.  For the most part, ugly and disgusting and terrifying as I find spiders to be, they are our household friends. 

When it comes to pets, there are less toxic treatments and chemical-free care products available to help you manage issues with fleas, ticks, mites and skin problems and you can use a flea comb to remove fleas.  Using pesticides really ought to be a last resort. With any pesticide, it’s critical to read package labels, follow the instructions to the letter, and use the least amount possible. Although cats are susceptible to pyrethroids, the chemicals are still used in cat treatments, so do read the labels before you buy anything.  Online sites offer great alternatives (such as this one here).

If you need professional help to safely eliminate household pests, try googling green providers who can offer a chemical free or low-risk solution.

You CAN protect your family – all of its members – by giving some real thought to what you purchase in your efforts to eliminate pests this summer.  The pesticides so cheaply available on the supermarket shelves are an effective "quick-fix", but at what long-term cost?