I’ve always been a health conscience person and grew up trying to eat real foods with good ingredients and avoid chemicals and medicine as much as possible. I played a sport every season in school and then took up running, Orange Theory, Pilates, Yoga, Peloton when that part of my life ended. Despite all of that and my outward “healthy” appearance, things changed dramatically for me beginning in 2020.

My husband and I began trying to start our family but it was taking longer than we were hoping so we dug into our health a little more. After cleaning up personal care products, limiting alcohol, and eating even cleaner, we still didn’t have much luck. Fortunately, my company started offering a fertility benefit and we were able to conceive via IVF in 2022.

Everything was going great. I had no morning sickness, felt generally like myself (minus a very fatigued first trimester), and baby was developing as she should. Then at 33 weeks I had a seizure as I was going to bed. By the grace of God, I was in bed and my husband witnessed it. We thought maybe it was something pregnancy related and I was admitted to the hospital after a few quick tests in the ER.

More tests were done and I had ANOTHER seizure in the hospital the next day (my poor husband had just left to let our dog out and get some fresh clothes). This happened at about the time I would have been driving home from work (another instance of God’s kindness and protection in our story). After more testing, they found I had a tumor in my right frontal lobe. We were transferred to the main hospital in Charlotte and fortunately, the neurosurgeon had a good instinct to get surgery scheduled as soon as possible (not to wait until after delivering the baby).

I will be forever grateful for him. Not only is he a believer (which helped me feel very much at ease), he had the best bedside manner, followed his gut to act quickly, was able to remove all of the tumor, and barely shaved my hair (vain, I know, but that was such a nice thing to not have to worry about).

Everything about my story is a testament to God’s power, faithfulness, and kindness. I have never felt such peace in my life. I couldn’t take anxiety medication due to the pregnancy for the surgery or MRIs (this was my first surgery EVER and I’m also extremely claustrophobic). My tumor was low grade (slow growing), in the perfect spot for surgery and not affecting my personality or memory (though it was heading towards a spot that would have made it impossible to fully remove the tumor), and the right kind of tumor and subtype that made treatment (read: chemo and/or radiation) unnecessary. I delivered our first child naturally, without being induced at 39 weeks (God is GOOD!!).

This prompted our family, led by my sweet and super research oriented husband, to really dive deep into our health and wellness journey. We cut out seed oils, sugar, gluten, and most dairy. We strive to only eat organic, if possible. All personal care items are free from toxins as much as we can. Our cookware, dishware, and Tupperware is toxin free. It was also important to us that baby items were the best, non-toxic items we could find.

Despite all of these changes, I still struggled with PPD for about 4.5 months. I was so grateful for mine and my baby’s health but I could not get out of this dark place. Prayer, therapy, friends and family got me through it and I’m in a much better place now. But there are products I’ve discovered through friends that I wish I would have known about in that time that I think would have helped me a lot.

All that to say, we have done our RESEARCH on all kinds of products/brands/ingredients and I’m always telling my friends about the stuff I’m using. So I figured it was easier to have a page where everything I recommend (and some things I even sell) in one spot.

Thank you for reading if you made it this far and cheers to a happier, healthier, and more whole YOU.

-Taylor