Have you read the labels on your skin care products or cosmetic packages lately? Chances are you'll have a hard time pronouncing most of the ingredients.
Coweta resident Emily Fritchey has a passion for helping others have healthy skin. Fritchey, a clinical aesthetician licensed through the Georgia State Board of Cosmetology, has more than 20 years experience in the field of skin care. Her own interest in skin goes back to her teenage years.
As a young person, Fritchey had a variety of skin problems treated with medications. "They seemed to be treating the symptoms," says Fritchey.
She wondered about the roots of the skin problems. "I'm a 'why?' person," Fritchey said. "I wanted to look normal. It really set me on a path."
Fast forward, with a career as a flight attendant along the way, Emily is now president of Sunshine Botanicals.
Fritchey founded Sunshine Botanicals to provide all-natural skin care products but also to help educate others about what nature has to offer.
A long-time student of natural medicine and herbology, Fritchey earned a Certified Natural Health Professional certification from the Trinity School of Natural Health in Indiana in 1998.
Emily is married to Dr. Phil Fritchey, a master herbalist and author of "Practical Herbalism: Ordinary Plants with Extraordinary Powers."
Dr. Phil made the first products for his wife's use, now she employs four organic chemists across the country to make serums, moisturizers, cleansers and other products.
The skin care products are "micro-brewed" using raw, natural products, says Fritchey. She compares the process of making a tincture or extract to what a cook does to can or preserve home-grown vegetables or fruits. The plant is blanched or cooked at a low temperature, which does not destroy the valuable enzymes.
You'll see ingredients like pure shea butter, grape seed extract, pumpkin extract, willow bark, white birch bark, and glycerin in Sunshine Botanicals' products.
"I've got a passion for people to be educated about the healing power of nature," says Fritchey.
Comfrey, which grows in most yards, was used by Civil War soldiers for foot wounds, according to Fritchey. It is a powerful wound healer, anti-inflammatory and a source of organic calcium.
Lemon balm, also an anti-inflammatory, is an astringent, anti-microbial, and anti-fungal.
These are plants that "God put here for use," says Fritchey.
Not only does she educate about the properties of natural ingredients, but promotes awareness about the dangers of ingredients in synthetic products including parabens and phthalates.
Fritchey presented concerns to the Annual Society of Plastic Surgical Skin Care Specialists in San Diego in May.
Both phthalates and parabens were banned by the European Union in 2003. In September 2000, scientists from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found phthalates at surprisingly high levels in every one of 289 people tested, especially in women of reproductive age.
According to Fritchey, phthalates have been known to cause a broad range of birth defects and lifelong reproductive impairments in laboratory animals. Phthalates are also known to be hormone-mimicking chemicals. Parabens are chemical preservatives identified as estrogenic and disruptive of normal hormone function.
Fritchey encourages those seeking healthy alternatives to parabens and phthalates to look for grapefruit seed extract and tincture of benzoin.
Sunshine Botanicals recently signed the Compact for Safe Cosmetics pledge. Consumers can find more information about the campaign, and their own products at www.cosmeticdatabase.com and www.safecosmetics.org
Sunshine Botanicals has a following right here in the community and celebrity clients as well. Fritchey participated in the 2007 Primetime Emmy Awards to provide education and goodie bags to the celebrities on-hand for the awards ceremony.
Many of the Sunshine products focus on skin in humid conditions like Georgia. Sunshine Botanicals can be found online at www.sunshinebotanicals.com .
While many companies are getting on the "green" bandwagon, Fritchey has been interested in natural products, and using them on her clients for years.
This is more than just folk medicine. "There is so much documentation," she said. "This is a mission for me."
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