Pregnancy Safe Skin Care with Holly Moore

00:04 Trina Renea: Good morning, everyone. Welcome to Facially Conscious.

00:08 Rebecca Gadberry: Welcome to Facially Conscious. This is Rebecca Gadberry.

00:13 Trina Renea: I'm Trina Renea, and we are here for an amazing deep dive today with a friend. 

00:20 Rebecca Gadberry: A very good friend. As a matter of fact, a friend who may be joining the faculty at UCLA Extension pretty soon. 

00:27 Trina Renea: So exciting. 

00:28 Rebecca Gadberry: At the Cosmetic Ingredient course. She took the course in November, was such a bright spot of the whole course. She actually TA'd this last February, and now it looks like she'll be joining us as a faculty. I am talking about Ms. Holly Moore. 

00:46 Trina Renea: Bravo. 

00:48 Rebecca Gadberry: Bravo. Who is, she has a Master's in public health from Boston University. She did her thesis, as a matter of fact, on the US cosmetic industry from a regulatory, ethical, and environmental health perspective and was one of the original movers and shakers in the Clean Beauty movement. She helped to found a company called Follain, which is now owned by Credo. 

She also is known as the Ingredientist. If you want to learn more about Holly, go to theingredienist.com. We love that handle. I think that's a brilliant handle. 

01:26 Trina Renea: So good. You got it. Also, you will be able to find that information on our show notes as well. 

01:34 Rebecca Gadberry: Yes. We will be talking to Holly today about a very interesting topic that she studied last year. What Holly does is she helps to develop products in the beauty category and also ingredients from a sustainable standpoint, which is a huge sector of the industry and is becoming even more and more popular. She's becoming a very popular and well-employed product developer.

And I want to welcome you to Facially Conscious. 

02:08 Trina Renea: Welcome, Holly. 

02:09 Holly Moore: Thank you so much. I'm equal parts flattered, nervous, honored. Thank you. Thank you for having me, both of you. 

02:18 Rebecca Gadberry: Absolutely. And we want to talk to you today about a topic that you researched for one of your clients last year. That when you did the research, I understand when you went to who you thought were authorities, they didn't even know anything about it. 

02:33 Holly Moore: Yes, that is…

02:34 Trina Renea: What are we talking about? 

02:36 Holly Moore: Yeah, what are we talking about?

02:37 Rebecca Gadberry: Is the research is about. 

02:40 Holly Moore: Yes, it's one of my favorite conundrums, and that is skincare during the window of pregnancy and beyond, which is a gray area, to say the least. 

02:55 Trina Renea: Can I just give a little tidbit? 

02:58 Holly Moore: Yes. 

02:59 Trina Renea: The thing that doctors tell you is the only thing you can't use is Retin-A or retinol, vitamin A. It used to also be salicylic acid, but since then, they say that one is okay now too. This is what the doctors, your OB-GYN, will tell you when you're pregnant today. So that's just…

03:20 Holly Moore: Oh, yeah.

03:21 Trina Renea: You know that. 

03:22 Rebecca Gadberry: And yet when you went to the doctors to talk to them about it, what did they tell you?

03:27 Holly Moore: Not very much. 

03:28 Trina Renea: Because they don't really know, I don't think. 

03:31 Holly Moore: Yeah. It's one of the things that we can definitely get into when it comes to the section. We can talk about which ingredients are appropriate and not appropriate during pregnancy.

But, yeah, what's interesting, and you mentioned, Rebecca, is that I interviewed many experts in their field on this. I interviewed toxicologists. I chatted with, of course, cosmetic chemists, endocrinologists. I spoke to essential oil experts, physiologists. I try to look at this from every angle that I could. And even those experts said to me, “Just so you know, I don't really feel qualified to comment on this.”

And I thought to myself, "Oh, my gosh. If these are experts in their field and if they don't feel comfortable really talking about this or giving insight on it, that also gives people, listeners a feel as to how I feel talking about this subject as well.”

It's complex. It's very, very complex. And the ethical parameters of it are equally so. 

04:40 Rebecca Gadberry: Why is it complex and why are the ethical parameters complex? 

04:45 Holly Moore: Yes. Well, the biggest challenge around pregnancy is data, which is the scientific backbone, particularly— I mean, depending on the design of the study, it's considered unethical to perform clinical trials or even consumer perception, various consumer perception tests on pregnant women.

05:15 Rebecca Gadberry: Which is why the thalidomide crisis happened in the '50s. 

05:19 Holly Moore: And I have that. That was going to be one of my samples. 

05:23 Trina Renea: I don't know what that is. 

05:25 Holly Moore: Well, get ready for this. Okay. So what data we do have stems mostly from oral consumption of specific chemicals, ingredients, and then an understanding of the consequences, but much, unfortunately, usually to the detriment of the person and the baby fetus taking them or consuming them. 

For example, what Rebecca is talking about is in the late 1950s, early 1960s, a medicine called thalidomide. That's how you pronounce it, right? 

05:59 Rebecca Gadberry: Thalidomide.

06:00 Holly Moore: Thalidomide, okay. 

06:02 Rebecca Gadberry: If you'll notice, she is an original English speaker, not an American English speaker. 

06:08 Holly Moore: Tomatoes, tomatoes.

06:12 Trina Renea: Cellulite, cellulite. 

06:14 Holly Moore: All that fun stuff, but not certainly to mind. 

So, it was a drug that was prescribed for anti-nausea, specifically, most commonly during the first trimester of pregnancy for so-called morning sickness, even though what the hell is morning about it, really. 

And it was considered a wonder drug. It was like a breakthrough drug because it completely took away nausea. There were no perceived side effects for women whatsoever, except that it resulted in severe birth defects.

06:52 Trina Renea: No. 

06:53 Holly Moore: Yeah. 

06:55 Rebecca Gadberry: And they were not allowed to do studies on women because women's hormones messed everything up. So they only did it on men and they never picked up the birth defect issue. 

07:07 Trina Renea: Until all these babies were...

07:10 Rebecca Gadberry: Yes. 

07:10 Trina Renea: Oh, God. 

07:11 Holly Moore: And that's kind of a commentary on medical history in general. We know more about neighboring planets than we do about what goes on inside a woman's body, especially during a critical window of development like pregnancy.

So, that is kind of the conundrum of this. 

07:33 Trina Renea: Well, that's true because when they said you can't have salicylic acid, it was because you can't have aspirin. So they just go, “Well, that's kind of like that, so just don't have it, because we're not sure.”

And then the same thing with vitamin A.

07:52 Rebecca Gadberry: So, what piqued your interest in this whole project? It sounds fascinating, but it also sounds really necessary and nobody wanted to tackle it. 

08:02 Holly Moore: Thank you. Yeah. I like to think that this topic kind of found me, to be honest. I never made anything easy for myself, that's for sure. I love a challenge. Kind of as we started to wade into— I can't understate the complexity of this area, especially where women's health is concerned in light of recent events. 

But when I got started in the beauty industry, I developed a bit of a reputation for being the ingredient person to go to, or more realistically, a total nerd when it came to ingredients. I know that’s one of our favorite things to say, Rebecca. Like, we really love how much of a nerd we are about all of this stuff. 

08:47 Rebecca Gadberry: And Trina too. Trina's a nerd too. 

08:48 Trina Renea: I love it too.

08:49 Holly Moore: I mean, what are we doing if we're not ingredient nerds? So, basically, my interest in this got piqued because I was both honored and at times devastated, which I know is an unusual combination of things, but people would find me in these moments where they were entering a critical window of development or change. This was either they just received a diagnosis, whether it was cancer or autoimmune, just as an example, or they just found out they were pregnant and they were flooded with questions what to do next. 

Obviously, having just had a conversation with a qualified doctor, as you should do, around this subject…

09:38 Rebecca Gadberry: Even if they're listening to us, they need to also go to a qualified doctor to talk to them about the information we're sharing. 

09:44 Holly Moore: Correct. Yes. If you are thinking of, planning on becoming pregnant, you are pregnant and you have questions and curiosities around this subject, please go and have a conversation with your qualified doctor. 

09:56 Rebecca Gadberry: What about breastfeeding? Does that also count? 

09:58 Holly Moore: We'll get into that. 

10:00 Rebecca Gadberry: Okay. Ahead of the game there. 

10:02 Holly Moore: Ahead of the game. So, yeah, I would have people come to me with these questions. There was also this assumption that, as we know, I got started out in what has come to be known as clean beauty, "clean”. There was this assumption that clean beauty is inherently safe or appropriate for this particular window. 

10:25 Trina Renea: Well, it has the word clean in it. 

10:27 Rebecca Gadberry: Yes.

10:28 Holly Moore: Correct, and we'll get into a bit of the marketing around that. But that's not necessarily the case at all. There are ingredients that are used in clean beauty that would not be deemed appropriate for use during pregnancy. We'll get into that as well. 

Also, part of my concentration studying my Master’s in Public Health was bioethics. Ethical conundrums are often found at the intersection of complexity and need. Pregnancy, for me, I think it's certainly one of them for reasons we've already outlined, like gathering clinical data around this, it's ethically complex from both anatomical and even an environmental health stance. 

11:21 Rebecca Gadberry: Right, because we can't test on pregnant women because we don't know what the results or the impact is going to be, but we need to test on pregnant women to see if it's safe. So complex conundrum. 

11:31 Trina Renea: That's why nobody has ever done it. 

11:32 Rebecca Gadberry: Right. And if we test on mice or rats or dogs or whatever, we're testing on animals. If you want a cruelty-free or whatever claims you want to hold with, you can't do that either. So what do you do? 

11:48 Holly Moore: Exactly. And the backbone of bioethics is do no harm, which, often, quite frankly, historically is translated to animal testing and studies. But we are moving into an era where that is not the step forward for many different reasons.

But pregnancy is also interesting because there is also a layer of emotional complexity to it as well. It is a very emotionally charged area. 

Part of my studies, I also got the privilege of studying some reproductive technologies. There was also the head physician of the OB-GYN department at a very prestigious hospital in Boston was on my concentration track. I basically sat next to her in every single class and…

12:39 Rebecca Gadberry: During your thesis?

12:40 Holly Moore: Yeah, during my Master’s. The insight that I got from her was just incredible and only just fed my curiosity for this more…

12:52 Rebecca Gadberry: What about computer studies? Can they predict?

12:56 Holly Moore: This is one of the areas that I have, and I know how much Rebecca, you're a fan of AI. This is an area where I'm really hoping we can make progress with computational modeling. I'm so curious to see what AI can start stringing together in the future. 

13:16 Rebecca Gadberry: Well, AI is only as good as what we put into it. 

13:18 Holly Moore: Correct. 

13:19 Rebecca Gadberry: So we need to collect more data. And notice, we're saying data. Holly and I both are, not data, because data is not the way you say the word. It is data. And I'm a big stickler about that, so I love the fact that you said data. 

13:33 Holly Moore: Tell me how you feel about apoptosis.

13:35 Rebecca Gadberry: You mean apoptosis?

13:36 Holly Moore: Yes. And autophagy? Never mind. We're not going there. 

13:41 Holly Moore: No, we won’t go there. 

13:42 Trina Renea: Oh, you nerds.

13:44 Holly Moore: Sorry. 

13:46 Rebecca Gadberry: So what's the bottom line of your research? 

13:46 Trina Renea: You just nerded out for a bit.

13:49 Rebecca Gadberry: So what's the bottom line of your research? What were your findings? 

13:57 Trina Renea: What are they?

13:58 Rebecca Gadberry: What are they? What's the data? 

14:03 Holly Moore: Maybe some more context. Gathering and interpreting data is challenging because we don't know what we don't know. Herein enters an ethical principle that many scientists are not a massive fan of, which is called the precautionary principle.

14:30 Rebecca Gadberry: I knew you were going to say that. Precautionary principle. It's European. It's not American. And what is it? 

14:38 Holly Moore: I don't think it has an affinity for countries, but it is an area where— it's more commonly used in European policy than it is in American policy, let's just put it that way.

14:50 Rebecca Gadberry: I don't think it's used in American policy at all. Maybe in California. 

14:56 Holly Moore: Yes, I think in California, in New York, I think in some states, and certainly in Washington, some states— in Washington…

15:04 Rebecca Gadberry: State, not DC.

15:05 Holly Moore: Not DC. 

15:05 Rebecca Gadberry: Not federally, but state-wise. 

15:07 Holly Moore: Yes. 

15:08 Rebecca Gadberry: And what is it? 

15:09 Holly Moore: Okay. So the precautionary principle is essentially where, on a very simplistic level, is where something is treated guilty before being proved innocent. It essentially becomes best practice to avoid interaction with an ingredient out of precaution versus the opposite is often innocent until proven guilty, right?

15:35 Rebecca Gadberry: Proven guilty. 

15:38 Holly Moore: So both of these approaches have different risk levels and it depends on how they're implemented. Now, my stance is that pregnancy is one of the areas where the precautionary principle is applicable, because we're dealing with layers of complexity, we're dealing with women's health, we're dealing with individual autonomy, and we're also dealing with generational health as well.

But I also think around the question of autonomy and the precautionary principle, I like to think what is your appetite for risk? Rebecca is laughing. 

16:25 Rebecca Gadberry: I'm laughing because we have another instructor at UCLA named Ronie Schmelz. When she gives her talk, she's a legal regulatory professional attorney, when she gives her talk, she prefaces everything by, “What is your risk appetite?”

16:43 Holly Moore: Yeah. And that is the regulatory aspect of me kicking in. 

16:45 Rebecca Gadberry: Yes, so anything is doable as long as you have an appetite to defend it or vacate it or pay for it later on. When you're pregnant, your choice is to use it or not. But if somebody is making a product and you use a product…

17:04 Trina Renea: Claiming it. 

17:04 Rebecca Gadberry: And they claim that it's safe, and then you wind up having difficulties or your child does, then it's not just your risk appetite as the brand, but it's their risk appetite and paying for it. When we're talking about the precautionary principle, we're saying, you can mess with your own self but don't mess with your kids’, and perhaps something that may be embedded genetically that mutates for generations to come. So when she talks about generational health, she's talking about the baby as well as generations after that. 

Some of these ingredients can have that kind of an effect. While we don't apply the precautionary principle as a rule in the United States, some states now are looking at this evidence of genetic mutations and also other issues that can…

18:00 Trina Renea: What about autism?

18:02 Rebecca Gadberry: Autism probably is not connected to this. 

18:08 Holly Moore: - Yeah, I'm going to withhold my comment on that.

18:11 Rebecca Gadberry: Okay. Well, if you disagree with me, state it. It's okay.

18:15 Trina Renea: Autism, to be honest with you, is not a condition that I have enough knowledge on to comment. I don't know if we're beginning to even grasp it as a diagnosis, as a condition.

But I know that there are, I believe they're called the 4As, ADD, ADHD, autism and asthma that are the most...

18:46 Rebecca Gadberry: And Asperger's? 

18:48 Holly Moore: Yes, Asperger's as a part of autism, one type of autism. But these are the four most common conditions that we're now seeing in children to various degrees. 

19:08 Rebecca Gadberry: I'm just wondering, because besides food that you're putting in your body, products that you're putting on your skin, whether it be washing your hands every day, cleaning your counters, washing your dishes, putting products on your face, washing in the shower, you're putting a lot of ingredients on your body. Every single day, it's going in. 

19:30 Rebecca Gadberry: And these are questions to be asked. Right now, with the precautionary principle, I think what you're saying is, if we don't know, don't do. Don't use it. 

But also keep in mind, as we've talked before at Facially Conscious, that when a lot of ingredients are put on the skin, they change into other chemistry as they penetrate into the skin, so they don't act the same in the body as they do on your skin. 

If we take it orally, it's going to behave differently than applying it to the skin, because it doesn't change chemically most of the time when you take it orally, or it changes in the liver or the kidneys.

20:13 Trina Renea: So then with the discoveries that you found working in this, how did you even get anywhere?

20:25 Holly Moore: That's at the heart of it. It's wanting to push for more information, but the ability to gather data with what we have is very limited.

20:38 Trina Renea: Yeah, because you can't test on pregnant women, so how are you ever going to know?

20:43 Holly Moore: Yeah, and that's where the precautionary principle kicks in. 

So, to Rebecca's point, what's interesting about a lot of the ingredients that are not recommended for use during pregnancy because they're deemed inappropriate or there is a question on safety, these are ingredients that have been confirmed to be unsafe when taken orally, oral consumption. As a result, have been blanketed as also no-go for topical because scientists can't prove that there isn't risk.

So, to your point earlier, retinoids, vitamin A are one of these ingredients that, when consumed orally, have demonstrated negative health impacts on the fetus. Like Tretinoid, for example, which is prescription retinol, your advice not to use retinols during pregnancy because of the studies found with what's happened during oral consumption, so much so that if you're prescribed Tretinoid, there's actually an ethical agreement in the prescription that your doctor, I hope, walks you through, that says you agree not to become pregnant whilst taking this medication, because that is how detrimental it is to a developing fetus.

20:43 Rebecca Gadberry: Now, what about bakuchiol that has similar efficacy or similar chemistry in the skin as your retinoids? 

22:30 Holly Moore: The same interesting argument could be applied for parabens and Japanese honeysuckle in chemistry structure often equals function. So, the answer is, I'm not sure.

22:47 Rebecca Gadberry: Because I know that parabens, when they penetrate the skin, they become a different chemistry. They are not a problem in the fetus at all. If you eat them, that's a different story. 

22:59 Holly Moore: That's a different story. Exactly, but proof is the tricky part. This is where there's conversation around precautionary principle, predictive modeling. We think that it's going to do this, but we can never be 100% sure.

Which kind of comes back to the point about, right now I'm seeing the term ‘pregnancy safe’ being thrown around a lot. This product is pregnancy safe. 

23:31 Rebecca Gadberry: And how do they know that? 

23:33 Holly Moore: Correct. 

23:34 Trina Renea: But you're allowed to do that, right? 

23:37 Holly Moore: Yes.

23:37 Rebecca Gadberry: There's no law against it. 

23:38 Trina Renea: There are no laws. 

23:40 Rebecca Gadberry: Now, once the FDA gets more teeth in it later this year and next year, then FDA or even the Federal Trade Commission can come back and say, "Prove that this is pregnancy safe." Right now, they can do that but they don't have as much teeth behind them. 

23:58 Trina Renea: It's almost as bad as TikTok. Everybody can say whatever they want on TikTok and like these kids believe what they're saying. My daughter sends me stuff all the time and I'm like, “Oh, my God.”

24:11 Rebecca Gadberry: I think we need to do a show just on what she finds on TikTok. 

24:14 Trina Renea: I'm serious.

24:15 Rebecca Gadberry: I know. 

24:16 Holly Moore: To be honest with you, tweens and TikTok, there was a really interesting article. I think it was in the New York Times recently, about the industry, like this budding industry of tweens on TikTok.

24:30 Trina Renea: It makes me so mad, I can't even— because they're 10 years old and their parents are buying it. So, they've learned how to market to these kids because they have internet and they have TikTok and they get advertised to.

24:30 Rebecca Gadberry: Well, those are people who were born 10 or 12 years after what we're talking about. So, I want to just go back to pregnancy.

24:52 Trina Renea: I know. 

24:53 Rebecca Gadberry: What about salicylic acid? Because that's a big one. People, a lot authorities of say, "Don't use salicylic acid?" Then as Trina said, "Oh, no, now it's okay." 

25:03 Trina Renea: Now it's okay all of a sudden. 

25:06 Rebecca Gadberry: So, what's that about? 

25:07 Holly Moore: Great question, and I've lost sleep over this. 

25:10 Trina Renea: Yeah, because when did it change? 

25:12 Rebecca Gadberry: She's a little neurotic, which being neurotic makes her even better at what she does, because she does take the time to worry at night until the wee small hours. She thinks about it in the shower and when she's driving. She's a deep thinker, which I think is neurotic in some situations.

25:33 Trina Renea: Also, she's trying to find an answer. 

25:36 Rebecca Gadberry: Yes, she is. Absolutely. 

25:37 Trina Renea: Constantly trying to figure out there's got to be a way. 

25:39 Rebecca Gadberry: It's always top of mind. 

25:41 Trina Renea: She's next generation.

25:45 Holly Moore: Well, thank you. Yes, I am on the next-gen committee at the Society of Cosmetic Chemists. That was exciting, but no. Thank you. 

No, neurotic, I think, starts to scratch the surface. Where was I? Ah, salicylic acid, my fave. 

Salicylic acid is part of a group called salicylates. Salicylates are…

26:12 Rebecca Gadberry: That sounds so salacious. 

26:13 Holly Moore: Salacious. Salicylates, salacious. Salicylates are quite a prevalent group in cosmetic chemistry. They have all different sorts of applications, but salicylic acid is the most well-known. Now, salicylic acid, you can get as a synthetic isolate, which is I think the most common. 

26:36 Rebecca Gadberry: What does that mean?

26:38 Holly Moore: Synthetic means it's been lab-created and purified. 

26:43 Rebecca Gadberry: Is it the same molecule as what you find in nature?

26:46 Holly Moore: No. 

26:46 Rebecca Gadberry: Okay, because salicylic acid doesn't occur in nature. 

26:48 Trina Renea: Where does it come from in nature?

26:53 Holly Moore: In nature, and this is one of the conundrums that I came across, there's kind of two camps that people will fall into. They'll either use the isolated salicylic acid, which you can control the percentage.

27:08 Rebecca Gadberry: And when you say isolated, you mean there's no other chemistry involved. It's just the salicylic acid. 

27:14 Holly Moore: Correct. Yes. Just the salicylic acid. Or, depending on your formulation philosophy or whether you abide by clean beauty, you may try to use a plant-derived salicylic acid. The most common of those is called wintergreen extract or wintergreen essential oil. 

Wintergreen is 98.5% methyl salicylate. Again, there's that fun word, salicylate. Methyl salicylate, once it enters the body or it's absorbed topically, it metabolizes into salicylic acid. So, like retinol, there's a conversion process that it goes through. 

So, depending on which scientific authority you subscribe to, whether that is the American or the European, you may fall into one of two camps on salicylic acid. In America, it's more generally accepted and the ACOG, the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology, they say that up to 2% salicylic acid is safe to use during pregnancy.

If you pay attention to the European authority, they have salicylic acid listed as a potential endocrine disruptor and tend to be less risk adverse when it comes to…

28:55 Rebecca Gadberry: Also known as a hormone disruptor. 

28:56 Holly Moore: Yes, a hormone disruptor. So they do not recommend to use it, but they just say “with caution”. That's more of a thing of one of the number one complaints during pregnancy as far as skincare needs is acne, is hyperpigmentation. Salicylic acid is one effective way to tackle that issue. 

So it becomes a question of, do the benefits outweigh the risk? And, again, what is your personal risk appetite? 

29:32 Trina Renea: Okay, I have a question about that, because there's other ingredients that are okay. If salicylic acid and retinol were the only two that you can't use during pregnancy, you still have glycolic, you still have lactic, you still have azelaic, you have all those other acids. And then you also have benzoyl peroxide that they let you use. 

29:53 Holly Moore: These are all great questions. 

29:56 Trina Renea: So, why those? Why use salicylic?

29:57 Holly Moore: Why those and use salicylic? Yeah, I realize I skipped ahead. The point I wanted to make was, what's interesting about, so wintergreen and the fact that it is 98.5% methyl salicylate. My gosh, it's a mouthful. Methyl salicylate is directly contraindicated, meaning deemed not safe or appropriate for use during pregnancy, but salicylic acid is not.

I spent hours agonizing over why on earth is methyl salicylate contraindicated but salicylic acid isn't. The only person that was able to give me insight on this, and I still sort of question, was a salicylate manufacturer. 

They said that wintergreen can contribute to muscle contractions. It has an effect on muscles as a relaxant. And so it was contraindicated because if there was an instance where it could cause uterine contractions, it could contribute to pre-term delivery. 

31:23 Rebecca Gadberry: and because it can be a muscle contractant when applied to the skin. 

31:27 Holly Moore: Yes. 

31:27 Rebecca Gadberry: Okay. That makes sense. 

31:30 Holly Moore: But wintergreen also is, going back to those oral accidents, there is this really unfortunate incident where a child consumed wintergreen and died. 

31:43 Trina Renea: A child as in a live child? I mean, like, not in the stomach?

31:47 Holly Moore: No, yeah. As in like, it was an accident. Toxic ingestion by accident.

31:52 Trina Renea: Oh, like a small child.

31:55 Holly Moore: Yeah. And because of these really unfortunate incidents, we know more about how potent these essential oils actually are. 

And not to say that I'm, by any means, against essential oils, but they are extremely complex. I know complexity is like the theme for this conversation, but…

32:16 Rebecca Gadberry: Very rich chemistry. 

32:19 Holly Moore: Yes, very, very rich chemistry. Essential oils are like the hyper-concentrated essence, if you will, of certain plants. 

32:29 Rebecca Gadberry: It's the plant's hormone system, its antibiotic system. They're there a lot of times to protect the plant. That means that they may not work well on you. So, it depends upon what you're using them for and what concentration you're using them at. 

Essential oils, a lot of essential oils are contraindicated for pregnancy. 

32:59 Holly Moore: Yeah. That's a pretty extensive list of them. At least it took me— that was actually one of the biggest challenges I had was trying to round up which plants and which essential oils to avoid during pregnancy. 

33:16 Rebecca Gadberry: What did you find out? 

33:17 Holly Moore: I got a list, and it's not a full list. 

33:22 Rebecca Gadberry: Everybody is waiting with bated breath out there. What's on the list? 

33:26 Holly Moore: What's on the list? 

33:27 Trina Renea: I can post that list on our website.

33:31 Holly Moore: Okay. That might be the best, the best foot forward.

33:33 Trina Renea: But you could tell us a few. 

33:36 Rebecca Gadberry: Yeah, vocalize them.

33:36 Trina Renea: And if you send me the list, I will post it.

33:40 Holly Moore: Okay. Well, you already know one of them, which is Wintergreen. Well, here's the thing. I should also preface that this list is an RSL. This is a restricted substances list, which is the technical term in toxicology for things that you shouldn't apply to your body.

34:01 Trina Renea: In general.

34:02 Holly Moore: Yeah, or with context. RSLs are what in clean beauty is often taken out of context and applied as clickbait. This is often where the misinterpretation of them drives fearmongering, which I in no way started this project because I wanted to contribute to that or contribute to chemophobia in general, or just fear of chemicals because, as Rebecca will say, in her classes, we are made of chemicals.

34:38 Trina Renea: Everything is a chemical except what?

34:40 Rebecca Gadberry: Light and electricity. 

34:44 Holly Moore: So there is context to this. We've already covered one of them, so I'm just going to back up and I'll get to the essential oils, but retinol. Retinol CBD falls under that list as well. But, again, this is looking at the oral consumption. And then there is a blanket approach to that that the topical then becomes involved.

This group of ingredients, I don't think just applies to pregnancy. It just applies to humans in general. They should never come into contact with you. But these are called PFAS. They are perfluorinated compounds. Fun fact about PFAS, they were actually invented during the Manhattan Project to make sure that the molecules that were responsible for detonation of the atom bomb were kept separate until there was a specific ignition. 

35:43 Trina Renea: What do they call it? PFAS?

35:45 Holly Moore: PFAS is the…

35:47 Rebecca Gadberry: PFAS. 

35:48 Holly Moore: PFAS, yeah. That's the shortened version of them. There are potentially thousands of PFAS chemicals. 

35:55 Rebecca Gadberry: Could you name some? 

35:57 Holly Moore: Oh, gosh, I don't have my list in front of me, but I can give you that list for after.

36:02 Trina Renea: So many lists. 

36:03 Holly Moore: I know.

36:05 Rebecca Gadberry: We'll post them on a blog. 

36:09 Holly Moore: PFAS basically, after the Manhattan Project and the information was made public, made their way into consumer products as a result of a couple of different companies. But, now, our understanding of them from an environmental health and a toxicology point of view has caught up. 

This is an instance of the opposite of the precautionary principle where they have been presumed innocent until proven guilty, but now they've been proven guilty and we're trying to figure out how to remove them in stages from our packaged goods. 

36:45 Trina Renea: Goodness gracious. Hurry up, people. 

36:46 Holly Moore: I know. There's a lot of legislation in the pipeline at the moment. California, I think is it 2025, next year, that they're going to be banned in cosmetics, Rebecca? 

36:57 Rebecca Gadberry: I don't remember if it's 2025 or 2027. 

37:01 Holly Moore: Washington state as well has taken the lead on this.

37:03 Rebecca Gadberry: New York.

37:04 Holly Moore: And New York, so there are ripples. Now, granted PFAS topical exposure is not the main source of exposure, but they're bad enough that, should you encounter one in your ingredient list, throw it away immediately. They're waterproofing compounds. They're waterproof. 

37:28 Rebecca Gadberry: Teflon happens to be one of them. 

37:30 Holly Moore: Yes. I didn't want to name names, but yes. 

37:33 Rebecca Gadberry: No, Teflon is okay.

37:34 Holly Moore: Okay. We can name Teflon. 

37:34 Rebecca Gadberry: We don't use it in products.

37:36 Holly Moore: No.

37:37 Rebecca Gadberry: But there are Teflon-related chemicals that are used in products like your perfluoropolymethylisopropyl ether. 

37:43 Holly Moore: There she goes.

37:44 Trina Renea: Isn't Teflon…

37:47 Rebecca Gadberry: It's a fluorinated…

37:49 Holly Moore: Yes.

37:49 Trina Renea: No, like you put it over your food? 

37:51 Rebecca Gadberry: No. Teflon coats pans so it's non-stick.

37:54 Trina Renea: Right. I'm like, I know that word. But then does that mean if you cook on it, you can get Teflon in your food? 

38:00 Rebecca Gadberry: Right. That's why we're not using Teflon anymore. These fluorinated chemicals, there's all through our environment and we're now editing them out. They're not really common in the cosmetic industry, but there are some products that are being sold. We were just looking at one last week that's out of England that's being sent into the United States. These have got the perfluoromethyl ethers in them that can be a problem.

So we'll post the names of those ingredients. Then if you want to do a scan when you buy ingredients, you can also learn how to recognize them. But it's basically fluros, F-L-U-R-O. 

38:50 Trina Renea: Anything that says fluro in your ingredient list. 

38:53 Rebecca Gadberry: You want to avoid, yeah.

38:54 Holly Moore: Generally, yeah.

38:55 Rebecca Gadberry: Now, I've got a list here of essential oils to avoid during pregnancy.

39:00 Holly Moore: I have a list as well, but it's not the complete list, but I have… Okay, okay, okay, sorry. We'll go to this. We'll skip it. We'll go to this. Okay.

There's a couple of surprising ones on here. Now, I say basil, you say basil. Basil oil. 

39:15 Rebecca Gadberry: You say Basil Rathbone, I say Basil Rathbone. No, I don't. I say basil. 

39:20 Holly Moore: Basil oil, laurel berry oil, black cumin seed oil, camphor, cinnamon oil, funnily enough, this category is not brilliant. 

39:32 Rebecca Gadberry: Peppermint and birch. Birch is another methyl salicylate. 

39:37 Holly Moore: Yeah, birch. Ho wood, fennel, mugwort.

39:45 Rebecca Gadberry: Yeah, mugwort is a muscle relaxant.

39:48 Holly Moore: And mugwort is typically used for period cramps. When you think of mugwort, you either think of Harry Potter or you think of, synonymous with women's health. But in this instance, not so much. 

40:04 Rebecca Gadberry: And that's frequently used with Clary sage, which is also on this list of avoid. 

40:10 Trina Renea: Avoid during pregnancy we're talking about. 

40:12 Rebecca Gadberry: It helps with cramps. 

40:13 Trina Renea: This isn't one of the other ones. 

40:15 Rebecca Gadberry: Right, these are hormone-related essential oils. 

40:20 Trina Renea: Got it. 

40:20 Rebecca Gadberry: Go ahead.

40:23 Holly Moore: So, wormwood, which is not very common. Wormwood is where absinthe comes from. 

40:29 Rebecca Gadberry: Which we have in our liquor cabinet at home.

40:32 Holly Moore: Yes. Ditto. I despise the taste, but my husband likes it, like licorice-y. 

40:39 Trina Renea: Yes, my husband also likes that. I do not. 

40:44 Holly Moore: And I mentioned fennel.

40:46 Rebecca Gadberry: Rosemary, sage and thyme. Those are also contraindicated. 

40:52 Holly Moore: I didn't find— okay. The other one I was going to say was yarrow and thyme, rosemary, sage, yes. Thyme and rosemary, all of these are also dosage dependent as well. Everything is dosage dependent. 

41:10 Rebecca Gadberry: They're also, like Oak Moss is on here and it can be in a lot of fragrances. 

41:13 Holly Moore: Yes, oak moss. A ton of fragrance. 

41:18 Rebecca Gadberry: A lot of these are in fragrances.

41:18 Trina Renea: I didn’t even think about fragrances. 

41:21 Rebecca Gadberry: But these are in fragrances. They can be fragrance oils in your perfumes. They can be in your topically or skin-applied products. And when they do, they can have an effect penetrating the skin, also, as well as breathing it in. 

41:41 Holly Moore: Yes. So well summarized.

41:44 Rebecca Gadberry: Thank you. 

41:46 Holly Moore: And you know, fragrance is actually, it's not on my, “no” list but it is on my use-with-caution list. This is where some people absolutely love fragrance. 

42:01 Rebecca Gadberry: You give up wine, you give up alcohol, give up fragrance when you're pregnant.

42:04 Holly Moore: Exactly. This is where the question about personal autonomy as a woman who's pregnant, it's a real thing. There's so many things that you have to give up. 

So there is this use-with-caution category. To take it back to what is your appetite for risk, obviously, within certain limits. But a classic example is some people feel completely fine having a small amount of wine in their third trimester, others absolutely not. So, there is sort of a personal preference there. 

Also, when you're exposed to certain chemicals it's trimester dependent. First and second trimester tends to carry more weight in term than the third trimester, for example, because the body becomes better at detoxifying or filtering certain chemicals the further along into your pregnancy it gets. 

43:08 Rebecca Gadberry: Also, we've talked about epigenetics before on Facially Conscious. That is where environmental chemicals have an effect on how your genes behave. In the first and second trimesters, especially the first, the epigenome is very active, selecting which genes turn on and off as the fetus develops. Whereas in the third stage of pregnancy, a lot of those genes have been turned on or off and it doesn't really matter anymore. 

43:39 Holly Moore: I would say you're not coasting, but yeah. 

43:42 Rebecca Gadberry: Right, you're not coasting, but it is important. To summarize just a little bit of this, what I'm getting as a takeaway is, if you are not risk-okay, our advice is to strip down to the bare basics so that you don't use a lot of chemicals that we don't really know if they're safe or not. Just use basic skincare and don't do a lot of what we call performance or action ingredients on the skin. And put up with a little acne if you can.

44:22 Holly Moore: If you can, yeah. 

44:23 Trina Renea: And hyperpigmentation will go away a lot of times after the hormones. 

44:26 Rebecca Gadberry: The mask of pregnancy, the melasma, there are things to do after you give birth, after you finish breastfeeding that you can do for the mask of pregnancy.

44:36 Trina Renea: We never got to the breastfeeding. 

44:38 Holly Moore: Yeah, that's on the list. I was going to say just before I go to that, I did want to say what I advise generally for cosmetic chemists or product developers or founders who are interested in this area and are…

44:56 Rebecca Gadberry: Are you talking about brand founders? 

44:57 Holly Moore: Yeah. First of all, get a feel for your own risk appetite. The reason that this area hasn't really been tackled is because it is a liability. You're taking on liability if you choose to tackle this area. So, how watertight is your evidence based on your claims? 

45:18 Rebecca Gadberry: And will your insurance cover you? 

45:19 Holly Moore: And will your insurance cover you? 

45:20 Rebecca Gadberry: And can you sleep at night if you cause a problem with somebody's health for the rest of their life. 

45:25 Holly Moore: Yes. Exactly. So to your point, this isn't an area where I think innovation and ingredients and formulation is appropriate. We want to try to go to, stick to areas with what's tried and tested, looking at larger molecules or at least ones where ingredients that we understand they have limited penetration. 

45:49 Rebecca Gadberry: Like silicones.

45:51 Holly Moore: Right. We understand the ingredient life cycle, at least that in itself is a step up. The golden question in all of this is, is there potential for this topical ingredient to breach the placental wall? That is the question. That's really where I'm hoping that predictive modeling or computational modeling can help us to answer those questions. 

46:18 Trina Renea: What is that? 

46:19 Rebecca Gadberry: The placental wall? 

46:20 Trina Renea: No, the predictive…

46:21 Holly Moore: Predictive or computational.

46:24 Rebecca Gadberry: They're computer predictions using things like artificial intelligence to take a set of data and then extrapolate from that and predict. So it's predictive data. Predict what will happen. 

46:39 Trina Renea: Is that effective? 

46:40 Rebecca Gadberry: Oh, yeah, it's very. We're using it, for instance, in genetics with cancer. We've been using that for almost a decade now, if not longer. And in epigenetics. So, there are ways to do it. 

But, again, AI is only as good as the data you put into it, so we have to collect more data in order to get more valid data. And we have to do feedback on what we get. 

47:13 Holly Moore: Okay, I'm going to raise that point again when we talk about breastfeeding, because that's a really good point. 

The last things I wanted to say on the formulation side of it to note are, one, around this topic of can it breach the placental wall, we're looking at the size of the molecule. It also depends on whether the formula itself is this a leave-on product? Is this a rinse-off product? Where on the body is it being applied? 

47:45 Rebecca Gadberry: For instance, there are thinner barriers, like around the eyes or on the inside of the arms or the inside of the thighs. Whereas the outside of the thighs, the buttocks, the stomach— what about the stomach area? 

48:01 Holly Moore: Exactly. I always say 2% of an ingredient in a formula that is intended for the face, which is a limited surface area, versus 2% of an ingredient that is being spread across the body…

48:16 Rebecca Gadberry: A larger size.

48:17 Holly Moore: The larger surface area. So even though it's 2%, it's the same percentage within that formula, those formulas are inherently different sizes so it's a different concentration. 

To your answer, if you're using 2% salicylic acid in a formulation intended for, like a face serum, for example…

48:39 Rebecca Gadberry: And you're only putting in on where the blemishes are. 

48:40 Holly Moore: Right, versus if you have acne or you're suffering from— oh, my gosh, I always mess this. Keratosis pilaris, is that how you pronounce it? 

48:52 Trina Renea: Yeah, keratosis pilaris.

48:53 Rebecca Gadberry: Bumps. 

48:54 Holly Moore: Keratosis pilaris bumps. 

48:56 Trina Renea: Bumps, red bumps on your arms, usually. Your legs. 

48:58 Holly Moore: On your arms and also your legs and your buttocks. 

49:04 Rebecca Gadberry: Or what we call the bum. 

49:05 Holly Moore: The bum, the bum region. 2% salicylic acid in that area is going to carry…

49:12 Rebecca Gadberry: That’s a lot, yeah. 

49:14 Holly Moore: That's a lot.

49:15 Trina Renea: Because it's a lot more surface that you're covering so you're putting more into the body. 

49:17 Rebecca Gadberry: That’s what she's saying. 

49:19 Holly Moore: Exactly, yeah. So those are a couple considerations. 

49:23 Rebecca Gadberry: What about theobromine and cocoa butter? Because theobromine is a fetal toxicant. 

49:28 Holly Moore: Okay. I have a fun, not necessarily to answer the question but to give context for that, which I actually read this the other day. It blew my mind. It made total sense. 

Another consideration is there's not just the chemistry but there's also experiential considerations as well. Your skin is hypersensitive. Your skin can become hypersensitized when you're pregnant. Also, your sense of smell shifts and change, and there's a reason why. 

So, your sense of smell, your olfactory receptors or your olfactive bulbs, as appealing as that image is, sit right below your prefrontal cortex of the brain, which is like the very…

50:09 Rebecca Gadberry: The decision-making part of the brain. 

50:11 Holly Moore: The very front part of your brain, kind of right behind your eyes and your nose. So your sense of smell is directly connected to your sense of taste because of the anatomy of it. This is why, as anyone who's had a rotten cold will know that if you lose your sense of smell, you lose your sense of taste.

I read recently that during the first and second trimester, a woman's sense of taste is attuned to detect bitterness. 

50:43 Rebecca Gadberry: And bitterness can be a fetal toxicant. 

50:43 Holly Moore: Right. 

50:46 Rebecca Gadberry: Bitter agents. Yeah, it makes sense.

50:47 Holly Moore: Yes, bitter. The taste of bitter in nature denotes poison or denote toxicants, because it's got an abundance of alkaloids in there, which alkaloids, depending on the concentration, can be toxic to the body. 

Coffee is a primary example of how rapidly your sense of taste and smell can shift. Because if it tastes bitter, the sense of smell is also attuned to detect that bitterness. It's got to be an evolutionary trait, essentially. A sort of self-protective mechanism built in. 

51:22 Trina Renea: That’s smart. 

51:24 Rebecca Gadberry: Absolutely. 

51:24 Trina Renea: Your body says no.

51:26 Holly Moore: So listen. Truly, like listen to your body or follow your sense of smell.

51:32 Rebecca Gadberry: That's why all I could eat was chopped liver and cream spinach when I was pregnant.

51:34 Trina Renea: Oh, my gosh, when you told me that, that’s so disgusting. 

51:39 Rebecca Gadberry: And he's a big boy now. He's going to be 45. He's a big person. So going— okay, so let's talk about some large molecules that are beneficial for the skin. Hyaluronic acid should be okay, from what you're saying here. Certain large polymers like certain proteins should be okay, like collagen protein. Although collagen protein is animal derived.

52:14 Holly Moore: I was going to say it can depend on the origin. 

52:14 Rebecca Gadberry: Or could be a GMO.

52:17 Holly Moore: Yeah, biofermentation. Synthetic biology, to get more technical. But niacinamide seems to be a fantastic solution, especially for people who are suffering from acne. 

52:30 Rebecca Gadberry: Also melasma, the mask of pregnancy. That should be a good one. Up to what kind of percent? Do you have any idea? 

52:40 Holly Moore: On niacinamide?

52:41 Rebecca Gadberry: Yeah. Because I know some companies are using up to 10% of it now. 

52:46 Holly Moore: Yeah, I don't have an exact percentage on niacinamide, but within the recommended limits.

52:53 Rebecca Gadberry: Okay.

52:55 Holly Moore: But to your point, Trina, earlier when you were asking about AHAs, what's the deal with them, AHAs are on my caution list, but caution within a percentage. Glycolic acid, for example, is actually really effective. The data that I did see said no more than 15%. How 15% is insane. 

53:19 Rebecca Gadberry: According to the FDA, they do not want, for home care use, to use higher than 10% total in a home care product. 

53:28 Trina Renea: I have a product that I sell at my spa that has a 12% in the cream and in a cleanser, 12%, but it's self-neutralizing. 

53:38 Rebecca Gadberry: Is it 12% total acid or is it 10% AHA and 2% glycolic or 2% salicylic? 

53:45 Trina Renea: It's 12% glycolic, 2% salicylic and 2% azelaic. 

53:51 Rebecca Gadberry: Okay. Those are not AHAs. Azelaic and salicylic are not AHAs, glycolic is. So you have a 10% glycolic with two other acids added to it. 

54:03 Trina Renea: Oh, that's how it goes? 

54:04 Rebecca Gadberry: Yeah. 

54:06 Trina Renea: Interesting.

54:09 Holly Moore: The more you know, right? It's just…

54:12 Rebecca Gadberry: Oh, that. Okay. 

54:15 Holly Moore: But AHAs within certain limits, alpha-hydroxy acids within certain limits are a great solution as well. I'm trying to think of another one that don't have data on, but seems promising. Tranexamic acid, for example. That's a new player. 

54:32 Rebecca Gadberry: TXA, yeah.

54:33 Holly Moore: Yeah, that's a new player on the scene, but you'll see that often combined with vitamin C.

54:42 Rebecca Gadberry: And vitamin C seems to be okay.

54:44 Holly Moore: Yes. 

54:45 Rebecca Gadberry: Especially if it's an Ester-C. Ester-C stays in the skin, whereas ascorbic acid slips through the skin. However, we're allowed to take vitamin C when we're pregnant, so it should be okay on the skin. We're allowed to take the B-vitamin group, niacinamide, folic acid. 

55:06 Trina Renea: I know that we have to come to an end soon, so I wanted to get back to this breastfeeding. 

55:14 Holly Moore: Yes. This is the last one.

55:18 Rebecca Gadberry: But wait.

55:18 Holly Moore: But wait, there's more.

55:19 Trina Renea: I'm not letting you go until then.

55:20 Holly Moore: No, thank you. Okay. So I will say that the majority of my focus on this topic was on pregnancy itself, not necessarily of the next window, which is breastfeeding. But breastfeeding is a very interesting window because, now, you actually have the ability to measure the excretion of chemicals from the body, although…

55:49 Trina Renea: Oh, that's such a good point. 

55:52 Holly Moore: Although that substance is intended for the baby, so it's a bit of a…

55:56 Trina Renea: You know what? I made a lot of extra. And if I knew you needed it for research, I would happily have given it up, because I was like, if somebody needs this…

56:04 Rebecca Gadberry: Me too. I know.

56:06 Holly Moore: It's an interesting biomarker. So now we have this biomarker for measurement and it's ethically sound, as long as you have the consent of somebody that they're going to donate the milk and analyze it accordingly. But we can map how, or better determine how certain chemicals are being circulated around the body, filtered out. 

56:35 Rebecca Gadberry: So what makes it into breast milk that we put on our skin?

56:40 Holly Moore: Well, the only concrete example I have, which is a good old friend, PFAS, which is not a very common one but damaging enough that it's actually one of the most concrete ways that we're able to prove PFAS is present within the body. There's a report that not long came out of the Nordic Scandinavian region where they were testing breast milk for PFAS exposure. Again, the main source of this is not necessarily being topical, but in ingestion or in other areas of your personal environment. It was heartbreaking to read that the advice was not to breastfeed when certain levels were present in the breast milk. 

57:24 Rebecca Gadberry: Of the PFAHolly Moore

57:25 Holly Moore: Yeah. 

57:28 Rebecca Gadberry: Again, the PFAS there would be coming from Teflon, or, from what I understand, maybe the inner coatings of tin cans and things like that. 

57:40 Holly Moore: I believe, and I hope I'm not going to misquote the study, but also water exposure as well.

57:45 Rebecca Gadberry: Can be in PFAS? 

57:46 Holly Moore: Yeah. 

57:47 Rebecca Gadberry: Or PFAS can be in water. 

57:48 Holly Moore: Yes. And also in that area as well, they're able to take ice samples too, to kind of understand how it's in our aquatic life. And this was an area of the world as well where chemical management is more progressive than in other developed countries. 

58:11 Rebecca Gadberry: Okay. So PFAS is in tap water, but does it make it into bottled water?

58:16 Rebecca Gadberry: Oh, gosh, I feel like that's a whole other podcast, I don't know. 

But, to your point, Trina, not to skip over this one, but I will just go out on a limb and say it's a rule of thumb that what is considered appropriate for use during pregnancy would also be the case during breastfeeding. 

But as Rebecca was saying, breastfeeding is now a window where if you you're struggling with melasma or hyperpigmentation or other issues, there is more flexibility in terms of what you're able to do to handle those issues or to tackle them much in the same way.

58:59 Trina Renea: I think most mothers, I know I was, very cautious. I just felt like I just don't want anything to pass through the milk, so I'm just not going to do it. Naturally, you feel like I just don't want to hurt them so I'm just going to still not do anything until I'm done.

59:17 Holly Moore: That's your personal risk appetite, which is great. You know that. I think that’s really important to know. 

59:20 Trina Renea: I have a huge risk appetite in life.

59:23 Rebecca Gadberry: She does. It's a little…

Okay. So I have an answer in the PFAS and water. There was a study done a few years ago that found 39 out of 100 bottle water brands tested had PFAS contamination at a level that was considered concerning. The best way to get PFAS out of water is reverse osmosis. 

59:51 Trina Renea: That's the water I have in my house. 

59:53 Rebecca Gadberry: You can do that at home or you can…

59:55 Trina Renea: And in my spa, I have it. 

59:58 Rebecca Gadberry: Absolutely, because you're very aware of all the contaminants that are in the water. 

60:03 Trina Renea: Yes, and when I had my mom spa, I also had reverse osmosis water put in there because I found it was the best. 

60:10 Rebecca Gadberry: So you could check on the bottled water website to see if they do reverse osmosis. It's not required right now, but there is an international standard that companies are starting to adhere to. So you could look that up under international standard for PFAS in bottled water, if you want to Google it. 

So I'm going to summarize again. This time, I'm going to say that fragrances, you might want to avoid, including essential oils. If you can take it orally, it's probably okay. Topically, or on the skin surface and skin care, for instance, vitamin C, your vitamin B's, things like that. 

Large molecules, like hyaluronic acid and silicones appear to be okay, because they don't penetrate the skin. Parabens are okay, as far as I know, the studies that I have seen. 

61:06 Holly Moore: Yeah, I feel backed into a corner on that one. 

61:08 Rebecca Gadberry: Okay, so I'm going to take responsibility here and suggest that parabens are okay, because they turn to metabolites that are not hormone disruptors. 

61:17 Holly Moore: You've done more research on that one than I have so I will trust your judgment. 

61:21 Rebecca Gadberry: And then we want to avoid anything that has fluoro in the name, F-L-U-R-O, which are PFAS. Does that pretty much summarize? 

61:32 Holly Moore: Yeah. I also do have hydroquinone, is one that is contraindicated. Obviously, that is only available through prescription. 

61:41 Rebecca Gadberry: In the United States now. 

61:42 Holly Moore: In the United States. 

61:44 Rebecca Gadberry: You can't buy hydroquinone over the counter anymore. 

61:48 Holly Moore: Yeah, but it's one that they do have evidence to show that it penetrates into the skin, or the absorption level I think is like 25% or something like that. So that's one to keep an eye on, because if you are using it and you are pregnant and you don't put the two together. 

I also have formaldehyde donors on here, Rebecca. 

62:14 Rebecca Gadberry: Okay. And those are things like imidazolidinyl urea, diazolidinyl urea, quaternium 15. We want to avoid those. But in other podcasts, we've talked about avoiding those anyway, because they're also sensitizers for the skin. They can cause allergies. 

62:30 Holly Moore: Yes. I also have resorcinol on here as well, which is also one for tackling hyperpigmentation and acne. Most of them evolve around pretty rapidly or aggressively changing the skin surface for a certain aesthetic. And that's my shortlist, I would say. Those are really the top ones.

62:56 Rebecca Gadberry: It's been fascinating. Thank you so much. 

62:59 Trina Renea: Yes, and we'll add some more information for you guys and have stuff in the show notes and also blogs. 

63:06 Rebecca Gadberry: Who knew that at 70 years old I could care so much about pregnancy? 

63:11 Trina Renea: Well, the next generations, you care about those people. 

63:15 Rebecca Gadberry: No, it's not even the next generation. It's the generation after that for me. 

63:21 Holly Moore: Yes, yes. It was a huge surprise to me to find this. I think it's like the justice of it. I don't know. 

Also, the fact that this is a real need and yet the complications of trying to address it are another thing entirely. 

63:36 Trina Renea: It's almost impossible because you can't test on pregnant women. So how are you ever going to truly know? 

63:43 Rebecca Gadberry: Well, those are the predictive studies using AI, but it's going to take a while. 

Another take home here is that big companies are not addressing pregnancy safe. These are the companies that should be because they can afford to. The little companies that are saying pregnancy safe, you need to find out how they determine pregnancy safe, because if they're little, they probably don't have the money to do real testing. 

64:08 Trina Renea: That's a big one. 

64:09 Rebecca Gadberry: How did they determine that? 

64:10 Trina Renea: I actually wouldn't trust, now after having this conversation. I, if I was pregnant, would not trust something that says pregnancy safe. Because I'm like, “They're probably lying,” because how do they know that?

64:22 Rebecca Gadberry: But we don’t know that. But how did they get to that? How did they get to saying pregnancy safe? 

64:27 Holly Moore: That's where I would love to be able to work with somebody to really try to help them understand what they're claiming. 

To your point, I love that, Rebecca. That's exactly right. The bigger companies that have the wherewithal to invest in this area, it shouldn't be…

64:44 Rebecca Gadberry: Aren’t going to touch it. 

64:46 Holly Moore: Well, yeah. It's also interesting that when you look at these bigger categories, pregnancy is often lumped in with children's products. To me, even the marketing of them is very infantilizing, at least that's just been my experience. 

65:05 Rebecca Gadberry: And it's two different biologies. 

65:07 Holly Moore: Completely, completely.

So that's my…

65:11 Rebecca Gadberry: Well, thank you so much, dear. 

65:12 Trina Renea: We're going to have to have you back, because you're fascinating. 

65:16 Rebecca Gadberry: And she has so much to say about sustainability. I call her a clean beauty reformist. She's asking not to say that, but I still do.

65:26 Trina Renea: She just did. 

65:27 Rebecca Gadberry: I did. 

65:27 Holly Moore: She so did. 

65:28 Rebecca Gadberry: it's like, I would never call her a clean beauty reformist.

65:34 Holly Moore: Full disclaimer, no. 

65:35 Rebecca Gadberry: But she does bring sense to the category. She's done a lot of research, so I would love to have her back. 

65:42 Holly Moore: Oh, thank you. I would love to come back, and I'd love to come back and comment more on that. 

65:48 Trina Renea: So many episodes for future. 

65:51 Rebecca Gadberry: Well, thank you so much. 

65:52 Trina Renea: Thank you, Holly. 

65:53 Holly Moore: Thank you both for having me. 

65:54 Trina Renea: It was great having you. All right. Bye. 

65:56 Holly Moore: Bye. 

65:58 Trina Renea: Bye, everyone out there. We'll see you next time.

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