Episode 61: Is Your Home Making You Sick? Paula Baker-Laporte

Can your home be making you ill? Paula Baker-Laporte is one of the top 10 “Healthy Home” architects in the world. Green homes are not equal to the standards of healthy homes. Green homes are more about energy efficiency. Healthy homes are about what building materials are used, how the home uses nature, and how the home can function alongside its inhabitants; all considerations, which promote health rather than illness. Learn what issues lurk inside most conventional constructed houses. It’s shocking. And discover a brand-new world of healthy homes that bring nature inside to be your roommate.

Some people are chronically ill due to construction materials that out-gas, or supplies that are breeding grounds for mold, or conditions that expose us to continual unhealthy electromagnetic fields. Discover exact steps you can take to assess and improve your present home to make it safer. Did you know that your home can be built to turn off the electrical grid while you sleep, so your body can do the house cleaning, detoxing and cancer-fighting it is designed to perform during the night?

Paula discusses how she went from a conventional architect to a “shape-shifter” in her field. Her and her husband, Robert Laporte, also an architect extraordinaire, now train other architects in what they have named, “Building Biology”. Building biology creates as much “nature” inside your home as possible. Learn about “earth-coupling” and how this can be applied to your new home or aspects of it to your existing one.

On this show Berkson and Baker-Laporte discuss how to keep a forced air heating system less damaging to your family’s health. Duct systems are a perfect breeding ground for pathogenic mold, so you need to know this if you have a forced air furnace, which most of us do. Learn where else mold tends to breed and what you can do about it. Learn several of the top most dangerous aspects of most of American houses, and how you can protect yourself and your family.

This is a power-packed show on diverse aspects that most of us never consider, surrounding our most sacred space, our very own home. Many builders don’t consider these ramifications and potential dangers either. Very few builders, construction workers or even architects are versed in how to build really healthy homes. Thus this has become Paula’s very important life’s work.

The fact is, homes can make humans ill. This is also not often considered when you trek from doctor to doctor for your chronic illness that seems to evade all remission interventions. This is critical information for all of us.

When building a new home, or assessing your present one, Paula encourages a “team-effort” between your functional medical practitioners, yourself and Laporte’s team. Their team is called Eco-Nest. Paula is passing this critical information foreword. She and her husband hold yearly courses in Santa Fe at a conference center for interested architects and aspiring homeowners. The conference center in the capital of New Mexico was one of the only places that was okay with turning off the Wi-Fi and electricity while the attendees slept, and also serving completely organic food.

I used to live in Santa Fe. That is where Paula and I became colleagues and girlfriends. Walking into one of Paula’s homes is like walking into a ancient church in some beautiful Italian town. It’s quiet. It feels safe. It feels solid. It exudes serenity. It’s all the terms wrapped up and applying to “sacred”. It is so palpable, the peace and the stillness and the welcoming energy, but it’s hard to appreciate if you haven’t spent time in a completely healthy home built entirely without conventional materials and only using natural ones like clay and oil. It’s honestly amazing, and I’m not just saying this because Paula is someone I love and respect. It’s completely the truth. Once you have walked into a completely eco-built home, you become stunned by the contrast when you go back to a conventionally built residence. It’s flabbergasting.

Eco-next gives the utmost attention to detail. Their work and their message is the tip of the iceberg of the home building industry. I remember when a water filter was not as commonplace as it is now. When I wrote Hormone Deception, I helped a water company in Santa Fe design the first “whole house” water filter, which makes much more sense, because we inhale more water inside our homes than drink it. But whole house water filters have not yet gone mainstream. Either have healthy homes. But Paula is a visionary leading this necessary way.

This is a game-changing show. You will never think the same way again, when going to buy a home or keeping your present one safe.

Here are the links to Paula’s three books, her company and her teaching programs.