Soap free?

[Jamshyd]

patchouli SMELLS like BO to some of us.

You are not the first I hear saying this, and for this reason I avoid patchouli in my soaps, despite not minding it myself.

Of all things, I found cedarwood (incorporated in a soap, that is) to be a good non-lingering deodorizer.

 

[Gnarbucks]

Gnar, I was actually looking at that soap before. However, the bottle is itself very confusing. I think I'll stick with what I have right now.

HAHA! the bottle is the best part of the product! smoke a bowl and read the whole thing while you take a dump.

then hop in the shower for a tingly, fresh, rejuvenating experience!

 

[GenericMind]

Man if I don't shower and wash with soap 1-2 times a day I don't feel clean. I can't even imagine leaving the house without deodorant.

The thought of not using these things never really crossed my mind, so you guys have me curious. Is soap/shampoo/deodorant bad for your body or skin, or do people not use them for other reasons?

 

[Jamshyd]

Soap with synthetic surfactants can be extremely irritating to the skin but you never notice this because you'd always used it . If you were to use natural soap but once you'd notice the difference. Furthermore, good soap should be deodorizing enough on its own, that you wouldn't NEED to use deodorant if you shower every day.

The problem is that natural soap cannot be produced en masse without being cut to shit, hence my call for making your own.

 

[MySecret]

I haven't brushed my teeth in a week. Anyone wanna smell my breath? I need testees, please.

 

[socko]

Grow some balls and make your own!!

It is tricky, but the patient are rewarded.

I've been using my own home-made soap for almost two years now. I say this and I have a serious phobia of any kind of skin trouble.

For cereals, here is the formula:

Patience
------------ = Luxury Soap
Lye + fat

I intend soon on trying to substitute Potash for the lye to make an all-purpose liquid soap.

....
p.s. Here is another one for anti-deodorant. Besides, I can't think of much that's more erotic than fresh b.o., but apparently I'm slightly kinky for thinking so...

I was wondering if you have any recipes to share? Where could I get started with this hobby? Store-bought soap tends to give me a rash.

I agree with the part about a little bit of fresh (not stale and rancid) BO smelling nice. That's probably why I like patchouli.



No toothpaste: There is no need for toothpaste. Baking soda is an excellent substitute. Just sprinkle a line of baking soda on your toothbrush. You can add sea salt (abrasiveness and flavor) as well.

 

[kaywholed]

Man if I don't shower and wash with soap 1-2 times a day I don't feel clean. I can't even imagine leaving the house without deodorant.

The thought of not using these things never really crossed my mind, so you guys have me curious. Is soap/shampoo/deodorant bad for your body or skin, or do people not use them for other reasons?

shampoo damages your hair and scalp. conditioner partially restores some health to your hair, but the natural oils on your head are the best thing for it.

 

[addictivepersona]

I was wondering if you have any recipes to share?

Here's something Jamshyd posted awhile back. Figured I'd save him the trouble of typing it all again. (No, I'm not a stalker--Just have a good memory some of the time.)

Yes, it goes without saying that one who handles lye must know just how powerful it is - the best way to do this is to imagine that you are handling concentrated sulphuric acid (and lye DOES fume as it is mixed with water).

AP: It is hard to post a recipe as soapmaking is closer to chemical synth than it is to cooking.

Very roughly, the absolute simplest soap can go something like this:

20lb Olive Oil
2.6lb NAOH
7.5lb Water

- The lye-solution is prepared by slowly pouring the lye into the water (and not the other way around) while stirring. Goggles and gloves are a must. It will go very hot and start fuming...

- The oil is heated (in a non-aluminum, non-teflon pan), some people suggest to bring it up to the same heat as the lye, but I find this unncessary.

- The lye-soln. is carefully poured onto the oil while stirring vigorously.

- Mixture will go through several phases, must be continuously mixed and stirred, until it reaches pudding-like consistency (it should be opaque too). This is the trickiest part, as it can take anywhere from 10secs to 1hr (although with olive oil it almost always takes a long while).

- From here many methods differ, the easiest being to turn down the heat and pour this stuff into a mold. From there, if given enough time (=weeks) it will self-propel its own reaction and eventually harden. You can test if it is finished by placing it near the tip of your tongue - if it "zaps" you then it is still not ready.

The subject is surprisingly deep and complicated, and the above is an extremely rudimentary guideline.

I've been tinkering with it the past year or so and have finally settled on a soap that contains no less than 7 different oils in different proportions, the stars being olive and avocado oils. The latter is amazing for skin, being particularly rich in vitamin E amongst other things.

Curiously, the method is almost identical to making biodiesel from clean, unused oil, with the exception that biodiesel requires the lye to be mixed with methanol first.

 

[Jamshyd]

^ Haha well done

Yes, this is the most basic... surprise, surprise! - castille soap! This is aka "Nabulsi", aka "marseilles", aka "aleppo", and probably several others.

All of these are characterized by being the product of olive oil and plant-derived alkali. They also differ by the hundreds of different ways to mix those two ingredients so as to get the most desirable product. The latter two listed above are also characterized by having Bay leaves as a third ingredient.

Today, Marseilles and Castile is is sold under many names and scents (usually overpriced). The reality, however, is that these soaps are traditionally favoured due to their ability to cleanse thoroughly without leaving any trace of perfume. This continues to be the trend in more rural parts and also in namesake locales.

I will update with a better recipe later

One thing to look out for: The calculations I give above DO NOT proportionally increase or decrease. The ratio of oil:lye is subject to more than one calculation depending on the oil, though there is software that can be used today as a rough guideline, such as soapcalc.com.

 

[GenericMind]

shampoo damages your hair and scalp. conditioner partially restores some health to your hair, but the natural oils on your head are the best thing for it.

Ha no wonder my hair is always frizzled to shit. Maybe I'll stop using so much shampoo.

 

[modern buddha]

My skin has been a bit dry lately. I'm still only washing my body every two days, but now that I've switched to every three days, I'm going to give you guys an update on skin condition sometime next week. I'm hoping it's not as dry as it has been, even with washing it every two days.

Lotion!

 

[chrissie]

Article: I haven't used soap or shampoo in a year, and it's awesome

Full Text

NSFW:

I stopped using soap a year ago. It was easily one of the best moves I've ever made in my entire flippin' life.

About this time last year I read an article (which Mark mentioned here as well) extolling the virtues of a soap-free bathing experience. TL;DR version: Your body is designed to regulate itself. Smearing chemicals all over it wrecks its own built-in processes, and screws with naturally balanced pH levels. This made sense to me and I thought I'd give it a shot for a month.

At the beginning of February 2010, I blogged about the results I'd seen so far. I didn't stink at all (confirmed by friends, family and random people I ended up sitting next to on various forms of public transit), my skin felt better, oily and dry patches had all but disappeared and the light dandruff I'd had my entire life was almost gone. I was pleased with the results of my month experiment and decided I'd run with it for a while longer. As of January 1, 2011: it's been a year now, and I can't imagine ever going back.

More on the results I've seen: As I just mentioned, my skin feels better than ever before. Not that it ever felt bad, really, but it feels awesome now. Still no stink at all, I swear even when I'm really active and sweating I don't notice any B.O., and I used to be über self-conscious about this and would think I was stinking if I walked up a flight of stairs too quickly. So this is a huge improvement for sure. And with the exception of changing climates drastically, even the dandruff is history. My previously wavy and mostly unmanageable hair now seems much more willing to bend to my will, a dream of mine since I first looked in a mirror, brush in hand, then tried and failed to make any sense of that monster. So I approve for sure.

And speaking of hair, that was actually a perfect test. Sometime mid-summer I stopped by a barber and before I'd realized it he'd squirted a glob of shampoo onto my head. It was too late to protest, so I just sat through the scrubbing. For the following 2 weeks my hair was a mess: full of dandruff and totally uncontrollable. Once things balanced back out to the previously established no-soap norms, all was good again.

Unexpected bonus: travel is much easier. Now that I'm not lugging shampoo and conditioner with me on the road, there's that much less for TSA to hassle me about and more room in my luggage (which I quickly filled with coffee stuff, natch). Not that I always carried lots of liquid toiletries with me, but now I don't even have to think about what the hotel I'm going to might provide, or worry about having to borrow something from a friend until I can get to a store and buy my own stuff. Those details are gone. I love it.

The future? I will definitely be sticking with this. I'm still annoyed it took me 35 years to learn what I clearly already knew as a baby kicking and screaming when my parents tried to wash my hair. At least that's what I want to assume I knew back then. I know now, but I'd still rather not think about how much I spent on soap and shampoo and related products over the years when they were likely causing all the problems I was trying to protect against.

If you don't believe me, you can totally smell me when you see me in public. Really. Just ask. It won't be weird at all. Okay, maybe a little bit.

 

[fizzle]

^I dont know, some of the comments in there give fairly mixed reviews, and I know someone who actually tried that... he gave it about a month, and by the end his hair just felt awful. I'm not saying dont try it, it sounds like it may work for some people and not so well for others, it does sound like an interesting experiment though. I know my hair does not take kindly when it hasnt been shampooed and conditioned, but assuming you are using hot water I can see how that might work for skin.

 

[atara]

I lived without soap for a while on Outward Bound. The result was that I smelled so bad at the end of the trip that my mother wouldn't let me get in the car with her. Not using soap doesn't seem to work very well for me.

Dr. Bronner's Magic Soap is absolutely fantastic; the label is the way it is to scare you. It works as both soap and shampoo (which is way more convenient than the alternative!) though if you use it as shampoo you'll absolutely need some sort of conditioner. And the peppermint is fuckin' tingly. :D

I use some stuff I got at Trader Joe's as conditioner; not even sure what it's called but it works pretty well.

 

[modern buddha]

Chrissie, that article is stunning. Many of the comments afterward also are comments of "I haven't used soap and I feel wonderful". I think I might have to give this a legitimate try. I think I'll starttttt... well, today sounds perfect.

The person who wrote this article is right; water is all we need. Stench only exists because our bodies are trying to fight the constant horde of chemicals we put them through. Have you started not using soap yet? Has anyone else not used soap in a while that can agree with the statements in the article?

 

[DarthMom]

personally i think it is a bunch of crap. i work at a jail. the girls who don't have access to soap or deodorant always smell, even after months of being there when their bodies should have supposedly adjusted to the lack of soaps. the bo is there. and they have access to water which is supposedly all they need. they bathe daily. there is a reason soap and cleansers were invented back in the day when there wasn't any. i am not convinced.

now don't get me wrong, i never use soap on "non dirty" areas such as arms and legs when i shower. unless i have worked out or gone to the beach, etc....because it is drying, that is true. but certain body parts need proper cleansing. using healthy soaps, non sulfate shampoos, etc, that i also agree with and do. but only water on the coochie and pits? hell no.

 

[modern buddha]

^ But the objective is to cleanse the body of the slime (if you have any) and the residue from the past day's work. Also, a prison? Those people probably don't even care about themselves. It stems much farther than your body simply "adjusting" in many cases. What kind of a diet do they eat? How often do they get outside the jail cell? Is there activity time, exercise time? How clean are their cells? The beds? Their clothing?

I haven't used soap on my cooch in many years, ever since I had a bladder infection that my mom mistakenly told me was caused by taking bubble baths (I was 5). Been washing with water down there ever since. I don't need it to be sparkly clean; it gets itchy if I wash it with soap. Perhaps the same might go for the rest of my body. You sploosh it out nice and thoroughly and you're done, if that's not tmi.

 

[socko]

Thanks for the information on soap making. I hope to try it soon.

Darthmom: Prisoners who wash daily still have BO because they don't have access to soap which is necessary to prevent BO.
OK, I guess working around a lot of prisoners who don't have access to soap makes you kind of an expert on the subject of not using soap. So, I have a few questions: Is that true for all of those who don't have access to soap? And, what about toweling. After the shower, if you dry yourself with a clean towel in such a way that it sloughs off dead skin and removes odor-causing grease and oil, will that be enough to prevent the BO?

 

[fizzle]

Keep in mind, historically people wore lots of perfumes and carried flowers and things with them because water was all they had to bathe with... they didnt have chemicals for soaps, or all this fake stuff in their food and they still felt the need to cover up the smells... I understand using natural soaps, but I also definitely understand the use of soap in the first place.

 

[spork]

I lived without soap for a while on Outward Bound. The result was that I smelled so bad at the end of the trip that my mother wouldn't let me get in the car with her. Not using soap doesn't seem to work very well for me.

Dr. Bronner's Magic Soap is absolutely fantastic; the label is the way it is to scare you. It works as both soap and shampoo (which is way more convenient than the alternative!) though if you use it as shampoo you'll absolutely need some sort of conditioner. And the peppermint is fuckin' tingly. :D

I use some stuff I got at Trader Joe's as conditioner; not even sure what it's called but it works pretty well.

i don't think conditioner is a necessity. for a couple years now i've been using white vinegar after i shampoo instead of conditioner and my hair's in great shape!