I only shower once a fortnight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There, I\u2019ve said it. It will turn noses up. Chairs will be moved away from me. Delicate sensibilities have been offended.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But why the gap between showering? Don\u2019t my friends say something? Don\u2019t I smell?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
No, I don\u2019t smell. I\u2019ve asked my friends and they are always brutally honest with me, as good friends should be. I don\u2019t smell.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In truth, I don\u2019t sweat easily, and do little to build up a sweat these days. I wash my armpits every two or three days, and I take a bath once a week. And I am lavish with the application of underarm deodorant every morning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, why not more frequent showering? <\/p>\n\n\n\n
What I find annoying about the shower is the cold air that envelops me once I get out of the shower. Icy tentacles wrap their evilness around me and I shiver. I prefer not to feel cold, so I limit the number of times I have to endure it. And I find the heat just seeps through me when I have a bath, keeping me wrapped up in warmth when I\u2019m done bathing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, I prefer bathing. I take my waterproof ereader in with me and wallow in a luxuriating bath whilst having a good read of a pulp crime novel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I\u2019m not alone in not showering. Doctors throughout the Western world advise us to not shower every day, and it\u2019s not just because they want us to save water. Washing and scrubbing removes the skin’s oil and healthy bacteria, and it can become dry, irritated and itchy. Dry, cracked skin can allow bacteria to get through, causing infections and allergic reactions. This is particularly true among older people, whose skin grows thinner, less hydrated, and more sensitive. And I am older, a pensioner, so this point is salient to me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What would happen if I never showered? Well, skipping my shower could lead to an excess of dead skin cell build up, says Amy Wechsler, a New York City dermatologist. Hyperkeratosis, which is the thickening of the outer layer of the skin, would probably occur. Rashes and itchy irritation will occur. Not pleasant, so that\u2019s why I haven\u2019t stopped showering all together. But I do prefer baths, baths with Epsom salts and baths with Himalayan bath salts in them. It\u2019s just that in water-sensitive South Australia\u2013\u2013the driest state in the driest continent on Earth\u2013\u2013drawing a bath every day would be prohibitively expensive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, what are some good reasons to consider not showering, or not showering every day?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Well, there\u2019s the genuine possibility that you\u2019re not dirty if you\u2019re an office worker. Sure, if you work with chemicals, or in construction, or on the land, or you go the gym every day or night, you are more likely to need to remove dirt and grime from your body but even then, some dermatologists say, the risk of stripping your body of natural oils is greater than the benefit of losing some of that dirt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There\u2019s a very delicate balance of microorganisms on the skin, and if it\u2019s disrupted\u2013\u2013by a harsh soap, say\u2013\u2013we leave ourselves open to invasion by other, more harmful, bodies. Dr. Robert H. Shmerling, MD, reported in the Harvard Health Publishing Blog that \u2018our immune systems need a certain amount of stimulation by normal microorganisms, dirt, and other environmental exposures in order to create protective antibodies and immune memory.\u2019 And stripping away those microorganisms leaves us, over time, more and more susceptible to a malfunctioning immune system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You might love a long hot shower, but the chances are good that your skin doesn\u2019t. The hot water strips the skin of those essential oils, which protect your skin and keep it healthy. Strip those oils away and you risk skin infections and acne. Should you have eczema, stripping away the oils will exacerbate the condition, leaving you with inflamed, itchy skin after a hot shower. Experts don\u2019t suggest hot showers at all to people with skin conditions\u2013\u2013cool or warm showers only to help keep the skin calm. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The same warning about washing our skin applies to washing our hair. According to the International Association of Trichologists, we should only wash our hair twice a week, especially if our hair is thin, damaged, or fine. We can still moisturise our hair by using conditioner on the days we\u2019re not washing it. The scalp is a delicate ecosystem; if it\u2019s washed too often it loses valuable protective oils, but if it\u2019s not washed enough those protective oils build up. If, through too much washing, the oils are stripped away and the skin dries out, then flakes arrive\u2013\u2013hello, dandruff!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now, I\u2019m guilty of running my bathwater at too high a temperature. My skin crackles when I gingerly ease myself into my piping hot bath. I should lower the temperature in order to protect the delicate oils that protect my skin, but I enjoy being warmed up by the bathwater, to where, when I step out of the bath at the end of my pampering session, the cold air of the bathroom doesn\u2019t assail me. A shower doesn\u2019t have that same warming effect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But one thing I don\u2019t enjoy about my baths\u2013\u2013the icy cold tiles on my back when I lay back in my bath and attempt to cover my chest with water. Those tiles at the head of the bath just don\u2019t heat up, even from the steam rising from the water, and I suffer a sharp intake of breath and a knee-jerk recoil back out of the water, sitting bolt upright to regain my composure. I\u2019ve taken to using a jug to pour hot bathwater over the tiles to raise their temperature first, before leaning back onto them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now you know why I don\u2019t shower anymore. It\u2019s not that I\u2019m unhygienic, it\u2019s that I get all the cleaning I usually need from a weekly bath. And let\u2019s face it, if a weekly bath was good enough for our grandparents, it is good enough for us. After all, who benefits from daily showering and hair washing but soap manufacturers and water utilities? Liberate your body, shower less. Or as they used to say in the 70s, shower with a friend.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I only shower once a fortnight. There, I\u2019ve said it. It will turn noses up. Chairs will be moved away from me. Delicate sensibilities have been offended. But why the gap between showering? Don\u2019t my friends say something? Don\u2019t I smell? No, I don\u2019t smell. I\u2019ve asked my friends and they are always brutally honest…<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"ppma_author":[306],"class_list":["post-396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-creative-writing"],"yoast_head":"\n