Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

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

boingboing.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 43 posts

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

#31

Post by eof »

jessriedel wrote: post #10

>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. I find this hard to believe. My money's on confirmation bias.

I wash my hair with shampoo only when I haven't been able to rinse it regularly and it accumulates gunk.

My blond, 3-4 inch long hair is shiny and lays on my head just fine. When I wash it.. its about two days before it goes back to being the same. Mostly it gets frizzy, but my scalp will also dry out to some degree, so I wouldn't be surprised if someone had increase dandruff.. though there is probably a bit of hyperbole going on here.

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

#32

Post by burgerbrain »

puredemo wrote: post #15
burgerbrain wrote: post #2

Cool story bro, just stay away from me.

Why is this upvoted? Almost everyone who has tried the no soap no shampoo thing says the same thing; that it works great. It's a little ridiculous that this trolling response is considered "contributing" to the site and has 17 upvotes.

Troll? No, simply an expression of incredulity. Every time I've seen stories like these the one thing they always have in common is they reek of bad science. Confirmation bias, no control, no double-blind setup, non-empirical testing procedures, you name it.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence and all I'm seeing here is one single piece of anecdotal evidence. If you want to convince me of the virtues of forgoing soap, then give me a peer reviewed paper in a major journal, not a blog about how your family and random strangers say that you don't smell terrible.

But hey, if anecdotal evidence is all we need today then let me add some of my own: I know two people who have admitted to trying this, and I really did like to be several feet away from both.

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

#33

Post by Mz »

guylhem wrote: post #3

I live in the FWI, in a tropical climate. Outside temperature is quite stable around 30 celcius in the daytime and a little less at night, say around 25. Here, avoiding BO requires a minimum of 2 showers a day. I tried this for a week and went back to soap and shampoo. Maybe in the canadian winter that's possible? Also, why is there all this hype for paleo stuff? Is this the new fad after environmentalist concerns?

I live in Georgia, which can be a 100 degrees Fahrenheit during the day in the summer (high 30's Celsius) and below freezing (mostly at night) in the winter. I and my two sons no longer use soap or shampoo. I also don't use deodorant. I have made quite a lot of dietary and lifestyle changes to get well when doctors claim that isn't possible. Giving up soap/shampoo was a very late game change, after a whole lot of other stuff happened first.

My opinion: This isn't simple. The way you smell is due to a combination of chemical and bacterial/microbial influences and changing one of them can upset the balance, temporarily causing die-off, purging effects, etc. before some new balance is firmly established. For me, I first spent years getting myself healthier before it made sense to give up shampoo. Presumably, for those folks where this works, they don't have whatever chemical and/or microbial issue causes you to smell when you give it up. (My experience: The kind of stable temperature/climate you live in does a very poor job of killing off microbes. Drastic changes in temperature are hostile to microbes and make it harder for the same ones to be causing smelliness year round. Ridding your home of some microbe of that sort is quite challenging and you probably would not be willing to go to the lengths I have gone to in order to accomplish something like that.)

EDIT: I will add that I do put salt in my bath water. So it is not like I am using nothing to kill stuff.

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

#34

Post by lhnz »

I don't mean to be rude, but I often hear complaints from non-development departments at work of how bad some developers smell... While it might be possible with very regular washing and the right kind of body/environment for this to work, do you really want to risk the above?

What are you doing this for? Because you can? Because you have to spend less money on products? Because you disagree with using chemicals on your skin?

Most people will think you're disgusting if they find out. Entering into a psuedo-scientific debate with them will not work out in your favour. I don't think you should follow this just from a couple of people's anecdotes...

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

#35

Post by andrewvc »

narkee wrote: post #28

> 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. These "naturalistic" or "pre-technology/paleo" arguments are bunk. Otherwise medicine would be unnecessary, as this argument leads to the conclusion that the body would regulate itself when presen…

The arguments may be bunk, but I do think we should challenge our base assumptions from time to time. From that perspective I find this sort of thing fun.

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

#36

Post by guylhem »

puredemo wrote: post #18
guylhem wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't stay away from work more than a week. And I'm not sure I'd be welcome at work during a no-soap experiment..

... you were still showering, right?

yep 3 times a day but that was not enough.

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

#37

Post by guylhem »

Mz wrote: post #33
guylhem wrote: post #3

I live in the FWI, in a tropical climate. Outside temperature is quite stable around 30 celcius in the daytime and a little less at night, say around 25. Here, avoiding BO requires a minimum of 2 showers a day. I tried this for a week and went back to soap and shampoo. Maybe in the canadian winter that's possible? Also, why is there all this hype for paleo stuff? Is this the new fad after environmentalist concerns?

I live in Georgia, which can be a 100 degrees Fahrenheit during the day in the summer (high 30's Celsius) and below freezing (mostly at night) in the winter. I and my two sons no longer use soap or shampoo. I also don't use deodorant. I have made quite a lot of dietary and lifestyle changes to get well when doctors claim that isn't possible. Giving up soap/shampoo was a very late game change, after a whole lot of oth…

Thanks for the info. You had success in Georgia - wow. First report I saw of success in a warm climate. Maybe I could try your tricks if you are willing to share.

The only thing I just don't use is deodorant. It gives me real skin problems (rashes on dried skin), so I just use soap and water at various intervals during the day. It is so weird - tried various brands, same problems every time I use it again.

Honestly, that's why I thought it was worth trying in the first place: even if I never noted any side effect of using soap/shampoo, maybe I just don't notice them because that's what I consider to be normal.

Still, it really sounds like a fad, but if it is helpful, why not.

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

#38

Post by Mz »

guylhem wrote: post #37
Mz wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in Georgia, which can be a 100 degrees Fahrenheit during the day in the summer (high 30's Celsius) and below freezing (mostly at night) in the winter. I and my two sons no longer use soap or shampoo. I also don't use deodorant. I have made quite a lot of dietary and lifestyle changes to get well when doctors claim that isn't possible. Giving up soap/shampoo was a very late game change, after a whole lot of oth…

Thanks for the info. You had success in Georgia - wow. First report I saw of success in a warm climate. Maybe I could try your tricks if you are willing to share. The only thing I just don't use is deodorant. It gives me real skin problems (rashes on dried skin), so I just use soap and water at various intervals during the day. It is so weird - tried various brands, same problems every time I use it again. Honestly,…

1. I switched to a good quality, high brine sea salt.

2. I worked hard on reconfiguring my body chemistry, some of which is specific to my genetic disorder but my general understanding is most modern diets are too acid and high acidity promotes viral/bacterial growth. So check your PH balance and work on it if it is out of whack.

3. I embraced ascetism and I own very few possessions. It was a necessary part of getting myself well and we have found that if microbes are growing on us, then they are also growing on all the things we routinely touch. So you may not be able to break the cycle without some lifestyle changes of a sort that most people sternly reject.

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

#40

Post by ElbertF »

narkee wrote: post #28

> 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. These "naturalistic" or "pre-technology/paleo" arguments are bunk. Otherwise medicine would be unnecessary, as this argument leads to the conclusion that the body would regulate itself when presen…

I wonder if he stopped brushing his teeth as well.
Post reply on HN