9 ms·

How often do you need to shower? A doctor argues, less often than you think

52 points by _zhqs 6y ago

david-gpu 6y ago
I once hired a contractor that showered once a week. He didn't tell me, it was apparent by his body odor that he bathed on Thursdays. So, while it might be true that medically we don't need to shower so often, socially it is a necessity if we want people around us to be comfortable in close quarters. I'll stick to my two daily showers with baby soap, thankyouverymuch. Thankfully I live in a place where water is abundant.
- rmdashrfstar 6y ago
  Two daily showers? Isn't one enough? You run the risk of drying out your skin and stripping your hair of its natural (and beneficial) oils.
  - david-gpu 6y ago
    To each their own. I'm definitely more comfortable with two showers. I have a buzz cut.
  - garciasn 6y ago
    I shower up to twice a day on the regular. I’d rather have dry skin than smell of BO. But even though I regularly shower twice a day, I only get dry skin in the dead of winter when ambient outdoor temps are sometimes as low as -25F.
  - bradlys 6y ago
    You can also just not get your hair wet. I only get my hair wet when I’m going to shampoo it. I’m one of the people who needs to shower a minimum of once a day. My stink is profound. Gets worse as the day goes. It can be better if I apply some antibacterial stuff to my armpits. (Kills all the stink creating biome)
    - OJFord 6y ago
      I shower every morning with the purpose of washing my hair, looks ridiculous and feels nasty if I don't. Perhaps it's conditioned to 'expect' it, but frankly I'd rather do it than stop for a period to find out.
- Cerium 6y ago
  I used to shower once in the morning, then married a once in the evening person. Now I'm happily in the twice a day crowd. Mornings I wash my hair, evening just to rinse off.
- wenc 6y ago
  I’m a twice a day person. When I was in Germany I told my host that I would be showering twice a day and she was aghast — she said that it was unhealthy for the skin and that there was a cost to the environment in terms of water usage and chemicals down the drain. I hear that, but to me showering goes beyond cleanliness. I do it for the mental health benefits. It’s my time to unplug from the stresses of the day, to think quietly to myself (bathroom ideas are a real thing), and to feel squeaky clean before the day starts and before I go to bed (the mental health benefits of a good nights sleep is significant). Showering is as psychological as it is physical. I once went on a camping trip where I couldn’t shower for 3 days. My body felt like it was overheating and I was irritable the whole time.
- foreigner 6y ago
  I'm curious where you live where "water is abundant". Water that comes out of your shower is the same stuff that comes out of your faucet. It's been carefully purified and disinfected, which costs a lot of energy. Even if you live somewhere (as I do) where water falls from the sky all the time, the water for showers is still not "abundant".
  - Turing_Machine 6y ago
    Where I live, the water utility sells water for about $5.00/thousand gallons (or about $1.30/thousand liters, if you prefer). Given that the utility stays in business, that is enough to cover the costs of the well, the pumps, the water treatment, and the vast network of pipes required to get it to my house. So, yeah, pretty abundant.
  - frosted-flakes 6y ago
    The water that comes out of my tap comes straight out of the ground, without any filters or purification steps. It tastes great, although it does have a moderate iron content. I live in the Great Lakes watershed, where water really is abundant.
    - tzs 6y ago
      I too have a well. For the curious, I estimate that it takes about $0.27 worth of electricity for it to pump 1000 gallons.
  - wenc 6y ago
    Generally in the U.S. and Canada, freshwater is abundant in the Great Lakes regions, so much so that this area is considered a strategic location in a climate crisis. The cost of residential municipal water in Chicago is US$1.08/m3 [1]. In Toronto, another Great Lakes City, it's US$3.04/m3, ratcheting down to US$2.13/m3 after 5000 m3 [2]. Water in Berlin costs US$1.98/m3 [4] (€1.7/m3). In comparison, Danish water cost US$6.70/m3 in 2016 [3]. [1] https://www.chicago.gov/city/en/depts/fin/supp_info/utility-billing/water-and-sewer-rates.html https://www.chicago.gov/city/en/depts/fin/supp_info/utility-... [2] https://www.toronto.ca/services-payments/property-taxes-utilities/utility-bill/water-rates-and-fees-copy/ https://www.toronto.ca/services-payments/property-taxes-util... [3] https://www.dailyscandinavian.com/highest-water-prices-in-the-world/ https://www.dailyscandinavian.com/highest-water-prices-in-th... [4] https://www.bwb.de/content/en/html/1712.php https://www.bwb.de/content/en/html/1712.php
LilBytes 6y ago
Generally. I shower when I notice I start to smell. I live in a subtropical climate in summer (40 degrees and above, 90% humidity), so daily showers in summer are a must. Having grown up in the UK where I suspect showering when needed, and not as a daily rituaual. I believe this is common. I recall a study that mentioned Europeans in moderate or cold climates only shower a few times a week, I suspect this is the same in the UK... though of course after sports I definitely always shower, no one wants a sweaty rugby boy rolling around in bed covered in other people's grime. I shower in Winter, Spring and Autumn when, well. When my underarms and crotch are... Clammy. There's really no way to put that delicately. The number of people in Australia who religiously shower every day, shampoo every day, even when their body doesn't need it. I find quite strange. As another comment added, I will never put my self in a position where anyone can smell my body odour but why shower so frequently if your body isn't telling you, "it's a bit dirty over here, I could do with a rinse?". I briefly dated some one who was diagnosed with OCD. Things didn't work out for us because amongst other things her idea of cleanliness was a whole bunch of topical treatments for her face and body over the course of 30 minutes before bed. She'd apply this 'skin oil' that made her face glisten. And would later complain that her skin was breaking out in spots because 'something isn't working with her skin care'. The idea that your skin can and will look after it's self without us interrupting it's balance, was foreign to her. To this day I still just clean my intimate parts and arm pits when I shower. And clean the other parts of my body when there's physical dirt there. Her situation just made me sad. Her fears and obsessive compulsions about what 'health and hygiene' should be, were targeted my unscrupulous companies deliberately selling products that she absolutely did not need.
- magneticnorth 6y ago
  While I do mostly agree with you, and think that there's generally no need to bathe on mostly-sedentary days in a mild climate, there is certainly an actual answer to your maybe-hypothetical question: "... I will never put my self in a position where anyone can smell my body odour but why shower so frequently if your body isn't telling you, "it's a bit dirty over here, I could do with a rinse?". I can certainly attest that I've known lots of people who seem to be unaware that anyone can smell their body odour, and presumably can't smell it themselves. The keenness of the sense of smell seems to vary a lot more among people than other senses (except perhaps sight, but we use technology to normalize that). So having known many people who are unaware that they smell, I certainly worry the same could be true of me - I have a decent sense of smell, but probably there are many people who would notice my body odor before I did.
maxerickson 6y ago
No mention of the variation in sweat glands. People with more apocrine glands unavoidably have more body odor when they don't wash. (It's easy to tell; dry ear wax means less apocrine glands, wet ear wax means more)
- maskedoffender 6y ago
  Right, I have dry earwax and have never worn deodorant. I shower once or twice a week, but I never start to stink. My clothes don't even stink if I get them all sweaty every day without changing them. It's not fair, but it's how it is.
  - 0xcoffee 6y ago
    Make sure you get a second opinion
    - sdflhasjd 6y ago
      Someone once told me something very similar before... I was too polite to say otherwise.
      - UncleMeat 6y ago
        Yeah in my experience every single person who has told me of the virtues of bathing less often stunk in that very moment.
    - maskedoffender 6y ago
      Oh believe me, I've had plenty of second opinions. I even ask the most brutal and least polite people I know. It's not a merit of less frequent bathing, it's just my genetics. I just don't produce stinky sweat. My brother-in-law was jealous after he smelled a pair of socks I had worn for a week and there was virtually no odor.
lmilcin 6y ago
I red this years ago and for the past 5 or 6 years haven't use any kind of soap or shampoo except for my hands. I shower every day (sometimes multiple times a day if it is hot) but I only use clean water and fresh towel to scrub oils from skin and hair. Once body adjusts it is possible to go longer time without shower with no problems. I did couple experiments but in the end I just like to feel fresh before bedtime so I stopped. I can say it takes time for body to adjust oil production but now my hair is healthier than ever and I generally feel better.
- stevewodil 6y ago
  I'd be curious to know if you have anyone in your life that was around you and could have complained about your odor and what they think about this
  - lm28469 6y ago
    I shower everyday but use shampoo maybe once a week and soap after my gym sessions or particularly warm days. My girlfriends never complained, they often told me I smelled good and I have no reasons to doubt them. I think it really does depend on the person. I lived in a lot of shared flats, I could smell some roommates' body odor across the room 1 hour after they showered, some other roommates seemed to never have any body odor, even after going for a run. The type of clothes you wear also has a huge influence. Some fabrics are naturally anti fungal/bacterial, some other will smell like death after even the lightest efforts.
- jelliclesfarm 6y ago
  I think showering has more benefits than just cleansing aspect. A shower with good pressure can be like a massage. A soaking bath is very primal and reminiscent of pre birth amniotic fluid. Water is healing. All soap is made from lye. Any cleansing product should be bio degradable, safe for marine life and shouldn’t be laden with chemicals. Bathing can be great without the toxic soups we create in plastic containers that clog the landfill. I love talking to older people and I am fond of taking notes of their grooming habits. That’s why some of my farm products focus on cosmetics that are also edible. They used ground grains and nut shells for exfoliant. Herbs and oils. Plant dyes and natural fragrances. Milk and cream and yogurt. Honey. Turmeric and saffron and rose water. Corn cobs and luffa to scrub down. It’s not much diff from what we do except we have to wrap everything in plastic and use preservatives for shelf life. Also..another thing I learnt about skin and hair care is that the inside matters. Make up and cosmetics may fix things from outside, but skin and hair are markers of diet and good health. Also circulation. Perhaps there was something to brushing yourself hair 100 times before going to bed. I also found that the women I spoke to always had grooming habits that they indulged in as a group. It was not a solitary activity. I found the whole thing fascinating.
jelliclesfarm 6y ago
How you smell depends on a lot of things including diet. I’d imagine body odour carries many markers for pheromones. If I were a betting person, I’d wager that those who shower often get laid less.
- EForEndeavour 6y ago
  > If I were a betting person, I’d wager that those who shower often get laid less. I honestly can't tell if you're being serious. Shower reasonably soon before a date, people.
  - jelliclesfarm 6y ago
    Right. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_odour_and_sexual_attraction https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_odour_and_sexual_attrac... Fun fact: truffles..the most expensive fungi in the world..is often sniffed out by male pigs because it smells like female pigs in heat. The French have trained dogs to sniff out The elusive and rare and expensive truffles because the damn pigs will scarf down thousands of dollars worth of truffles(1200-1500 quid/kg for black truffles and upwards of $4000/kg for Italian white alba truffles)once they dig them out. The most expensive fungus in the world makes pig horny. Food for thought. Just sayin’ When I was in London, I ate at McDonalds for a month so I can buy a little knob of alba truffle to shave over a bowl of buttered noodles. And.It.Was.Worth.It.
- nextweek2 6y ago
  > I’d wager that those who shower often get laid less. A really interesting wager. I'd take you up on it if I could. There has been a big trend over the last 10-20 years to add stronger artificial scents to cleaning products. People couldn't tell much difference between how well a product cleaned so manufacturers found that smell also played a vital role in our perception of cleanliness. Since shower gels and soaps clearly overpower natural pheromones, in a side by side mate picking, I'd wager the one wearing the most fragrant scent would get laid more.
  - jelliclesfarm 6y ago
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
blueridge 6y ago
I've always had a sensitive sense of smell, and I'd much prefer to smell sweat and body odor than the synthetic goop that people cover themselves with. I notice this most frequently while hiking and passing other people on the trail. A good deal of people have this synthetic aroma that hovers over them everywhere they go. One whiff and you have to spend the next half-mile forcibly exhaling to get that junk out of your airway. My sniffer detects: perfume, sunscreen, bug spray, hair product, hand sanitizer, scented lotion, and probably a special blend of essential oils applied from head to toe to help deter moose or something. I think it's truly disgusting, but that's just me. Generally speaking, I like humans who smell like humans. One thing I've come to believe: eating right, staying fit, and sleeping well makes one smell good.
- emerged 6y ago
  I refuse to go to the mall because the chemical warfare is unbearable. It burns my eyes as well.
- wyxuan 6y ago
  This times 100. I often jokingly quip that Assad has nothing on US fragrance companies when it comes to chemical warfare, but when I walk into a room with a wall mounted airwick it becomes less of a joke.
- frosted-flakes 6y ago
  While I mostly agree with you, some people can truly smell foul, to the point where I gag. But I suspect that's mostly a case of them not washing at all.
jasonv 6y ago
My teenage son have this discussion every day.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
njharman 6y ago
Need to shower? Sure clickbait title. Still I don't understand. For almost all of human existence we've somehow survived without showering. You obviosly don't ever need to shower. But also, nearly as far back as history goes, we've been cleaning, coiffing, and perfuming ourselves. Attracting mates and reproducing is overwhelming instinct that still drives most human behavior.
- Barrin92 6y ago
  >For almost all of human existence we've somehow survived without showering for almost all of our biological history we didn't wear clothes and hang out in the open, not dressed in a shirt in a office building with 20 other people in the same room or a packed subway station.
jacknews 6y ago
Depends on climate.
- cybertronic 6y ago
  and your job
melenaos 6y ago
My grand grandfather was saying that he only bathed once, when he was baptised. He lived for 107 years, a happy and mindfulness life. He ate meat once per year, at easter and he drunk one bottle of koniak per week, along with one packet of cigarettes per day. But the most important thing, i believe, was that he had two ears, anything that went into one ear was going out of the other. He never bothered about anything, he lived 3 wars, buried 5 children but he never got sad or sorry. But, who knows, maybe it was the distance from the shower. And, by the way, he didn't smell bad.
- rambojazz 6y ago
  I think he has simply won the genetic lottery if he was able to live in good health to 107 with that lifestyle.
- loco5niner 6y ago
  > buried 5 children but he never got sad ?
kwhitefoot 6y ago
Surely never is the answer if the act in question is literally a shower. Growing up in the 50s, 60s, 70s in the UK hardly anyone I knew had one. But washing is surely only necessary when it is necessary to remove dirt and possibly smells.
LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago
On demand! Furthermore not showering doesn't necessarily imply no washing at all. Like with a sponge, washingcloth in maybe 4 minutes, like eyes, face, neck, armpits, crotch, feet?
welly 6y ago
For me I like the feeling of cleanliness and freshness after having a shower in the morning before I start work. Clearly I'm not dirty or smelly after a hard day's work behind a hot Das Keyboard but l suppose it has become routine for me and unfortunately I can't abide the way I feel if I haven't showered for longer than a day. A shame really because my inner hippy wants me to not be so reliant on showering and go for days if not weeks without bathing.

52 points by _zhqs 6y ago

I once hired a contractor that showered once a week. He didn't tell me, it was apparent by his body odor that he bathed on Thursdays. So, while it might be true that medically we don't need to shower so often, socially it is a necessity if we want people around us to be comfortable in close quarters. I'll stick to my two daily showers with baby soap, thankyouverymuch. Thankfully I live in a place where water is abundant.

rmdashrfstar 6y ago
Two daily showers? Isn't one enough? You run the risk of drying out your skin and stripping your hair of its natural (and beneficial) oils.
- david-gpu 6y ago
  To each their own. I'm definitely more comfortable with two showers. I have a buzz cut.
- garciasn 6y ago
  I shower up to twice a day on the regular. I’d rather have dry skin than smell of BO. But even though I regularly shower twice a day, I only get dry skin in the dead of winter when ambient outdoor temps are sometimes as low as -25F.
- bradlys 6y ago
  You can also just not get your hair wet. I only get my hair wet when I’m going to shampoo it. I’m one of the people who needs to shower a minimum of once a day. My stink is profound. Gets worse as the day goes. It can be better if I apply some antibacterial stuff to my armpits. (Kills all the stink creating biome)
  - OJFord 6y ago
    I shower every morning with the purpose of washing my hair, looks ridiculous and feels nasty if I don't. Perhaps it's conditioned to 'expect' it, but frankly I'd rather do it than stop for a period to find out.
Cerium 6y ago
I used to shower once in the morning, then married a once in the evening person. Now I'm happily in the twice a day crowd. Mornings I wash my hair, evening just to rinse off.
wenc 6y ago
I’m a twice a day person. When I was in Germany I told my host that I would be showering twice a day and she was aghast — she said that it was unhealthy for the skin and that there was a cost to the environment in terms of water usage and chemicals down the drain. I hear that, but to me showering goes beyond cleanliness. I do it for the mental health benefits. It’s my time to unplug from the stresses of the day, to think quietly to myself (bathroom ideas are a real thing), and to feel squeaky clean before the day starts and before I go to bed (the mental health benefits of a good nights sleep is significant). Showering is as psychological as it is physical. I once went on a camping trip where I couldn’t shower for 3 days. My body felt like it was overheating and I was irritable the whole time.
foreigner 6y ago
I'm curious where you live where "water is abundant". Water that comes out of your shower is the same stuff that comes out of your faucet. It's been carefully purified and disinfected, which costs a lot of energy. Even if you live somewhere (as I do) where water falls from the sky all the time, the water for showers is still not "abundant".
- Turing_Machine 6y ago
  Where I live, the water utility sells water for about $5.00/thousand gallons (or about $1.30/thousand liters, if you prefer). Given that the utility stays in business, that is enough to cover the costs of the well, the pumps, the water treatment, and the vast network of pipes required to get it to my house. So, yeah, pretty abundant.
- frosted-flakes 6y ago
  The water that comes out of my tap comes straight out of the ground, without any filters or purification steps. It tastes great, although it does have a moderate iron content. I live in the Great Lakes watershed, where water really is abundant.
  - tzs 6y ago
    I too have a well. For the curious, I estimate that it takes about $0.27 worth of electricity for it to pump 1000 gallons.
- wenc 6y ago
  Generally in the U.S. and Canada, freshwater is abundant in the Great Lakes regions, so much so that this area is considered a strategic location in a climate crisis. The cost of residential municipal water in Chicago is US$1.08/m3 [1]. In Toronto, another Great Lakes City, it's US$3.04/m3, ratcheting down to US$2.13/m3 after 5000 m3 [2]. Water in Berlin costs US$1.98/m3 [4] (€1.7/m3). In comparison, Danish water cost US$6.70/m3 in 2016 [3]. [1] https://www.chicago.gov/city/en/depts/fin/supp_info/utility-billing/water-and-sewer-rates.html https://www.chicago.gov/city/en/depts/fin/supp_info/utility-... [2] https://www.toronto.ca/services-payments/property-taxes-utilities/utility-bill/water-rates-and-fees-copy/ https://www.toronto.ca/services-payments/property-taxes-util... [3] https://www.dailyscandinavian.com/highest-water-prices-in-the-world/ https://www.dailyscandinavian.com/highest-water-prices-in-th... [4] https://www.bwb.de/content/en/html/1712.php https://www.bwb.de/content/en/html/1712.php

LilBytes 6y ago

Generally. I shower when I notice I start to smell. I live in a subtropical climate in summer (40 degrees and above, 90% humidity), so daily showers in summer are a must. Having grown up in the UK where I suspect showering when needed, and not as a daily rituaual. I believe this is common. I recall a study that mentioned Europeans in moderate or cold climates only shower a few times a week, I suspect this is the same in the UK... though of course after sports I definitely always shower, no one wants a sweaty rugby boy rolling around in bed covered in other people's grime. I shower in Winter, Spring and Autumn when, well. When my underarms and crotch are... Clammy. There's really no way to put that delicately. The number of people in Australia who religiously shower every day, shampoo every day, even when their body doesn't need it. I find quite strange. As another comment added, I will never put my self in a position where anyone can smell my body odour but why shower so frequently if your body isn't telling you, "it's a bit dirty over here, I could do with a rinse?". I briefly dated some one who was diagnosed with OCD. Things didn't work out for us because amongst other things her idea of cleanliness was a whole bunch of topical treatments for her face and body over the course of 30 minutes before bed. She'd apply this 'skin oil' that made her face glisten. And would later complain that her skin was breaking out in spots because 'something isn't working with her skin care'. The idea that your skin can and will look after it's self without us interrupting it's balance, was foreign to her. To this day I still just clean my intimate parts and arm pits when I shower. And clean the other parts of my body when there's physical dirt there. Her situation just made me sad. Her fears and obsessive compulsions about what 'health and hygiene' should be, were targeted my unscrupulous companies deliberately selling products that she absolutely did not need.

magneticnorth 6y ago
While I do mostly agree with you, and think that there's generally no need to bathe on mostly-sedentary days in a mild climate, there is certainly an actual answer to your maybe-hypothetical question: "... I will never put my self in a position where anyone can smell my body odour but why shower so frequently if your body isn't telling you, "it's a bit dirty over here, I could do with a rinse?". I can certainly attest that I've known lots of people who seem to be unaware that anyone can smell their body odour, and presumably can't smell it themselves. The keenness of the sense of smell seems to vary a lot more among people than other senses (except perhaps sight, but we use technology to normalize that). So having known many people who are unaware that they smell, I certainly worry the same could be true of me - I have a decent sense of smell, but probably there are many people who would notice my body odor before I did.

maxerickson 6y ago

No mention of the variation in sweat glands. People with more apocrine glands unavoidably have more body odor when they don't wash. (It's easy to tell; dry ear wax means less apocrine glands, wet ear wax means more)

maskedoffender 6y ago
Right, I have dry earwax and have never worn deodorant. I shower once or twice a week, but I never start to stink. My clothes don't even stink if I get them all sweaty every day without changing them. It's not fair, but it's how it is.
- 0xcoffee 6y ago
  Make sure you get a second opinion
  - sdflhasjd 6y ago
    Someone once told me something very similar before... I was too polite to say otherwise.
    - UncleMeat 6y ago
      Yeah in my experience every single person who has told me of the virtues of bathing less often stunk in that very moment.
  - maskedoffender 6y ago
    Oh believe me, I've had plenty of second opinions. I even ask the most brutal and least polite people I know. It's not a merit of less frequent bathing, it's just my genetics. I just don't produce stinky sweat. My brother-in-law was jealous after he smelled a pair of socks I had worn for a week and there was virtually no odor.

lmilcin 6y ago

I red this years ago and for the past 5 or 6 years haven't use any kind of soap or shampoo except for my hands. I shower every day (sometimes multiple times a day if it is hot) but I only use clean water and fresh towel to scrub oils from skin and hair. Once body adjusts it is possible to go longer time without shower with no problems. I did couple experiments but in the end I just like to feel fresh before bedtime so I stopped. I can say it takes time for body to adjust oil production but now my hair is healthier than ever and I generally feel better.

stevewodil 6y ago
I'd be curious to know if you have anyone in your life that was around you and could have complained about your odor and what they think about this
- lm28469 6y ago
  I shower everyday but use shampoo maybe once a week and soap after my gym sessions or particularly warm days. My girlfriends never complained, they often told me I smelled good and I have no reasons to doubt them. I think it really does depend on the person. I lived in a lot of shared flats, I could smell some roommates' body odor across the room 1 hour after they showered, some other roommates seemed to never have any body odor, even after going for a run. The type of clothes you wear also has a huge influence. Some fabrics are naturally anti fungal/bacterial, some other will smell like death after even the lightest efforts.
jelliclesfarm 6y ago
I think showering has more benefits than just cleansing aspect. A shower with good pressure can be like a massage. A soaking bath is very primal and reminiscent of pre birth amniotic fluid. Water is healing. All soap is made from lye. Any cleansing product should be bio degradable, safe for marine life and shouldn’t be laden with chemicals. Bathing can be great without the toxic soups we create in plastic containers that clog the landfill. I love talking to older people and I am fond of taking notes of their grooming habits. That’s why some of my farm products focus on cosmetics that are also edible. They used ground grains and nut shells for exfoliant. Herbs and oils. Plant dyes and natural fragrances. Milk and cream and yogurt. Honey. Turmeric and saffron and rose water. Corn cobs and luffa to scrub down. It’s not much diff from what we do except we have to wrap everything in plastic and use preservatives for shelf life. Also..another thing I learnt about skin and hair care is that the inside matters. Make up and cosmetics may fix things from outside, but skin and hair are markers of diet and good health. Also circulation. Perhaps there was something to brushing yourself hair 100 times before going to bed. I also found that the women I spoke to always had grooming habits that they indulged in as a group. It was not a solitary activity. I found the whole thing fascinating.

jelliclesfarm 6y ago

How you smell depends on a lot of things including diet. I’d imagine body odour carries many markers for pheromones. If I were a betting person, I’d wager that those who shower often get laid less.

EForEndeavour 6y ago
> If I were a betting person, I’d wager that those who shower often get laid less. I honestly can't tell if you're being serious. Shower reasonably soon before a date, people.
- jelliclesfarm 6y ago
  Right. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_odour_and_sexual_attraction https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_odour_and_sexual_attrac... Fun fact: truffles..the most expensive fungi in the world..is often sniffed out by male pigs because it smells like female pigs in heat. The French have trained dogs to sniff out The elusive and rare and expensive truffles because the damn pigs will scarf down thousands of dollars worth of truffles(1200-1500 quid/kg for black truffles and upwards of $4000/kg for Italian white alba truffles)once they dig them out. The most expensive fungus in the world makes pig horny. Food for thought. Just sayin’ When I was in London, I ate at McDonalds for a month so I can buy a little knob of alba truffle to shave over a bowl of buttered noodles. And.It.Was.Worth.It.
nextweek2 6y ago
> I’d wager that those who shower often get laid less. A really interesting wager. I'd take you up on it if I could. There has been a big trend over the last 10-20 years to add stronger artificial scents to cleaning products. People couldn't tell much difference between how well a product cleaned so manufacturers found that smell also played a vital role in our perception of cleanliness. Since shower gels and soaps clearly overpower natural pheromones, in a side by side mate picking, I'd wager the one wearing the most fragrant scent would get laid more.
- jelliclesfarm 6y ago

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

blueridge 6y ago

I've always had a sensitive sense of smell, and I'd much prefer to smell sweat and body odor than the synthetic goop that people cover themselves with. I notice this most frequently while hiking and passing other people on the trail. A good deal of people have this synthetic aroma that hovers over them everywhere they go. One whiff and you have to spend the next half-mile forcibly exhaling to get that junk out of your airway. My sniffer detects: perfume, sunscreen, bug spray, hair product, hand sanitizer, scented lotion, and probably a special blend of essential oils applied from head to toe to help deter moose or something. I think it's truly disgusting, but that's just me. Generally speaking, I like humans who smell like humans. One thing I've come to believe: eating right, staying fit, and sleeping well makes one smell good.

emerged 6y ago
I refuse to go to the mall because the chemical warfare is unbearable. It burns my eyes as well.
wyxuan 6y ago
This times 100. I often jokingly quip that Assad has nothing on US fragrance companies when it comes to chemical warfare, but when I walk into a room with a wall mounted airwick it becomes less of a joke.
frosted-flakes 6y ago
While I mostly agree with you, some people can truly smell foul, to the point where I gag. But I suspect that's mostly a case of them not washing at all.

jasonv 6y ago

My teenage son have this discussion every day.

deleted 6y ago

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njharman 6y ago

Need to shower? Sure clickbait title. Still I don't understand. For almost all of human existence we've somehow survived without showering. You obviosly don't ever need to shower. But also, nearly as far back as history goes, we've been cleaning, coiffing, and perfuming ourselves. Attracting mates and reproducing is overwhelming instinct that still drives most human behavior.

Barrin92 6y ago
>For almost all of human existence we've somehow survived without showering for almost all of our biological history we didn't wear clothes and hang out in the open, not dressed in a shirt in a office building with 20 other people in the same room or a packed subway station.

jacknews 6y ago

Depends on climate.

cybertronic 6y ago
and your job

melenaos 6y ago

My grand grandfather was saying that he only bathed once, when he was baptised. He lived for 107 years, a happy and mindfulness life. He ate meat once per year, at easter and he drunk one bottle of koniak per week, along with one packet of cigarettes per day. But the most important thing, i believe, was that he had two ears, anything that went into one ear was going out of the other. He never bothered about anything, he lived 3 wars, buried 5 children but he never got sad or sorry. But, who knows, maybe it was the distance from the shower. And, by the way, he didn't smell bad.

rambojazz 6y ago
I think he has simply won the genetic lottery if he was able to live in good health to 107 with that lifestyle.
loco5niner 6y ago
> buried 5 children but he never got sad ?

kwhitefoot 6y ago

Surely never is the answer if the act in question is literally a shower. Growing up in the 50s, 60s, 70s in the UK hardly anyone I knew had one. But washing is surely only necessary when it is necessary to remove dirt and possibly smells.

LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago

On demand! Furthermore not showering doesn't necessarily imply no washing at all. Like with a sponge, washingcloth in maybe 4 minutes, like eyes, face, neck, armpits, crotch, feet?

welly 6y ago

For me I like the feeling of cleanliness and freshness after having a shower in the morning before I start work. Clearly I'm not dirty or smelly after a hard day's work behind a hot Das Keyboard but l suppose it has become routine for me and unfortunately I can't abide the way I feel if I haven't showered for longer than a day. A shame really because my inner hippy wants me to not be so reliant on showering and go for days if not weeks without bathing.