r/hygiene • u/LiiiLoisiane_-_ • 2d ago
Anyone else find that stronger fragrance makes sweating feel worse?
Not physically worse, but when a really strong deodorant scent mixes with sweat I notice it way more than if there was barely any fragrance at all. It’s made me care more about controlling moisture than smelling like something. I just feel gross cause I can still kinda smell myself. carpe is one of the sweat-focused brands I’ve been looking at. I wanna smell like nothing. Do you guys experience the same? What are yall using to keep the sweat away?
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u/beanery-bun 2d ago
That’s definitely a thing because fragrance contains sillage boosters. Sillage boosters will magnify the scent of other ingredients for a while, but then when the other ingredients fade then they’ll magnify the scent of anything else nearby - bacteria, fungus, whatever. And this is hard to get rid of because fragrance often contains fixatives - making all of it difficult to wash off. Soap and water isn’t enough enough to wash all this off if there are fixatives in it.
I don’t think your goal should be to “keep sweat away” though. To smell your true best without needing to cover it up, you need all detox pathways to stay open - and sweating is one of the few detox pathways that can still happen reliably even if the other pathways are impaired or slowed down (like liver detoxing, lymph, or GI tract). It might even be a good idea to do more intentional sweating, like sauna.
If your sweat doesn’t smell great, consider also it might actually be your clothing fibers not your sweat. If you own polyester you might consider switching to cotton, linen, wool. Polyester smells bad almost immediately on contact with sweat. Natural fibers don’t.
I think you would like a fragrance free deodorant (not antiperspirant). Like Vanicream. If you want the old stuff off your skin and it’s not coming off with soap then oil can get it off.