The Pits

I have sweaty pits.  I do.  It's been a chronic problem for me.  No commercial antiperspirant ever really combatted the sweat problem except for that time I got semi addicted to Certain Dri.  My body loves chemicals and obeyed Certain Dri like a beast.  Unfortunately, the price I paid for dry armpits was a chemical burn.  Like any addict I denied the problem until it became extremely painful for me to even put my arms down AT ALL.  I finally decided to quit using and in a defiant act threw my Certain Dri away forever.  The sweat came back ten-fold.

Around this time I decided to start reading labels and living a more granola life.  I bought some all-natural deodorant at Sprouts, first Toms then Kiss My Face Liquid Rock.  Now, I realize these are just deodorants and not antiperspirants so I wasn't expecting much but even at that I was discouraged by their ineffectiveness.  My sweat problem even seemed to get worse with the use of these products and I had to reapply at least three times a day to have any security in the odor department.

During my "make your own facewash" experiment I google-stumbled across some DIY deodorant recipes.  They were all basically the same three ingredients- coconut oil, baking soda, and cornstarch.  The coconut oil is your base, the baking soda acts as an odor-fighter, and the cornstarch functions as an antiperspirant.  I had all these ingredients on hand so I gave it a go.  Yall, I knew I had crossed a serious granola line with this one, so I had my fingers crossed.

I'm in love.

I have now gone through an entire calendar year using my homemade deodorant and I love it.  It goes on easily and is pretty effective.  I do have to apply it twice a day usually, but that's not odd for me with conventional deodorant anyway.  My deodorant sits in a little baby food jar in my bathroom and I apply it with my fingers.  It's not a cure-all for heavy sweaters, but it works just as well (if not slightly better than) as any deodorant/antiperspirant on the market, without all the bad-for-you junk.

You should know that I can't smell.  I have a hard time distinguishing smells and I can't smell most things unless they are right up on my nose.  I put it out to my friends to let me know if I smell bad and I haven't had a complaint, so either my friends are jerks or smell hasn't been an issue.

Below are two links for DIY deodorant.  I use the recipe from In Sonnet's Kitchen (the first link).  In fact, it's time to go make some more, so happy fall and get in the kitchen and rub some oil on your pits!

http://www.fortheloveoffoodblog.com/diy-deodorant/
http://www.theprairiehomestead.com/2012/12/diy-coconut-oil-deodorant.html