DIY Week: Homemade Deodorant

Well, "dirty hippie" installment number two here: make-your-own deodorant.  I didn't really talk about my skin allergies, and I won't go into too much detail, but my skin can't take much abuse.  If there is pressure on it for a long time, like from a bra or waist bands on pants and such, I develop bad bruising and rashes.  I have horrible scars around my ribcage from this.  Also, certain chemicals cause me to have sever contact dermatitis, which is a bad rash that is both itchy and painful.  For a long time i thought I would just have to bear it since I couldn't go naked, or without certain grooming products, like deodorant and hair gel.

But after years of suffering, I decided that I couldn't handle it anymore.  I met some friends that taught me all about natural alternatives to things like deodorant.  I have used a bunch of brands, and they all worked about the same.  I never smelled bad, but I did sweat.

I never really cared about sweat showing on my clothes; I'm from the Southern U.S.! We sweat there all the time.  But here in Canada,  the more people kept pointing it out to me, the more self-conscious I became.  So I went back to my old anti-antiperspirant. 

One day, my skin rebelled so fervently, that I had to take time off work because I couldn't function-- I had to keep my arms raised to have even a little comfort.  I realized that I needed an alternative; so I started making my own deodorant.  At first I used a recipe I found online, but then I changed it and honed it to my needs.

Why use a natural deodorant?  Well, it's no secret that there are tons of bad chems in regular deodorant that seep into your body through you skin.  Cancer researcher Dr. Philippa Darbre of the University of Reading says there is evidence that the aluminum-based active ingredient in antiperspirants can mimic estrogen in the body.  Parabens also increase the risk of breast cancer my mimicking estrogen, according to some experts. Researchers have found parabens inside autopsied breast tumors. Dr. Darbre comments on the study:

And that's not all.  Other harmful chemicals include: Propylene glycol (anti-freeze); TEA and DEA (hormone disruptors);  FD&C colors (carcinogens, and made from coal); and aluminum (a neurotoxin).   Dr. Samuel Epstein, specializes in environmental medicine points out, "Not a single cosmetic company warns consumers of the presence of carcinogens in its products." 

If you are going to use a homemade deodorant, you will have to get used to sweating.  This stuff will not block sweat from coming out of your pores.  So you will have sweat stains.  I am fine with this, so I love my homemade deodorant.  It makes me smell like oranges.

Ingredients:

1/8 cup of shea butter

1/8 cup of cocoa butter

2 tbsp of baking soda

2 tbsp of cornstarch

1/4 tsp of Vitamin E

8-10 drops of essential oil (I use sweet orange)

8-10 drops of tea tree oil

You can get most of the ingredients fairly cheaply from Goodness Me, or Whole Foods.  I bought the Shea butter Fair trade through Ten Thousand Villages.   

Substitutions: Some people use coconut oil.  I haven't tried it; I'm one of those peoples whose body and hair doesn't really like coconut oil; and because I have always used Shea and cocoa butter for moisturizers too.   You can use any essential oil scent you want, I use orange because I like all my grooming products to smell the same.  (This is going to sound odd, but I like making my own body products so that I can customize the scents.  All my products use the same scent.  I like smelling vaguely of oranges.)  Sometimes I add some Witch Hazel (or I guess you could use cheap vodka?) for evaporation of sweat, but I didn't in this batch.  If you want to use it, add 2 teaspoons.  It does the same job of the tea tree oil; its an antibacterial, to kill the bacteria that causes body odor.

This is super easy to make.  Put the Shea and cocoa butters into a microwave safe container that you won't be using for food.  Pop them in the microwave for one minute and take it out when the butters have melted.  In my microwave it only takes 20 seconds.  Once they are melted, add your baking soda (deodorizer); your cornstarch (absorbant); Vitamin E; Essential oils (smells nice); Tea tree oil (anti-bacterial); and Witch hazel if using (anti-bacterial and evaporation of sweat).  Always add your oils at the end of the process; if you heat of the oil, the fragrance will dissipate, and it will be useless.  Some oils are volatile, and can catch fire, so don't heat up the oils.  Give it a good stir, and let the mixture cool, and solidify.

This will give you about 125 ml of cream.  I store mine in a mason jar.  It doesn't have to go in the fridge, the Vitamin E helps preserve it.  Sometimes, when I have it, I add some grapefruit seed extract for preservation too.

It will get pretty hard.  To use it, I scrape some out of the container with my finger nail or a small metal spoon, and let it soften in my hand before I rub it onto my armpit.  I use an amount about the size of a soy bean once a day.  DIY hair gel, DIY deodorant, you too can be on your way to becoming a dirty hippie! Please let me know if you try this!

 There are still 2 more days of DIY Week left!  

Every day this week I will be sharing a new DIY project.  I hope you find them useful!