To ask how often you need to wash yourself to be clean?

[Goldencurtain]

I have a shower every other day but wouldn't admit that publicly because fear I would be shamed for being dirty. When my mum was growing up it was standard to have a bath once a week, no shame attached at all to that. Indeed it's probably only been fairly recently there has been an expectation of a daily/twice daily shower.

When did social attitudes start to change on what 'dirty' meant and what do you do?

When I was a child we had a bath once a week and a wash every morning
That was normal then
Now I shower twice a day and have an hour long bath on a Sunday
Different times

As a young child in a family of 5 dc we had a weekly bath when long hair would also be washed and rinsed with vinegar. Water was heated in a back boiler by the fire. Shared bathwater with brothers 🤮, and bath with sister with top ups to keep it warm. Midweek it was a flannel wash only.

We got an overhead shower (attached to taps) when we moved to a new council estate in the late 1970s and I was around 10, it was off a hot water tank so had to be quick or wait for it to warm up again if all the water had been used. Dad always had priority.

We got an electric shower in the mid/late 80s, by then my brothers had left home, so less of a queue and daily showing became normal.

I go straight from bed to a shower every morning, I struggle to function until I have my morning shower.

Definitely daily as an adult.

I shower every second day, otherwise my hair and skin dry out and I get eczema.

I think that the change from a weekly bath to a daily shower happened when showers became popular (when was that?). My mother never had a shower in the house until she was quite old.
I can't envisage not having a shower every morning, and again in the evening if I'm going out. I'm a bit obsessed with cleanliness I'm afraid, and change my bra every day, and knicks sometimes twice a day.

For me, I need a shower once a day. That’s my norm. If run or go to the gym or get sweaty it will be twice a day.

I do occasionally miss a day if travelling or whatever but I feel a bit grubby and so much better when I shower.

The people who say you can smell when people haven’t had a shower that morning are lying. Unless they’ve just been to the gym, you can’t. It doesn’t work like that.

We were only allowed to bath once a week as children and it was miserable. I remember having incredibly greasy hair and skin and a permanent tide mark on my school shirts.
My mother took daily baths though which still pisses me off to this day.Pre puberty most people are fine with topping up with a strip wash but after that I do think a daily shower is necessary.
The only times I skip it are when I’m unwell & I can definitely smell myself .

You need to wash your bits and pits everyday, or more often if necessary. The rest less often

This thread had made me think. I was part of the generation where weekly baths were the norm and I’ve no doubt we did smell but because we all smelt similar no one noticed. Although the world was full of smokers then so perhaps the general nicotine miasma masked things a bit.

Nowadays, if this thread is indicative, most people shower or bathe daily but if this is the case, why do so many people still small bad? Anyone who has ever worked in a school/uni will know how much a roomful of students can stink. And anyone who commutes in London knows how bad it can be on the Tube in the mornings.

Why is it that personal hygiene had apparently improved but people’s body odour hasn’t?

At boarding school we had scheduled baths (prep school) and showers (main school)
every other day. There were no facilities to shower or wash after games!!!!

I was born in 1968 in the Netherlands and we showered every day back then. I wonder whether the lack of bathing facilities in the UK was down to the lack of hot water in the home? The house I grew up in after babyhood was built in 1969 so is pretty old now, but was the heights of modernity back then.

I shower every day but I don't always wash everywhere. Sometimes I won't soap my legs, arms and torso if I haven't been working out - I just wash my face, armpits feets and privates.

@Inherdefence

I work with teenagers and I can say with near certainty a LOT of them (especially the boys) don’t shower every day, wear clean clothes every day or even wear deodorant. The stench of BO and dirty hoodies is overpowering most days!

I shower everyday. I also use soap and not shower gel. I use the white company Seychelles soap. You notice a huge difference when you swap from shower gel to soap. Soap actually cleans you, shower gel does a sort of half clean and moisturise. When I used shower gel, I used to wake up feeling very oily in the morning so I always showered in the morning but now I can shower at night if it makes things easier (if I have an early start the next day).

People think soap leaves a residue but it doesn't, quite the opposite. It actually cleans your skin to a squeaky clean feeling. As long as you moisturise your body once or twice a week, using soap is a better option I think. It's not even more expensive either. I used to use a shower gel that was £2 but I needed to buy a bottle every 10 days or so. The soap I buy is £7 a bar but it lasts about 6 weeks. It also means all you are disposing of is a paper wrapper once every 6 weeks rather than a plastic bottle every 10 days. Makes a huge difference

UserThenLotsOfNumbers

Try Sure roll on - the white and blue bottle. I think it's called cotton fresh. It says quick dry on it. I find it's dry in about one minute.

You can usually smell your period before it even arrives, so I absolutely agree there is a certain...odour

Again though - this is totally person specific. you might be able to smell your period but others will not.

We were bathed once a week as children (Sunday before the school week started).

I now bath almost every day (don’t have a shower in the house), I go to the gym most days and my job means I get a bit smelly, I only shower when I go swimming and I will still have a bath when I get home. My kids only bath twice a week but dd2 swims a couple times a week and showers at the pool.

I will admit that I have always struggled with this. As a child we had weekly baths and hair washes but we used flannels and soap daily to wash face and hands. I don't recall ever being told to wash my bits (or given any guidance on personal hygiene really). There was a bidet but we kept bath toys in it and I had no idea what it was really for.

As a teenager (90s) it mainly seemed to be hair that was important to keep clean as it got greasy quickly then, so I used to wash it with my head upside down over the bath and often go out with it still wet. It's always been super thick so takes an age to dry properly. Over the years my hair has become drier and frizzier but not lost the thickness so it looks its best 2/3 days after washing.

On holiday or when there's time I do shower more often but day-to-day I find it very hard to schedule in cleaning whether it is personal or household. It's something I'd like to get better at. In the meantime I console myself that I am saving water & plastic!

Shower and hair twice per week. Wash when necessary. I think this is more normal than people admit. Any more than this my dry skin really suffers as does my hair. I don't smell. I am clean. And I use far less water! Very few people need to shower daily, and it's incredibly selfish to use energy for an unnecessary habit. Things need to change.

Doing your pits and 'bits' at the basin is just disgusting. Unless you are bleaching the area after your 'clean' so its hygienic for others to use. That's pointless it amounts to the same time of having a quick shower or bath.

Brazi do you share toilets? Rediculous

brazi I think you have issues.

Unless you are bleaching the area after your 'clean' so its hygienic for others to use.

Do you bleach the area after you've spat out the toothpaste when cleaning your teeth?

I was bathed once a week as a child in the late 60’s / 70’s. When I went to boarding school at 11 daily showers were compulsory, but we still didn’t have shower at home except the rubber hose you stuck on the bath taps to wash your hair.

I know showers became the norm in the home 80’s onwards? But I still don’t own one! I have a bath most days and a strip wash in between on days I don’t. I don’t smell.