Showering: what's your m.o./strategy/order of events

I have been on a lifelong quest to find the most efficient way to shower. Because I don't luxuriate -- I want to get in and out with utmost haste. I still think I'm a long way off from the ideal.

But for now it goes: quarter size squirt of shampoo which I lather into my hair and use the excess to wash my face, ears and neck.

Next is the dirty parts, genitalia and butt. I wanna get to these quickly because they are the nastiest parts of the body and even the drip-down is contaminated.

Next is the feet because I wanna get that out of the way. For some reason I don't enjoy washing my feet, who am I, Jesus??

Then I clean my torso and back. I use the same soap for the whole body, even the hair. It's all cheap ass sulfates. Unless you're super bougie.

Last is legs. For men, easy to forget. But I run a little soap over them. Then my legs won't stick to my jeans. But you could make racks upon racks just pulling out high end pants and selling them online

my M.O. is no B.O.

I have come ton accept that guys can stink "down there" as bad or worse than girls

I have come ton accept that guys can stink "down there" as bad or worse than girls

*to

I have needed a new hot water heater for years but still haven’t gotten around to replacing it, the upshot bring I usually only have about two minutes of hot water when I shower. I basically just rinse my hair, lather shampoo in hair and now in my quarantine beard, apply soap to armpits and swimsuit area, then rinse. I don’t wash my legs, I guess that makes me gross

id soap from chest and shoulders down, not sure starting at bollix and spreading up makes any sense to me at all

I start with soaping what little hair I have left on my head, then I rinse it off. Shampoo would be overkill. Next, I lather my washcloth ('flannel' for non-USAers), take a quick swipe at my armpits and arms, then I wash the remainder of my head and progressively work my way down to my feet, then I rinse off whatever soap residue has not already rinsed away on its own.

poll: soap to skin or washcloth / loofah?

former

i mean youd have to wash a facecloth every time otherwise, or so itd seem to me anyway

soap is good for dissolving skin oils and whatever matrix of dirt, sweat and bacteria is embedded in such oils, but a facecloth or loofah provides some extra friction to remove dead skin cells and leaves one's skin just a bit better cleared of detritus.

I have come ton accept that guys can stink "down there" as bad or worse than girls

― i will FP you and your entire family (rip van wanko), Saturday, May 16, 2020 5:32 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

WTF obviously dudes get worse smells. Girls bits are tucked in and self-cleaning, guys have hairy balls and all manner of moist crevices getting funky.

not to mention well not to mention it i guess

First thing in I shampoo + rinse, then conditioner to set. i spend the conditioner time absorbing heat to sustain me for the next 24 hours or konjac sponging my face/neck and soaping front. After conditioner time, rinse conditioner. Then soap back of the body. I alternate between mitt/loofah and no mitt/loofah every other day or so.

Christ I remember a really smelly guy who got multiple verbals + eventually a disciplinary warning at work in a letter that warned that his self-hygiene was that bad he was a "health and safety hazard". He started turning up stinking of deodorant after this but was still essentially emanating a stale sweat and general decay kind of B.O. which was an improvement btw. The last straw was when his mum phoned in sick for him and I am not making this up, she said he couldn't come in today because he had to go to the local surgery with a very painful boil on his penis! They sacked him after this for other reasons obv but it went down in legend that he got sacked for having a septic festering carbuncle on his cock!

buy a shower cap and shampoo your hair way less than you already do

exfoliate however you can

quincie otm
and buzzfeed and reddit lead me to believe that some straight men are terrified of touching their butts so it's an entire exclusion zone down there.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-U61RS_q-0

I pretty much go from top down which makes sense to me.

- Shampoo, rinse
- Wash face/head/neck
- Use my wet/dry rotary electric shaver & cleanser to smooth face
- then continue downward in about four steps till feet are clean.

Bidet built into toilet seat (highly recommended) often used beforehand.

Also:

Last is legs. For men, easy to forget.

WTF? How do you forget your legs? Like forgetting your arms...

('flannel' for non-USAers)

FP’d you for racism

my hair looks and feels terrible if I don’t shampoo at least every other day but I’m sure I’m DOiNG IT WRONG

shave my head obviously

Funky balls smell is so bad. I’m amazed that there are men out there that don’t realize this is a thing.

Shampoo hair then condition and brush teeth while the conditioner is doing it’s thing. Then use shower gel usually without a sponge or poof then shave legs last.

i follow PEMDAS strictly

Face with just soap and water, then neck to feet in descending order, with scratchy Korean washcloth, pausing 2-3 times to add more body-wash (Aveeno), wash hair quickly and then a safety check for smell pits/biznizz, second wash as necessary, turn the shower office and get sad again.

wash my legs?

why?

1) Wash legs
2) Wash torso (chest and stomach, arms, underarms, genitalia)
3) Wash back and ass

Shampoo hair every other day; on non-shampoo days, wash behind ears
On Mondays, shave face before showering
During warm months, finish by turning the water as cold as it'll go and shoving head and shoulders under it for as long as I can stand it

shave before showering?

!?

Madness

It is uncivil to condemn a man's Monday shaving regimen without first compassionately seeking for its cause and its logic.

im startled, maybe a little wary, but ive not yet attacked

purely nonsense to suggest that i have bristled, what

not worth getting into a lather over

brush it off

the regularity of shampooing is very much determined by hair texture and skin oiliness and/ or ethnicity.

hair presence

hair intersectionality and moonphases

this thread is gross, sorry

you should wash every part of your body, every day

organs????

legs?

Inside AND out?

don’t want to be with anybody who doesn’t think it’s important to wash their legs

theyre right under me when i shower, theyre not "unwashed" like

I guess since have to give myself an intramuscular injection every week in one of my thighs I’m really aware of leg hygiene

you should wash every part of your body, every day

― Dan S, Saturday, May 16, 2020 6:39 PM (forty minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

“every day” nah

theyre right under me when i shower, theyre not "unwashed" like

― spruce springclean (darraghmac), Saturday, May 16, 2020 6:48 PM (thirty-two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

generally the point of cleaning yourself is removing dead skin cells. soap from the upper part of your body sliding down to your legs doesn’t do this job

i mean this is the impression i’ve gleaned over time i could be full of shit

people who aren’t interested in hygiene, ugh

you should wash every part of your body every day isn’t controversial

does one's tongue count as inside or outside one's body, when it can move between these two states?

you should brush your tongue every day it’s good for your breath

and for peoples' filmy, white tongues.

i can't go to sleep without taking a shower beforehand as a robotic response no matter what. I don't know why most people don't. it's so cuddly to get into bed so warm and clean.

I know your hearts are broken, mine is too

I hate showering. The worst.

Sometimes: shampoo and condition hair.

Apply soap to armpits, arms, torso, undercarriage.

Flee shower and spend next half hour rubbing dead skin off of ankles.

Repeat 1 to 6 weeks later

agree with yerac

meticulous personal hygiene is very sexy, don’t see how that’s hard for people to understand

whatever commander data

I love showering and when not pressed for time I'll stand in there 15 or 20 mins no bother. I do a good job of cleaning all the culprits but my shins, for instance, aren't getting much attention. I wash my body first,then hair,then face. No rationale. I shower every morning usually (every afternoon when I clock off work now during covid wfh) because I'm a sweaty, greasy masculine human individual who stinks

Yerac OTM re: showering before bedtime >>>>> showering in the morning

I'm the opposite, showers help me wake up

I sweat in my sleep,would just have to also shower morning if I showered at night

quincie otm
and buzzfeed and reddit lead me to believe that some straight men are terrified of touching their butts so it's an entire exclusion zone down there.

― Yerac, Saturday, May 16, 2020 4:07 PM bookmarkflaglink

apparently! that's why some guys have such stank asses. my friend used to roll over and tap her b/f on the shower and be like "take a shower, your ass reeks", though I suspect his reason for poor hygiene wasn't so much creepy anti-butt touching rebellion as much as "laziness"

i don't know why but my face is massively oily lately in a way it has never been. and yet I've been showering daily.

definitely not taking as much time as I usually do. I'm paranoid about smells and won't leave the house without a shower unless it's a quick run to the store

xpost on the *shoulder*

does anybody turn the shower on after they get in or does everybody turn it on before to test temperature?

you're either really brave or have some amazing bathroom science if you are willing to stand under the shower head and just turn it on

how you shower isn't as important as how often imo. I gotta shower at least once a day (usually mornings cause it helps me wake up and at nights on weekends, been showering at night more since lockdown though) and wash my hair every 2-3 days otherwise it becomes a gross oily mess. 

some days I do a very quick all over wash, some days I luxuriate and really take my time to scrub every part of my body. and you gotta wash your butt and genitals everyday (just the outside though for people with vaginas! you shouldn't overclean your girly bits - you don't wanna get rid of the good bacteria that keeps the bad bacteria out).

I pretty much go from top down which makes sense to me.

i also go top-down. reasons:

1) hair will be a little bit faster to dry at the end
2) residual soap/shampoo/condition wash will cover more of the body, more often, than bottom-to-top

however, going against what i just said, and also going against the op, i take as long in the shower as i want to, and it's always one of the best parts of the day. it really is a modern luxury

I get in, close half door then curtain take shower hose off stand run it for a bit to make sure temperature good. Spray myself all over so I'm wet. Pick up whichever shampoo I'm using out of several. Rub into scalp through dreads standing with back to the stand. Rinse out thoroughly, wash out of eyes, rinse again.
Then select shower gel apply to belly then spread out from there. Not sure if I have a fixed order I work in but may start with crotch and I think end with feet since they're going to keep getting residue of wherever else I'm washing until I'm through. Try to work through each toe space individually and try to remember things like backs of knees and centre back individually. Probably give myself another rinse down once I've lathered and scrubbed everywhere once including giving hair another rinse.
Think I shower every couple of days. Certainly aim for that. So like 3x per week but don't have a fixed schedule but don't like leaving it much more than that cos feel grubby.
Tend to use gels and shampoos from Lush and Body Shop but have picked up things from a few other places recently.
I can recommend Lush's Sleepy for relaxing you when you need to unwind. Might think twice about it if you need not to cos it has a bit of a zonk like drinking valerian tea during the day does.

no bottom up showerers itt? smdh

start with soles of feet and toes, then shins, work way up from there I thought everyone did it like this

Y’all are so meticulous. I’m starting to feel like I don’t shower right. Shampoo, face soap, conditioner, body soap. I’m not that thorough but if I’m hot and sweaty from cleaning or something I definitely keep using the body soap a lot longer and for multiple rinses.

I love going to bed clean and showered but it’s also easier for me to wake up if I shower so the bedtime shower is a more rare and thus even more clean and fresh feeling for me.

There was a thread on here somewhere about those that washed their feet during a shower and those that assumed trickle-down hydronics would be sufficient. I admit I am with the latter camp. Don’t @ me

My most important important step: make the water as cold as possible for as long as possible at the end for an added refreshing jolt.

took a dump in the shower once, smushed the turds down the drain with my toes - felt like i was stomping grapes

― Princess TamTam, Sunday, 12 December 2010 00:34 (nine years ago) bookmarkflaglink

the gold standard of showering posts on ilx imo

“There was a thread on here somewhere about those that washed their feet during a shower and those that assumed trickle-down hydronics would be sufficient. I admit I am with the latter camp. Don’t @ me“

Who’ll also go on record as one of those people. I’m not a particularly smelly person so am probably more lax than others but I’m another who doesn’t wash their legs. If I were rolling around in the mud or something it might be diff but for an every day shower the trickle down is fine. Plus I shave like every other day and that is even better because you’re literally removing dirt and skin. Wouldn’t even occur to me to wash my feet in the shower unless I’d been barefoot somewhere outdoors.

And I always shower in the morning. I don’t feel awake if I don’t.

And now I’m off to shower and probably think way too much about each part of it while doing so.

God i thought the girl in You're The Worsdt was an outlier. THought you'd shower and clean all parts of your bodies in a shower if you had the shower hose removable so you could get everywhere.
JUst thought it was an absurd characteristic of hers so surprised to hear it is far more common than i thought.
Do people who don't was tehir feet in the shower wash them otherwise, like sit down with a bar of soap and give them a scrub or just leave them totally? Don't your feet get itchy?

Also forgot to mention sticking shower head next to my ears so they get cleaned out and I don't need to get them syringed or use oil to clear them out. Nice to have a power shower here.

The best part of haneke’s 7th continent is watching the main guy shower, dude has a good technique

Gretchen was 100% right in that scene. No, they don’t get itchy lol. Again a post workout or beach shower might be different but for an everyday shower you’re literally standing in soapy water which I cleans your feet. The only place I’m barefoot is in my apt which is clean. I just got out of the shower and didn’t wash feet or legs but I can assure you’re they’re very clean!

I mean, as I said upthread I might be more lax than some about this stuff but I 100% think people are too obsessed with cleanliness and it’s probably hurt out resistance to germs and the condition of our skin in some way. I don’t know that I’d even shower every day if I didn’t need it to wake me up. Again this all goes out the window of for some reason I’ve been particularly sweaty or gotten dirty but that’s the exception not the rule.

ive never noticed my lower legs to get in any way dirty, itchy, smelly

i play football three times a week, i prob look at my feet more often than many ilxors tbh

yr legs and arms (well ok, my legs and arms) arent in the warm central mass or wrapped up too closely in an undergarment all day, so the idea that they are equally requiring of a scrub like the pits or the bits is not imo one that holds up

In the summer I just get myself wet all over, turn the shower off, soap up all over and then rinse. In the winter I’ll keep the shower running to keep the stall warm.

ive to run the cold tap in the sink for the shower to get sufficient hot

any ideas, actually, on that?

Descale the mixer valve and fiddle with the set point. The answer to almost all rainy island a plumbing problems starts with descaling.

hmmm we do have exceptional hard water

thanks!

Descaling things is often on my to do list when I go home to my dad’s.

another anti cleanliness obsessive here. i shower two or three times a week. i shampoo my hair but i don't use soap except on my otherwise central area, unless I've been strenuously exercising. i rinse my face every day. maybe I'm blessed with a low maintenance bod; maybe i smell but i don't think so. i do have a sedentary lifestyle but it was no different when i cycled to work 20 mins twice a day.

Some people are very sensitive to textures. Probably the reason I can't sleep unless I shower before bed. Like, if I hold someone's hand and it's dirty, it bothers me.

I wish I could go a day or two without washing my hair.

The funny thing is, if you are a bar soap user- if you wash your face first and your butt last (which would be a natural unconscious instinct in order to completely avoid the possibility of the soap going from your butt to your face), then you’re really just setting yourself up for the worst the next time you shower, using yesterday’s butt soap on your face.

Which is why I waste a ton of soap rinsing it off at the beginning and end of every shower.

Soaping every toe seems impossibly luxurious. Like, that is a level of paying attention to my body that I wouldn't normally take time for. Also there's usually nowhere to sit in a shower and standing on one leg for that long would be uncomfortable? #showergoals though.

Before I quit my job I was showering very irregularly. It's much nicer to do it now. I've been having hot ones when I'm cold, and cold ones when I'm warm (that number is gonna go up, it was 80deg here yesterday) and I feel so good afterward.

Hot and cold running water, man. We're living the dream.

I wouldn’t want to hold a dirty hand either, Y. I do think falling asleep after showering feels amazing but like I said earlier I have to shower in the morning or I feel weird and not awake and I just can’t imagining shower at night and in the morning unless it was 90 something degrees out and I needed to get cool.

im a night showerer too if i can

but i also need to air dry a good ten mins before getting into bed

life is balance

Showering before sleep helps me sleep but i sweat in my sleep so i inevitably have to again in the morning. So morning showers

^^^ yep

i'm guessing people whose legs never get dirty are not sweating

anyway personal hygiene: as variable and individual as body chemistry, who knew

a shower every day, two if it's been a particularly hot or strenuous day. I couldn't imagine going to work or out to see people without having a wash beforehand, and the idea that I would go longer than 24 hours without washing my body is awful to me, this thread is blowing my mind

Morning shower ftw, but soaping up legs? Nah.

i am such a stickler of showering before bed, if i accidentally fall asleep, i will wake up 1- 5am and shower and go back to bed.

shower most days, say five from seven, after exercise or commute covers this

showering ten times a week? id have no skin left tbh

i just cannot deal with the day unless i have a shower in the morning.
simple routine: i have very little hair, dollop of shower wash in hands, and then spread all over from top to bottom.
when me and bh extended our little semi-detached to include our new master bedroom, the main thing was the en-suite for us.
best thing we ever did.
cant even remember the last time i had an actual bath.

oops meant to say : no bath in en-suite - just a walk in shower.

I didn't shave for a month until yesterday, when my friend accused me of trying to look like Scott Ian

usually I shave every week.

showering I am still regular, but shaving, that's been harder.

The longest I've gone without shaving is about a week. I briefly entertained the notion of growing a beard just see what it would look like, but after a week, my entire face felt like it was on fire, so I had to bail.

it's often worse when it's just growing in, yea

I still have never ever manscaped, but am seriously considering it now because I'm meeting girls and I'm single.

But I don't know howwww

Just wanna cut the hairs in half, not go down to like a 1-3 on trimmer guard scale

A thick, luxurious man bush is a divisive topic. Half will be repelled, half allured. It's a good litmus test, I say roll with it.

Less hair at the base makes it look longer. End of discussion IMO.

There are "body clipper" devices available at Target, Walmart etc. Operation is surprisingly self-explanatory.

I'm rather astonished to learn that many ppl don't bother to separately wash their legs in the shower. How much effort and time would that add, ten seconds? Feet, given their propensity to become smelly, would seem even more odd to skip, but I've wondered if some do just because it can be difficult or dangerous to balance yourself on one foot while lifting your other if you don't have a seat or bathtub ledge to sit on in your shower stall, especially in showers that don't have any grab bars. I sometimes found it difficult in my previous home's shower which had none of these.

I'm heartened to learn how common a cool-down rinse is though; I thought I was one of only a few that thought to drop the temperature at the end of a shower.

if you have a crappy water heater, the cool-down rinse is automatic

despite some inexplicable embarrassment over sharing these details here we go

I usually start with a hot water rinse down of hair, face, and ass. The hot steamy water is just as important for helping to open my sinuses as it is for cleaning. I then apply shower gel to my bath scrubby and let it foam up under the hot water. I use the scrubby to clean arms, torso, legs (although don't spend much time on legs), but then use the foamy soap on hands to clean off any problem areas like pits, genitals, butt. I don't usually scrub my feet with soap, but will give heels and big toe a quick rub with thumbs to knock off any excess dead skin. Then shampoo and conditioner. I usually don't apply soap to my face, but if it is a shaving day, I will use an exfoliating face scrub and plenty of hot water, often at the same time as I'm conditioning. If I exercised or am having back/neck pain, I will switch the shower head to massage mode to work out any bad spots while conditioning.

My ideal is to shower every day as soon as I get out of bed because it helps me wake up and clears out my head, but for various reasons including quarantine, I've been more lax about this lately.

I'm a big fan of Lush products, and have specific ones as part of my daily shower time:

Dirty shower gel
Big shampoo
Veganese conditioner
Ocean Salt face scrub
Prince shaving cream

Other brands I use:

Anthony After Shave Balm
Suavecito matte pomade

my shaving ritual is also very specific. I landed on it after years of struggling with razor burn and face bumps. But that is probably for a different thread.

I like to shower with my winter jacket on so I can feel the benefit when I take it off.

I don’t really drink anymore but a beer in the shower is nice every once in awhile. for us longer showerers.

I’ve been washing my body first from top to bottom and then my hair and face. I think that has been because I cringe a little when I first get into the shower and don’t want to expose my head the first moment the water hits me, but the logical way seems like hair, then face, then body

I do agree with the idea that the shorter your hair is the more often you need to wash it,

Taking an inventory today: under the water, bar soap on armpits and "danger zone". Shampoo and rinse hair, apply conditioner. Soap a flannel then scrub face, arms, torso, legs. Wash and rinse flannel, rinse out conditioner, done. Usually takes me 5-7 minutes but I have shorter hair. Fun fact: I use my hands to wipe as much water off me as possible before grabbing the towel - my bathroom is not great for drying towels.
Fascinated by this topic and its variations, only on ILX.

I also try to wipe off water before getting out if the shower

tonight I should have stayed at home/soaping up my danger zone

YESSS

i have been supposed to not wash my hair so much for a long time. now my hair is getting long. this thread reminded me to work on not being so addicted to washing my hair. i took a shower this morning but did not wash it. it's really difficult already! so greasy.

I wash my hair every second day. it's so greasy that it looks like it has pomade in it on the second day even if it doesn't

1) put shampoo in hair
2) start soaping self
3) get in shower
4) take clothes off
5) get out of shower and towel off
6) turn shower on
7) go to sleep

water bill really fuckin high this month

1: Jump in Shower.
2: Remember that I forgot to take off my clothes.
3: Hang clothes to dry.
4: Jump back in shower.
5: Wash hair.
5 1/2: Rinse hair.
5.75: Put conditioner in hair.
5.99: Start rinsing hair.
6: Shave chin.
7: Feel weird about shaving chin since I'm a woman.
8: Remember that when I was younger, I didn't have to shave my chin.
9: Cry.
10: Wash face with cheap face wash.
11: Wash underarms and stinky bits with cheap body wash.
12: Try not to think that I could probably save money by using cheap body wash on face, too.
13: Shave underarms and lower arms if it is Friday, my day off.
14: Get out and dry off. Scrub feet extra hard with towel.
15: Put robe on.
16: Wait for about 10 minutes.
17: Turn the circuit breaker back on because the hot water heater tends to overload the electric system in our RV. Wish the park manager would upgrade the electricity in the park.
18: Spend way too much of the rest of the day in bed drying off.

I use my hands to wipe as much water off me as possible before grabbing the towel

thirded

i have been supposed to not wash my hair so much for a long time. now my hair is getting long. this thread reminded me to work on not being so addicted to washing my hair. i took a shower this morning but did not wash it. it's really difficult already! so greasy.

― forensic plumber (harbl), Wednesday, May 27, 2020 2:49 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

your hair will adjust the more used to not being washed it gets! in my experience!

mine takes 3-5 days to get gross now, and it used to get gross within 24 hours of being washed

your hair will adjust the more used to not being washed it gets!

I've been experimenting with this theory during quarantine and for me... washing my hair less has no effect at all, other than having a gross fright wig most of the time during the experiment (I washed it once a week for six weeks).

i mentioned above but the no hair washing thing really is dependent on your hair texture/skin type/race and then your shampoo process.

yeah, a lot of my friends easily get by not-washing, meanwhile, my hair gets greasy and gross fast. lot of variables. i think my hair is a weird, atypical case

yeah i have fine, straight asian hair and an oily scalp. this no hair washing thing is always an eye-roll from me. I can manage 2 days if I don't exercise and it's not humid/hot out.

i used to wear a Guinness cap though which made me care less...until I lost it when puking out a moving car window

lol that's why i added "in my experience" bc it could just as easily be not my experience

I use my hands to wipe as much water off me as possible before grabbing the towel
mine takes 3-5 days to get gross now, and it used to get gross within 24 hours of being washed

co-signing both of these

one of my best friends not only claims she only washes her hair every 4-5 days, but that she often goes 4-5 days without showering.

idk if I believe her, but she never smells so...you say tomayto, I say

my head becomes an oil slick and smells and my hair starts falling out if I can't wash it regularly. I've tried.

xpost oh yeah Brad, I noticed that you disclaimered it. I just get snnoyed because it's always in these wellness/essential oil types of blogs about not washing your hair.

The poorly named "no poo" movement

i don't know yet how my hair reacts with the grease longer term but i have thick hair that reacts to humidity. my hairdresser keeps telling me to stop washing it so much but i can't. she said if i stop it will be less dry and get less huge/unmanageable in the humidity. we'll see.............

Aside from how it looks, which is something of a lost cause for me anyway, I *like* washing my hair every day. It feels good!

i certainly agree with that and it's why i used to do it every day

wow some of you motherfuckers out here using up a lot of water, lowkey toxic imho

(j/k)

I loved reading robin hood stories as a kid, and I always wondered if one of the merry men was a hairdresser or if they waylaid nobles and stole their shampoo because I knew from movies they had a beautiful secluded pool fed by a waterfall to bathe in, but surely they couldn't make shampoo in the forest?

You can use clay, or mud with a lot of clay in it.

Taking an inventory today: under the water, bar soap on armpits and "danger zone". Shampoo and rinse hair, apply conditioner. Soap a flannel then scrub face, arms, torso, legs. Wash and rinse flannel, rinse out conditioner, done. Usually takes me 5-7 minutes but I have shorter hair. Fun fact: I use my hands to wipe as much water off me as possible before grabbing the towel - my bathroom is not great for drying towels.
Fascinated by this topic and its variations, only on ILX.

― an incoherent crustacean (MatthewK), Sunday, May 17, 2020 10:52 PM (one week ago) bookmarkflaglink

this is basically me except ive never thought of my dick, balls, taint, and asscrack to be dangerous

also i shave my head every so often and shampoo maybe once a week, and im p oily by nature so conditioner is kinda pointless

shampoo and rinse hair
apply conditioner to hair
soap up scrubbing device (washcloth or faux-loofah scrubby thing)
robustly scrub from shoulders down, including torso and limbs
extra squeeze of body scrub that I rub in my armpits and groin/butt
use handheld shower wand to blast said areas
use face soap to wash face with cloth, including ears
rinse conditioner from hair and stand with my face in the water to remove any lingering soap

I can get all this done in about five minutes but it's nice to take longer

i've had trouble enjoying a relaxing pace for showers since I've been at my folks because there's no windows. steam makes it hard to breathe pretty quickly. I could open the door but i ain't riskin nobody coming in and taking a dump while I'm showering, the shower is so ridiculously close to the toilet that you can't put your foot between the bowl and base of the tub. and given that my dad seems to have nature call whenever I go in the shower, even though I never take it at the same time twice....I'll do the abbreviated shower for now!

once I get home, back to the 10 minute shower I go.

now this folks is how it's done xp

it was very soothing to read matthewk's and mh's routines

My hair takes at least a day to dry, so no way am I washing it everyday.

i've had trouble enjoying a relaxing pace for showers since I've been at my folks because there's no windows. steam makes it hard to breathe pretty quickly. I could open the door ....

Bathrooms that don't have exhaust fans are so annoying

how do night showerers handle sleeping with wet hair? do you just cap it during the shower so it stays mostly dry?

I use a hair dryer. Max hot at first but change setting to cool air once hair is partially dry.

there is like a lot of body neurosis in this thread! showers are fucking fantastic. why not enjoy them? i'm pretty sure i do the same thing out of habit but i don't like keep track, i kind of go by feel. that doesn't mean i miss anything. a few things:

your genitals aren't as dirty as you think they are
your asshole is probably dirtier than you think it is and needs a little tlc
your feet are probably dirtier than you think they are and need a little tlc

other than that, just like fuckin rub some nice soap and shampoo over yourself where it feels good to clean and sing a carly rae jepsen song

also it's not "bougie" to be decent to your skin and hair with what you put on it. natural soaps with some essential oils you like are a beautiful thing.

i just sleep on it wet. I have since I was a kid. I don't own a hairdryer. xpost

your genitals aren't as dirty as you think they are

sorry this needs a postscript - if you have foreskin it needs a careful clean

i don't know why i'm being a shower explainer other than this is a weirdly gloomy thread for something that's so enjoyable and i hope more people give themselves permission to enjoy showers.

i keep wanting to post some things but then it makes it too serious when I think ilx needs some non serious things...but yeah.

On a side note, it is a fact of life that hair tends to accumulate and hold onto smells. It is a fact of human evolution that growing luxuriant hair around our genitals and armpits happens when we become sexually active. These two facts are related. Hard as it may be to believe, but one must conclude that for most of human existence smelly pubes and pits were particularly sexually attractive.

You all may now carry on.

in my experience, the best a vagina can smell is very close to an armpit at the end of the day, so I have come to love that smell

Wow

showering before sex is just not a thing in my life

i keep wanting to post some things but

Haven't used anything more than water on my hair or face for 20 years or more.

Actually I shave twice a week so I guess I use shaving gel on my face, never soap tho.

in my experience, the best a vagina can smell is very close to an armpit at the end of the day, so I have come to love that smell

― i will FP you and your entire family (rip van wanko), Thursday, May 28, 2020 2:15 PM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

rvw coming THRU with the true-to-username Content

showers are so awesome, sometimes I think the shower is the one place where I can truly relax

your genitals aren't as dirty as you think they are

sorry this needs a postscript - if you have foreskin it needs a careful clean

i don't know why i'm being a shower explainer other than this is a weirdly gloomy thread for something that's so enjoyable and i hope more people give themselves permission to enjoy showers.

― crystal-brained yogahead (map), Thursday, May 28, 2020 10:51 AM (three hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

yeah I was like "offtm" when I read your initial post lol.

it was very soothing to read matthewk's and mh's routines

― mellon collie and the infinite bradness (BradNelson), Thursday, May 28, 2020 12:15 PM (five hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

ASILXoR

my only strongly held shower opinion* is that showering at night is disgusting. what's the point of showering if you are just going to lie down for several hours and marinate in accumulated dirt and grease and sweat and soggy wet-hair pillow, thus undoing the shower? why wouldn't you want to be the cleanest when you are actually around people, not when you're either alone or around someone who's unconscious anyway?

* with the caveat that all such opinions are bullshit, unless you happen to know the showering routines of every single person you encounter; chances are they do something you find either gross or excessive, and yet the outcome was acceptable to you

Or you have a job that requires you to be there at 9, but you don't really function well before 11.

showering before bed sometimes helps me sleep.

it's called keeping it real, look it up

showering before sleep is called "keeping it real"?

I like showering at night. the feeling of getting into bed afterwards is the best, I used to do it regularly when I came home feeling gross from my job.

admittedly this is one of those things where I just have no ability to comprehend the other side -- like, you know how mattresses get gross before it's time to replace them? that's what you're soaking in, for hours. and then you just... go out in public like that?

showering at night is called "keeping it real"?

just didn't seem to be too real

omg A+++

idk about ya'll's mattresses, but mine has a mattress cover that is regularly laundered along with the bedclothes

I mean not as frequently as the bedsheet but, y'know, regularly

if someone wants to make the bedding thread, I will prepare my list

do night showerers also have a shower first thing the next day

wasn't there a "how often do you wash your sheets" type thread at one point?

i don't sweat in my sleep and I launder bedsheets very regularly so I don't experience this "marination" problem. But if it's very humid/hot I will do a quick shower in the morning. Just like if it's exceptionally hot out or if I exercise, I will have another shower when I get home but I usually always do another shower at night before bed.

I want one of those japanese tubs that you can program and it shuts off by itself. So, nice to have a hot bath waiting for you right after dinner.

I wonder if there is a similar divide of people who wash the day away before bed and the people who take their shoes off in homes.

I wear my shoes to bed

i wear my shoes in the shower while washing dishes.

I wear a thong in the market

I use a laundromat that serves real pizze Napolitano

if someone wants to make the bedding thread, I will prepare my list

you could use this one: Your Bedsheets and These Changing Times

ooh I did share some good stories over there

I feel like there is a venn diagram to be made from this data.

I do sweat in my sleep, especially during summer (it's bad enough that I usually have a box fan running full blast at the foot of the bed)

(also have a mattress cover, but the whole point of a mattress cover is as a barrier against all the gross shit that is produced by one's body by the act of being a body. hence. showering in the morning, to get rid of it)

it's not as if you're shedding tons of gross shit every month, it's a slow accumulation.

I usually morning shower but I know night shower friends who don't smell like stinky poopoo

*every NIGHT

I have revived the bedsheet changing thread

I imagine that where you live affects how you feel about frequency and time of showering. I prefer morning showers but don't shower every day. I have a baseline of every other day but will shower more often than that if I've been swimming or working out or just feel particularly sweaty. But when I lived in NYC I showered more often because the air was so dirty that I always came home feeling grimy. And when I lived in Sitka, which is basically a rainforest, it was so humid that I started showering every day. When I lived in Fairbanks, otoh, and the air was cold and dry and I didn't have running water in my house, I could easily go more than two days.

The only time I put real energy into washing my legs is if I’ve been outdoors (like nature-y outdoors) in shorts/sandals. Usually I wear pants, I don’t sweat a lot, never have my legs been a source of blemishes, no one is ever interested in my legs and bending over is annoying for my 80-year-old-man back.

More aggressive showering schedule comes into play when the bugs are out and I have to cover myself in DEET and permethrin to be outside.

i am on the 3rd round of every other day hair washing and it's getting better. i will try every 3 after i warsh tomorrow. i feel so accomplished.

now I cannot take a shower without a mental rehash of my post here and/or a loop of Kenny Loggins playing in my mind