Monday, July 30, 2012

Adventures In Beauty - Give Yourself a PITicure

For the past few weeks, the Montgomery, Texas temperatures have been upwards of 100 degrees. The other night at 6:15pm it was still 94 outside. When the temp goes up that much, and the humidity is more than 50%, you're gonna get some sweaty pits. For someone like me, it doesn't take long either. Usually in the 2 minutes it takes me to walk from my house to my car and strap my daughter in to her carseat I am sweating in a number of places and on my way to misery. It's so hot outside that it takes my car's a/c a good 15 minutes to cool off. It's friggin hot. I'm friggin hot. I'm hot, I'm sweaty, I feel nasty.

In my new kick of beauty Googling, I found a few armpit health tips. They're working overtime out here and could use some TLC. The first, and most interesting tip I found involved black tea. Here are the instructions I have followed the past two evenings. It's super easy but can feel a little funky.

As dictated by Cosmopolitan Magazine:
Brew a super strong batch of black tea, but instead of drinking it, pour it over a washcloth, let it cool, and then place the compress under each arm for five minutes. Do this every night for two weeks and the tannic acid in the tea will permanently reduce your sweat production. 

What I have been doing is making the tea in a cup, then dunking two washcloths into it, one at a time, until all the tea has been absorbed. Then I lay down in bed and place one folded in half wash cloth under each armpit and hold them in place by closing my arms. The first night was a disaster because the washclothes were touching my sheets, so my bed got all wet. So the following night I put a towel, folded into a rectangle, under myself to catch any tea leaks. My bed was perfectly safe. I also chose this time to put the cucumbers on my eyes. Killed two beauty birds with one stone.

(Now I don't have much shame when it comes to posting personal things on here, but one thing I wont do is post a picture of my armpits. You're welcome.)

In my armpit research, I found something that talked about all the dead skin cell build up that can happen in that area. That grossed me out. Big time. Apparently it can lead to dark skin in the area and also irritation and ingrown hairs, and a simple way to clean yourself good is to exfoliate! Whoda thunk of exfoliating their armpits? Maybe I'm just slow. There are several methods of underarm exfoliating that I found, but the simplest of all was Simple. A popular brand of UK skin care products, called Simple, has recently been made available in the US. I stumbled across a huge display at my local Walmart. I got the Simple Exfoliating Facial Wipes. The good thing about Simple is that they use no perfumes or dyes and their products are marketed as being "kind to skin" and their brand the "sensitive skin experts". Not that I have sensitive skin, but I know that can be a big problem with many people. I figure these wipes are a win-win, seeing as how they are facial wipes, they can also be used to clean my face! I hope that it goes without saying that I recommend using one wipe for your face, and a separate wipe for your armpits. Come on now, people.

I got this bag at Walmart for about $4.99

4 comments:

  1. I have heard this tea thing before, a while ago. I think I may be trying it soon, thanks for the tips and keep it up. I like to read all these.

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  2. You didn't say though if it is really working!

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  3. I could sweat that the color under my arms is a bit lighter from the exfoliation. But it may be my imagination. The tea thing you're supposed to do for two weeks. So I am still in the process. I do it every nit. I honestly don't expect huge results with it out here. It's my beliefs that NOTHING can stop the sweat producing power of 102 degree heat. But we will see! :)

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  4. Oops! Autocorrect. I meant "I could swear..." , not "I could sweat". Hahahah

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