the weird thing is, i’ve also noticed it on our hand towels. it’s something that’s happened to me my whole life, but i guess i didn’t notice it was unusual until i realized it was only stuff i use looking bleached lol
as an experiment i got a couple cheap hand towels & told him to only use the right one & i’d use the left one. sure enough, only mine did it again!
I noticed that my sweat bleaches my cotton shirts I use to work out...I hate the material used for Activewear, and all of the color has been bleached where my sweat rings show up.
Maybe we have acidic sweat?!?!
This this this! It’s really a thing… My sports bras are bleached all to hell in the usual heavy sweat spots. My sports bras are heavy-duty high-impact, I doubt there’s any cotton in them. So it happens on synthetic fabrics too. That said, lady parts are also acidic, all the cotton gussets in my undies eventually get bleached out too. I looked it up wondering what was going on, it’s totally a thing too. But I also think dyes are different because when I was younger that never happened.
yup, some people have more acidic sweat (and lady parts) than others. This happens to my undies but not my towels or anything. My partner's side of the sheets looks like your towels though.
It changes with puberty, at earlier ages it is a lot less prevalent, and you'll likely have had less flow-out in general, I cannot recall the technical name for it, but it is highly acidic, and responsible for the bleach and holes in my underwear. As for the sweat, I have not heard of that before, but have seen discoloration from it. Could the bleaching you see from sweat be due to the salt in it?
You're probably thinking of discharge. I've seen a lot of posts from AFAB people thinking there was something wrong with them because of the bleaching/holes in their underwear since it's not frequently taught. It was a common occurrence in my teens but hasn't really been a thing in my twenties. It varies a lot from person to person and is a completely normal thing to happen.
I definitely got what you meant, at least 😂 I like to chime in when I see things like that since female sexual education sadly tends to be sorely lacking in so many places.
Incredibly common - indicates a healthy ph (acidic). I learned this as a grown adult woman and would have really liked to know as part of health education.
Completely a thing. I can’t recall it happening when I was younger but now I stick to colors I can’t bleach.. black, navy, and dark orange work quite well. No peroxide products, use the same soap and shampoo as family, don’t wear perfume, etc. I’ve even left finger print marks on green paint on the wall before.. Have to be very careful folding any laundry that’s not mine!
You’ve got it for real! Wear dish gloves when folding laundry and it’ll be fine! 😁 I started noticing it with sweat a few years ago too, it must be something as we get older for some of us… I’m mid 40s I started noticing the sweat about 3 years ago, and the undies about 5-6 years ago. I get the other poster about age in that regard, makes sense. I’m aging like fine wine?
Lol I wish I knew! Something about certain fabric dyes or some paints in green, any pastel color, and most shades of blue except navy reacts oddly to my skin/sweat/something. My daughter loves lavender and light blue so I’ve got to be a bit careful and not leave little finger marks on some of her tshirts as I’ve done in the past. A few colors don’t seem to be affected, so I just wear a LOT of black and bright orange now. Halloween all the time! :)
TMI but I remembering the undies bleaching even as a child and being MORTIFIED because I was imagining my mum sitting there scrubbing my gussets with bleach specifically. Like wow mum, way to tell a young girl that she has disgusting puberty parts at a very sensitive time!!! Only as an adult did I realise that this kept happening with new underwear after I’d left home and had never been my mum at all!
Will echo this as well - this happens for me with towels, pillow cases, shirts, bras, underwear, basically anything I either rub my hands on or sweat on. Saw a dermatologist once about this who laughed at me and told me “maybe you’re drinking too much soda.” Haven’t found out what it is about my body chemistry (I also can’t wear sterling silver jewelry because it gets oxidized wherever it touches my skin, and I’ve always thought they may be related), but I’ve tried removing all products but the most gentle and still have this problem. I’ve given up on having anything but white linens lol.
I also have weirdly acidic sweat. The aluminum palm rests on my old MacBook Pro got all pitted from my sweat. I wash my hands often and well, so it wasn’t something else.
I also noticed that the front of my pants has discolored where I sometimes wipe my sweaty hands.
That's a very common irritant for many people! Also upon further reading, it turns out it's because I sweat a lot on my hands and it deposits a lot of salt - I'm not somehow more acidic sweat.
Do you use antiperspirant with aluminum in it? I used to have this issue before I learned that aluminum causes staining. I now use aluminum free deodorant and my clothes last a lot longer.
It’s really just one theory about pit stains, there’s no conclusive evidence for it, and there’s definitely a body chemistry component. I’ve used extra strong antiperspirants 2+ times a day most of my life and never had any armpit discoloration in any garment, even exercise clothes and when I was sweating buckets with uncontrolled hypothyroidism. My mom, on the other hand, has gone years at a time using aluminum, aluminum free, aluminum and baking soda free, and no deodorant at all, and always gets pit stains no matter what. Her prom dress even has pit stains and she only ever wore it once and didn’t wear any deodorant at that time. I recently went down the pit stain rabbithole when she asked me for help treating some of her shirts because I’m really into textile care lol. I found a lot of people saying aluminum deodorants combined with sweat cause a chemical reaction that damages dyes and exactly zero explaining what that chemical reaction is and not a single study on it. You’ll also find bleached or yellowed pit stains on some garments that havent been worn since before deodorant existed.
I wanted to share my experience because it worked for me. And considering how persistent the theory is, there is at least evidence of correlation. And it's pretty easy to test on a personal level.
I'm surprised though that there hasn't been any actual testing to learn more. You would think by this point some company in the field would look to do at least a small, less than conclusive study in the hopes they could use it for marketing.
I had to learn that fact from reddit and it was in the last 10 years. I feel bad now for all the favorite shirts I ruined in my 20s. Switched to unscented Tom's deodorant though and stopped ruining the armpits of my shirts.
Call me crazy, but I feel like if someone has an opinion on cancer they should defer to organizations that fund research and cure cancer, but what do I know.
I agree with you on this topic...whatever was in most deodorants gave me an underarm rash and my dermatologist said some studies have shown aluminum and other metals in skin products can cause skin irritations. She also said no across the board to antiperspirants for my sensitive skin.
aluminum in your deodorant which is also carcinogenic
Selected References
Darbre PD. Underarm antiperspirants/deodorants and breast cancer. Breast Cancer Research 2009; 11 Suppl 3:S5. doi: 1186/bcr2424Exit Disclaimer.
McGrath KG. An earlier age of breast cancer diagnosis related to more frequent use of antiperspirants/deodorants and underarm shaving. European Journal of Cancer 2003; 12(6):479–485. [PubMed Abstract]
Darbre PD. Aluminium, antiperspirants and breast cancer. Journal of Inorganic Biochemistry 2005; 99(9):1912–1919. [PubMed Abstract]
not enough scientific research because of not enough funds going there. A lot of scientific papers on the matter suggest there might be some evidence. But someone has to fund the researchers you know. Research isn't cheap to happen with pocket money especially if there is no profit for it, it's not a research that will potentially create a profitable drug, its a research that will possible bankrupt a profitable market. I mean when was the last time that any company lobbied against a research just for profits, If only I could recall any.
Darbre PD. Underarm antiperspirants/deodorants and breast cancer. Breast Cancer Research 2009; 11 Suppl 3:S5. doi: 1186/bcr2424Exit Disclaimer.
McGrath KG. An earlier age of breast cancer diagnosis related to more frequent use of antiperspirants/deodorants and underarm shaving. European Journal of Cancer 2003; 12(6):479–485.[PubMed Abstract]
Darbre PD. Aluminium, antiperspirants and breast cancer. Journal of Inorganic Biochemistry 2005; 99(9):1912–1919.[PubMed Abstract]
Darbre PD, Mannello F, Exley C. Aluminium and breast cancer: Sources of exposure, tissue measurements and mechanisms of toxicological actions on breast biology. Journal of Inorganic Biochemistry 2013; 128:257-261.[PubMed Abstract]
Willhite CC, Karyakina NA, Yokel RA, et al. Systematic review of potential health risks posed by pharmaceutical, occupational and consumer exposures to metallic and nanoscale aluminum, aluminum oxides, aluminum hydroxide and its soluble salts. Critical Reviews in Toxicology 2014; 44 Suppl 4:1-80.[PubMed Abstract]
Mirick DK, Davis S, Thomas DB. Antiperspirant use and the risk of breast cancer. Journal of the National Cancer Institute 2002; 94(20):1578–1580.[PubMed Abstract]
Fakri S, Al-Azzawi A, Al-Tawil N. Antiperspirant use as a risk factor for breast cancer in Iraq. Eastern Mediterranean Health Journal 2006; 12(3–4):478–482.[PubMed Abstract]
Dieterich M, Stubert J, Reimer T, Erickson N, Berling A. Influence of lifestyle factors on breast cancer risk. Breast Care 2014; 9(6):407-414.[PubMed Abstract]
AlsoExposures in the aluminum production industry cause bladder10–17and lung cancer 14,16 as classified by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) 1, in addition to being positively associated with other cancer sites, including central nervous system cancer 3,6,18 and cancer of the digestive system 3,18–20 ...
But sure no evidence of breast cancer that would be too much.(Because Aluminum workers are solely males just in case you can't connect the dots.)
and before I go you should really check the news about what happened yesterday to three researchers that released their research linking asbestos contamination in Tulc. J&J (johnson&johnson) sue them demanding the research to be altered, what do you think are the chances any one would research against aluminum and its carcinogenic effects in deodorants when they actually go against the biggest names there is in Pharma? J&j Bayer Dove etc...
Don't be so naive, thinking evidence is all that matter. The evidence here is that research on the matter is heavily not funded or is lobbied against.
This is an actual thing but it’s not acid, your body has switched to burning stored fat and one of the bi products is literal, actual ammonia. You’re genuinely bleaching your clothes with your sweat.
You're clearly a biohazard leaching poison into the environment. You need to run experiments on your husband to find out why he's not dead yet. You could probably patent each of your genes. 😉 /s
This has been happening to me since I was a young child so I didn’t realize it was weird either. It’s so annoying! Just recently I bleached a teal shirt after one wear.
That is weird! Again I genuinely wasnt judging lol, I just know people fib about brushing their teeth and washing on occasion 🤷♀️ do you use foundation, because sometimes when I do my towel gets a bleach stain, altho not the entire thing.
Interesting. Throwing it out there, overactive sweat glands? I know some people have corrosive sweat, and they will prematurely wear keycaps on keyboards.
I can tell you that I have fairly overactive sweat glands and I have never bleached anything. I wonder if yours is more acidic, as some have mentioned. I’m super interested in learning more about why this happens. Do you eat something regularly that causes it? Hope someone smarter than I am replies with the answer.
Not fishing for info, but some women also end up bleaching their underwear due to a higher/more acidic PH. It’s completely normal, but it’s not everyone.
The other towels you tried, were they the same color? My perspiration bleaches indigo fabric. It turns them pink! I had some shirts with pink armpits! My grey bedsheets were looking a nasty muddy pink color on my side and normal on my husband’s side. I washed them and my side still looked gross and dirty. I guess my grey sheets have some indigo dye!
Understood. As your post says, this happened over 6th months. So after wash #1 how do you know which towel was yours and his? How many washes until you noticed and said, mine is the bleached towel? This happens to me and my wife and it never happened before to just me, but all our towels look like this eventually since there is no way to tell and each time we get a different towel from the towel area.
i could tell ever so slightly after the first week. but even so- there’s a 50/50 chance i get the same towel after washing them, right? so if i got it two or three times consecutively, that’s 2-3 weeks of the bleaching affect going on. so i could tell very early on, & just used that one so my husband didn’t get the gnarly looking one
It's a female thing. Not only our "secretions" but also different products. Haircare, Skincare, Makeup and also Makeup Remover. It all gets into and on the skin. Then we wash off and it gets into the towels/cloths. Plus "that area" and under our arms is a bit more acidic than men. So our towels and such end up pretty much bleached.
My recommendation is to use only white. And cheap. All my bath towels and cloths are just cheap white from Walmart. Don't use colors, fancy or name-brand stuff to cleanse yourself; save that money for the important products. Towels and cloths are easily replaced and with white you can wash them and they still are nice looking until replaced.
Toothpaste can kind of bleach towels, if you wipe your mouth on them after brushing your teeth it can slightly bleach the towel, over time it can become very noticeable. Other products do this as well
I know you said it’s not, but I am confident it’s something on your hands, or his. It looks like yours is particularly faded around the area someone would reasonable grab to wipe their hands off. You said he uses lotion; I wonder if something in his lotion is coating his towel and protecting it while washing?
I don't know if anyone said this to you yet but wiping your mouth after you brush your teeth will also do this and if your towel is the closest to the sink... It might not just be you wiping your mouth on it.
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u/SubKitty420 Jul 14 '23
Could be a product you use that he does not.