Something that is commonly joked about among my friends are my showering habits. They tend to not be the best in relation to modern day standards, and many of my friends attribute it to my depression and therefore lack of personal hygiene. The decision to change my showering habits from showering every other day to showering less frequently are a direct result of the changing environment.
In September of 2016 an announcement of worsening greenhouse gas conditions, and reaching 400 parts per billion in the atmosphere were announced. This scared me to death, because I couldn’t believe that we let the world get this bad. I immediately tried to cut down on any carbon footprint inducing habit I had. I began keeping my lights off almost all the time, showering in the dark, and getting ready in the dark. This scheme failed VERY quickly.
I needed a new way to help out, even if it was a little. There was something that I had been thinking about that I wanted to try. I had heard that it was better for your hair, especially in dry environments, to shower less frequently, and to use hair oils and serums. After watching a video of a girl who didn’t shower, or at least wash her hair, for two years, I wanted to try showering less.
I knew that showering was a huge waste of water and, in fact, according to Home Water Works, people use around 17.2 gallons to shower on average for an 8-minute shower. They say that people use 2.1 gallons per minute. Most people that I know shower for around 45 minutes. That’s 94.5 gallons a shower, and if people are showering 3 times a week (every other day) that’s 283.5 gallons a week. Just for showering. The amount of waste that produces is astronomically large, and almost too terrifying to look at. This is what caused my frequencies of showers to change.
In the middle of my senior year in high school I began showering once every 3 days, slowly easing myself into my schedule now. After a few weeks I moved it to once every 4 days. In the summer of 2017 I began showering once every 5 days. This trend continued into my freshman year in college, the communal bathrooms making it easier, as I didn’t really want to shower there anyway. Now I am at showering once every 10 days to 2 weeks. This may seem ridiculous, because I only shower about 36 times a year, but let’s look at the math. If I shower 36 times a year at 30 minutes each that is 2,268 gallons of water a year, compared to showering every other day at 45 minutes each shower is 13,608 gallons a year. Showering once every 10 days to 2 weeks is 6 times less water overall.
There are so many benefits to this. After starting this pattern, I fell in love. My hair feels so much healthier and less grainy. It is often soft and smooth. Not to mention that hair will adapt to the amount you shower. If you shower more frequently your hair oils will be washed out often, and produce at a more rapid rate to replenish themselves, the less you shower the less they have to do this.
I still clean myself often, toweling myself off with wash cloths, using cleansing wipes, and shaving by wetting my legs and applying shaving cream. This allowed me to stay clean, and help reduce water consumption. Through this I also discovered the benefits that not showering as often can have on your hair.
I know that this might be scary to some, especially if you’re used to showering every day or every other day. Something that I would recommend is showering every three days, and let yourself get used to it. Just use a little less water, because it all helps reduce water waste. If you feel as though you need something to clean your hair in between those days dry shampoo is a wonderful invention that has saved my hair multiple times, and it can save yours too.