Detergent Allergies

[whirlcool]

Usually during the winter time I suffer from very dry skin. The itching drives me nuts. So I usually end up oiling up and staying on Benedryl or Hydroxyzine whenever the temp is below 55F. I've had this since I was a teen.

A few weeks ago we were in Kroger and they had a sale on All Free & Clear detergent. We used it the last time we did laundry. I was impressed by how good it cleans and the clothes in the end have no odor or smell at all.

For the past few days the temps outside have been in the 30's & 40's and one thing I noticed is no itching at all. None, no Benedryl no skin lotion or anything. So I washed a load of my flannel lounge wear using FOCA today. I put on a flannel shirt with the pajama bottoms and within an hour all the itching came back again. It finally occurred to me to be a detergent allergy.

Earlier in the year we tried that Purex Baby detergent that is supposed to be dermatolgist recommended and we washed our sheets in that stuff. I like the smell, but within 30 minutes of getting into bed I felt like I was laying in a bed of fiberglass. We had to change the sheets to ones washed in a different detergent.

In the meantime we've tried out Tide compact detergent, Peril and I get varying degrees of allergic reaction to all of them. Has anyone seen anything like this before? It seems like All Free & Clear is the only thing I can use without any reaction. This sounds like a pretty severe allergy to me.

 

[appnut]

Growing up about the only detergent I could tolerate with All with Bleach, Borax, and Brighteners.  Nowdays, as long as I wash my hands right after adding detergent to dispenser, I"m ok.  My mom started developing quite an allergy to many cleaning products during the last 10 or so years of her life.  She could only use All Free & Clear and Dreft. 

 

[whirlcool]

The only thing I can think of is when I was a teen my mother used that detergent Miracle White. That stuff caused me to itch like mad. All my mother would tell me was that it was impossible to be allergic to a detergent since you don't eat the stuff. What happened was I would start itching then a few days later a red rash would develop.

I had been to several dermatologists and they all said I just had a bad case of "winter itch" and just to use lotion and Benedryl. Not one of them suggested using another detergent. Strange, isn't it?

Since she wouldn't stop with the Miracle White I found I could use Dash. So I did my own laundry with Dash. A few months later my father started to complain about that. He said all I am doing is running up the water bill and to let my mother do my laundry again. Shortly thereafter I left for college in another state where I used Fresh Start without any problems at all.

I was wondering if somehow the continued use of Miracle White could have started the allergies to detergents I have today?

 

[westie2]

Allen the algery is true.  Our 38 year old son is algeric to detergents and some bath soaps.  Our Dr. we had when he was a baby told us to use the Sears detergent.  He would get the red welps and itch and  cry would turn into scaly red patches. 

 

It is nice to try diffwernt detergents but for him anything but the Sears causes problems.  I'll tell him and his wife to try the All Free and Clear.

 

 

 

[whirlcool]

This allergy started getting worse a few years ago. We used to use Dial bar soap for bathing, but about 3 years ago I started to get itchy after using it. Then my dermatologist suggested Cetaphil detergent. That worked for about 4 months then I started having a reaction to it. Someone suggested I use a body wash rather than a soap. My reaction was even worse than with the Dial bar soap, and I tried several. For for the past two years I have been using Basis soap. It worked but last summer the company that makes Basis changed their formula and I'm back to itching from it.
Fortunately on Ebay I was able to secure about 30 bars of the original formula for a rather cheap price.

In researching this it seems that detergents and soaps affect the permability of your skin. Some people are more sensitive to this than others. What happens is the soap or detergent after some time gets down into the lower layers of your skin and cause a reaction. Some soaps do this more than others.

It appears that Goat's milk soap mixed with Glycerine doesn't have increase the permability of the skin. So I ordered a few bars from the Vermont Soap Company. We'll see how that goes.

Another thing I read is that for people who are allergic, detergent can let loose some "detergent dust" after the clothes have been washed and dried with an offending detergent. So they recommend vacuuming often and dusting often to keep surfaces clean of this stuff. They also recommend 4 or 5 rinses before drying. Vonegar in one of the rinses helps removing detergent residue in clothing as well.
And over time your clothes can get a detergent build up. In extreme cases allergic people may have to use soap to wash their clothing in.

Has anyone else experienced anything like this before? I'm kind of worried as this has gotten worse over the past year or so.

 

[franksdad]

Allen...

My wife suffers detergent allergies and to an extent I do too.  My wife uses All Free and Clear and I use All Free and Clear in my underwear wash.  For some reason I don't remember I was discussing detergent allergies with one of my clients several years ago.  She stated she had awful detergent allergies and advised me to get my wife a bottle of All Free and Clear for Babies.  It has either a light yellor or pink top.  My wife loves the stuff and I've satisfactorilly used it also.  The only place around here I can find All Free and Clear for Babies is at Wal-Mart-and they don't keep it all the time.  Whenever I see it on the shelf we stock up.    

 

[washer111]

Liquid Detergent

A number of people I know use liquid detergents in their washers as those help with skin allergies. Apparently less perfumes and that stuff. 

 

We don't use it, because we don't need to, and because it isn't the best for our washer!

 

[whirlcool]

That's one thing that worries me. Until this came up we only used powdered detergents because we had an incident in our washer of mold/smell from using liquids before. I do think that liquid detergents leave a bio residue behind. Looks like we'll have to do a Cascade DW detergent soak with super hot water after every wash day. But I now see they do make a All Free & Clear powder. So we may have to hunt that down.

We tend to let our clothing pile up and then spend most of a weekend doing it all at once. So the washer has a long time between wash days to dry out. [this post was last edited: 1/17/2013-01:49]

 

[lordkenmore]

They do make an All Free and Clear in powder form. I know I've actually seen it for sale locally at some point.

I hate to mention this brand, because it seems to be horribly unpopular in some circles, but someone I casually knew 3 years ago or so who had serious skin issues (so bad that she actually started making her own soap) swore by Arm and Hammer laundry detergent.

Another thought--and this is just a thought--but I also wonder if "green" detergents wouldn't potentially be good for at least some people with skin issues.

 

[whirlcool]

Another thought--and this is just a thought--but I also wonder if "green" detergents wouldn't potentially be good for at least some people with skin issues.

I'm glad you brought this up. We washed a set of sheets the other day in Vaska and they are scheduled to go on the bed tonight. So we will see if it turns into a itch fest tonight.

 

[davey7]

I have a friend with shared laundry and she explained which ingredient it was which caused the itch, will ask if I remember. I know a lot of people with real or purported chemical sensitivity (the scent added to cooking gas is one).

A lot of people are allergic to common Swedish liquid dish soaps, all the non-Swedes I knew had peeling skin (thank god almost everything is done in machines there).

 

[foxchapel]

The Purex Baby, Tide, Persil (including "Sensitive") all have perfumes in them and they can cause itching, rashes, hives, etc. for people with sensitive skin. The perfume in soaps and detergents is usually the #1 culprit, but people can be sensitive to other things in detergents.

Using too much detergent in the washer for one's water hard/soft levels can leave detergent residue that will cause skin problems, even in the most pure F&C detergent. Too much is too much. Have you tested the hard/soft-ness of your water? Home Depot sells test kits for something like $10 that I've used.

I love the Sears Ultra Plus powder. No perfume and it works great on our clothes.

 

[whirlcool]

We have hard water here, 15 grains. We always watch our dosing and rinsing when it comes to washing clothing. If there is any suds at all in our rinse, we rerinse until the water is clear. Then we put the clothes through a spinner. If there are any suds in the clothing at all, you'll see them in the spinner output.

When we first got out spinner even though the rinse water was perfectly clear the output from the spinner was loaded with suds. It was all that detergent residue that was left in the clothes from the 600rpm spin in our Whirlpool TL machine.

We have redone quite a number of clothes in the past few days with ALL FC. We had some clothing that was stained pretty bad and it got all the stains out. I was also surprised to see on the ALL bottle that it is made by the SUN Company. I am curious to know why ALL FC does not appear in the dollar stores where you can easily find the SUN detergents.

 

[washer111]

Fabric Softener

I believe Fabric Softener works well as a suds killer: But since that is highly chemically concentrated, you may wish to use White Vinegar instead (it also works in dishwashers for Rinse-Aid, albeit with reduced results). 

 

Make sure you are using the highest spin and most vigourous agitation (but short cycle) and less detergent, and you MAY see some improvement in your allergies. Always reset for double rinsing, or triple. Perhaps two deep rinses, then 1 cycle of spray rinses if your machine has the Deep/Eco Rinse options (Thats what I used to do with the dog rug on our Simpson, Deep Rinse, Deep Rinse then Spray Rinses)

 

[stan]

Always find it interesting

That it is common place for the words "soap" and "detergent" to be used interchangeably LOL
But should point out that they are not the same.

Deterrents by nature are meant to pretty strong, and depending on their intended purpose can be quiet sensitizing to skin.
In detergent manufacturing, chemists are chalanged by the fact that we expect a lot from our laundry detergents.
Most people don't sort laundry any more, or pre spot, pre soak, ect. (I know all of us do LOL)

When you add the fact that most do laundry in cooler water temps than years ago, and in less water,
(sometimes less than 15 gallon per load ) chemists have come up with (Or tried to) ways of satisfying us with perfect laundry results. Unfortunatlely there is a price to be paid for those with sensitive skin types

Besides the petro chemicals used for the surfactant portion of the detergent, there is the scents that are designed to adhere to the fabric for a week or so, (made from synthetics) the optical brighteners, that stick to the fabric, 1,4 dioxan ect ect. All combined can produce superior laundry results, but can also produce red itchy hives, for those with allergies. (Consider your dryer sheets as well)

Sun liquid laundry detergent makes scent free product, that I believe is free from at lest the O.Bs and scent, and also, the 1, 4 dioxane
(if that's a concern)
While most here are not fans of this detergent, it is relatively inexpensive, and low sudsing
(If that's concern) and seems to rinse easy enough.

As for the bar soaps mentioned above, I would encourage those with sensitive skin to look closely to the ingreideants, you may be surprised that what your calling soap is really not, but what is refured to as a "sydet" meaning that they are blends of real soap, and detergent, with a added oil to conter the drying effect of the detergent portion of the bar, and of course the added scent.

Some real "pure soaps" are scented with essential oils, (plant based) but that dose not mean that plant oils can't be sensatixing as well.
So, I also encourage those sensitive individuals to search for "real" bath soaps that are not syndets, and do not contain any scent.

Surprising enough plain old lye soap (just lard mixed with lye) and glycerin left intact, can be very helpful, because of the high oleic acid contained therin
(Provided that its made as a bath soap, not made for laundry use) it can be cleansing as well as conditioning.
For those who are vegan, a good olive oil soap (make sure olive oil is the first, or only ingredient) is usually a safe bet.

Hope this helps

 

[launderess]

Fabric Softener As A Defoaming Agent

It isn't the product per se but the fats/oils including silicone one wants to break down foam(defoamer).Soaps again can be used as froth control agent again because of their fat/oil content.

Really for this one can use any oil such as mineral if all one wishes to do is break up the suds. However keeping froth away for long periods and or not create more problems. IMHO however silicone works best and that is what one finds as the defoamer/froth control of choice in most TOL "low foaming" detergents.

Silicones not only break up foam but act to keep it from building up again. However you have to match the dosage to the need. If there is way too much froth in a wash and or more keeps coming in excess of what can be handled by the first dose, more may be required.

It is really best if one is having a huge froth emergency to use silicone or whatever to knock down the froth, then set the machine to drain out wash water and begin rinsing.

Back to fabric softener: you want to make sure whatever product you are using for this purpose does indeed contain some sort of fats and or oils. Some fabric softeners are made from surfactants (cationic)which won't do the job as well or at all.

 

[whirlcool]

We just finished washing the last of my clothes and bedsheets in All F&C. My shipment of Goat's Milk soap also arrived and I used it. I have also received a bar or Pine Tar soap, but haven't tried it yet.

Just two days later, no more winter itch at all. The redness I sometimes have on my skin is totally gone. I still have some rough spots on the back of my legs but that is where my clothes made contact with my skin. But I think it's the skin just healing from the constant irritation.

So two dermatologists later, I finally learn that the problem is a detergent allergy on my own. The dermatologists just said "It's winter itch, just take benedryl and put this steroidal creme on". Hmph. No more benedryl and no more cremes required. Amazing isn't it?

I was talking to a cousin of mine on the phone the other night and I was shocked to find out she has the same exact problem. I asked her what detergent she uses and she said "Tide".

 

[stan]

Allen. Glad your better.

If you haven't used Pine Tar soap before,
You might want to do a small skin test with the Pine Tar soap. Wet the soap with your finger, and apply to the inside fold of your arm, or somewhere you know is a problem area, leave on 10 min and wipe off. Keep that area under observation for a few hours, to make sure your skin says, or no.
The goats milk bar should helps with soothing.

 

[whirlcool]

Thank you for the good wishes.

This goat's milk soap is kind of strange. It feels like regular soap, but has an odor reminiscent of 1950's bar soap. You rinse it off and you feel clean. Wipe dry and a few hours later you feel like you have used some kind of skin creme on your skin. It's not oily at all, just feels like something has been rubbed in.

We have a bar of this soap in our bathroom off the kitchen hall. Karen said our hands are now so soft and smooth in just a few days use. No flaking skin anywhere. [this post was last edited: 1/25/2013-03:08]