I have written about deodorant many times here over the years and reviewed my fair share of products to find the best ones. It is actually a tall order to find a good, natural deodorant. You may find many that are made of safe and natural ingredients, that part is not hard. But finding one actually works like their conventional, toxic counterparts is quite a bit harder.
The ingredients list may be impressive but the ability to actually control odors for more than an hour is usually what is lacking. It smells mice, it feels nice going on, and then an hour or two later you reek and you walk around wondering if all your coworkers can smell you. Needless to say that deodorant goes in the garbage can.
Other options may rely heavily on ingredients that are natural but also irritating to the skin…such as baking soda. Many natural deodorant seekers have likely run across the baking soda burn that can be associated with these products. Red, inflamed pits mean another deodorant bites the dust. My own journey to finding the right deodorant has been fraught with misadventure (and burned pits).
So yes, finding a good deodorant is freakin hard! And yet you cannot give up on the search because conventional deodorants are bad news. They often times work well at controlling bad odors but they can have lots of nasty ingredients and more than one report coming from the scientific community has hinted at a possible link between the nasties in deodorant and beast cancer. Just a quick gander at breast cancer rates and you may soon find yourself freaking out about what kind of deodorant you are using. It is said that it only takes 26 seconds for a body care product to be absorbed into our bloodstream. That should make us very aware of what we use on our skin, no?
We don’t want to be slathering our pits with carcinogenic products or ones that will mess with our hormones (think parabens). We also don’t want chemical nasties from deodorant to show up in our breastmilk! The search must go on…
I have been lucky to find a few good ones over the years and I write about the ones I find here on this blog. I have another to add in Spruce Naturals.
Last month I rocked their 100% natural Herbal English Lavender. It is certified organic and made with bacteria fighting coconut oil and a deodorizing blend of essential oils. It is also vegan and cruelty free. Other ingredients include Carnauba wax, arrowroot powder, shea butter, and baking soda.
The baking soda is a side star and not the main star because I am prone to the pit burn caused when too much is used. I noticed no sensitivity at all while using Spruce Naturals. The coconut oil base made it go on very easy, especially since it is summer. I am curious to see how it fairs in the cold winter months. I think it would probably last a bit longer. That is really my only complaint, that is went too fast and I think it may be because it is so soft in summer it is hard to avoid using a bit too much.
But did it pass the smell test? Yes! It lasted my whole work day…which was recently about 9+ hours and I was not the least bit self conscious about smells. I did feel the desire on some days to shower before bed because it was wearing off but I can’t expect miracles here…it did the job for the majority of the day, including some days spent in the hot sun gardening after work.
The verdict is in and this deodorant passes the smell test. I would definitely buy again.
