Natural Deodorant

If you ever thought about making your own deodorant, here is my recipe, for a creamy deodorant without additional wax. If you would like a stick, there are recipes on the internet with added bees or soy wax which you might find helpful.

The ingredients you need are readily available, and even if you have never even heard of arrowroot, don't despair. Arrowroot is an odourless starch, not too dissimilar from corn starch and you can get it online for less than £5 for 500g. Or you can use corn starch. I bought my shea butter online, too, and believe it or not, my coconut oil is from Aldi.

Here is what you need to make your own natural deodorant:

2½ tbsp coconut oil (~ 37.5g)
2½ tbsp shea butter (~ 37.5g)
1/4 cup arrow root (~ 32g)
1½ tbsp spoon baking powder
2 drops of tea tree oil
essential oils to your liking

A note on baking powder and essential oils:
Baking powder is known to cause skin irritation which is caused by its PH level which is around 8.3 while the skin has a PH level of around 5. I experienced irritation and moved away from the baking powder, replacing it with additional arrowroot powder. Other people use clay or leave it out completely.

As for essential oils, they can also be irritant to the skin so make sure you do not use too much. Here is a nifty little calculator for you to find out the amount of essential oil you need: Essential Oil Dilution Calculator

The process is very easy:

Heat the coconut oil and the shea butter in a bain-marie (i.e. put your jar into a pot with hot, yet not boiling, water) and once liquid, add the arrowroot powder and mix well. Now add your essential oils and again mix well until everything is combined.

Close the jar with a lid and leave to cool. You can put the jar into the fridge to cool off, no bother.

Now a word of warning. NOW?! I hear you shout. Yes, now, but... 

Antiperspirants contain aluminium that clog your pores so you don't sweat. Logical. Natural deodorants do not clog your pores, and are not antiperspirant. What will happen is that your pores for the first time in a long time feel the freedom to actually sweat and yes, they will smell. This is normal and while it is annoying it won't last long. Your armpits need time to adjust to their newly won freedom to breathe and sweat as nature intended. Unfortunately, this means that you likely will have to wash you armpits a few times a day and reapply your deodorant. There are people online who claim that you can easily reset the PH level by using apple cider vinegar. I would strongly recommend not to try this as it can cause really bad irritation.

If you indeed experience irritation, please discontinue using the deodorant. Always remember, there is nothing wrong with deodorants you can buy. There is no evidence of them causing cancer and whatever other so-called "facts" are flying around the internet. Natural does not automatically mean that something is better for you. And let's be fair, scaly itchy underarms aren't sexy.

I hope you find this recipe helpful and you like the deodorant.