What’s the worst-case scenario if you under-shower?

Most of us take a shower every day. We do this to keep ourselves clean, smell fresh and feel confident in our appearance. It’s one of those daily routines that help us get started on the right foot.

However, with so many celebrities openly admitting to not bathing regularly, you may be asking yourself: what’s the worst that could happen if you followed their advice? In this post, we’ll explore what could happen if you don’t shower, and look at the pros and cons of daily showers from an expert’s point of view.

The benefits of daily showers

There are many benefits to showering daily, including

• Kick-starting your day feeling refreshed and revitalized
• Removing unpleasant bodily odors (and preventing new ones from cropping up)
• Always looking and smelling your best
• Keeping germs, dirt, and bacteria off your body, which helps prevent diseases like athlete’s foot and dandruff
• Feeling clean!

What are the downsides?

Although these are some great reasons to shower every day, there are several drawbacks as well:

• Washing your body with soap every day strips your skin and hair of their natural oils, leaving them dry and brittle.
• Showering uses a lot of water. A standard showerhead uses two and a half gallons of water per minute, so the average eight-minute shower can use around 20 gallons of water. That’s 7,300 gallons per year if you shower daily!
• It’s expensive, not because of the actual cost of water itself, but because hot showers consume a lot of energy.
• The entire showering process (including undressing and redressing, drying your hair, etc.) can take a lot of time out of your day.

What’s the worst-case scenario if you don’t shower frequently?

Though there are drawbacks to showering daily, there are also consequences for not doing so. Studies have shown that washing the skin with antimicrobial soaps reduces the risk of infection.

However, other research suggests that the number of bacteria on our skin is stable with or without daily showers. Clearly, the verdict is still out on whether washing the skin is truly beneficial, or more of a placebo.

In contrast, the body odor you’ll have if you shower less frequently will be very real. Left long enough, that body odor could create real social problems in your life. It could affect your relationships with your coworkers, your partner, and your friends. Anyone who chooses not to shower for weeks (or months?) at a time could even find themselves losing their job over it.

The bottom line: Why are some people against showering?

The newly exposed lifestyles of some celebrities may well be an indication that many of us are showering more than we need to be. While you may not need to shower as much when working from home as when going to the office, that doesn’t mean it’s an excuse to forgo showering completely. At the end of the day, it comes down to your particular situation and what makes you feel comfortable. 

There’s no perfect answer for how often you should shower. Many variables come into play, so it’s difficult to determine who should shower daily and who can go days without it.

The best way to find the right cadence for you is to pay attention to your own body. If you’re feeling greasy, smelly, or sweaty, a shower is a good idea; if not, a quick rinse or waiting for tomorrow may be a better choice.