Armpit Whitening - A Beginner’s Guide To The Perfect Underarm

Do you use an underarm whitener? As I sit slurping coffee in the morning and crunching my toast, I generally have a look at my Google Analytics account and go through such things as what keywords are bringing visitors to my articles. Since the beginning of spring I have noticed that the term ‘underarm whitening’ keeps appearing. Now I am not sure why, because I have never written anything at all about this topic. But the term keeps showing up and it has got me to thinking; do women really worry about having dark underarms? Living in chilly, rainy England where you do not get too much chance to wear skimpy tops, I have never really much thought about my armpits, other than squirting deodorant every day and a quick shave in the shower, so I took a good look at them in the mirror. They seemed ok to me, but since I have obviously been neglecting my underarm skincare regime, I decided that I needed to find out more about underarm whitening and how you go about it.

It appears that having dark underarms is a source of embarrassment to many women, and can even prevent them from wearing strappy tops in the summer, raising their arms in the air or playing sports. Dark underarms are more visible on fair-skinned people, and like skin discolouration and blemishes on other parts of the body, they can lead to a lack of confidence and self-esteem. So what causes this darkening of the armpit area? Like most things, some people are more prone to developing them than others, but the main causes are poor armpit hygiene, friction from tight clothing rubbing, a build-up of dead skin cells, being overweight, reactions to deodorants and other skincare products, shaving, and taking androgen-based contraceptive pills. It is worth noting that having dark underarms and hyperpigmentation around your collar bones and neck could be a symptom of Type II diabetes, and it could be worth getting it checked out and having a blood sugar test.

So what can you do to whiten your armpits and get them glowing and radiant once more? Well one of the easiest things to start with is that you can exfoliate the area under your arms and get rid of any dead skin that has built up. Choose a mild exfoliator or body scrub to use on your underarms a couple of times a week when you are in the shower and this should keep the area free of dead skin build-up. Try and choose a mild exfoliator, and also one that is organic and paraben free, so that you are not absorbing any nasty chemicals through your delicate skin. You can also now get roll-on deodorants that are designed to reduce skin darkening under your arms that when used every day can help to keep those armpits pale as a lily. Also, it has been suggested that a common ingredient of many deodorants, alum chloride, can react with your sweat to stain both your clothes and your skin. So even if you do not switch to using a whitening deodorant, try and choose one that does not contain alum chloride. There are now many natural and organic deodorants out there that do not contain any damaging chemicals and will also cherish your precious skin.

You could also investigate other methods of removing the hair from under your arms. Shaving only cuts the hair off at skin level and does not remove the root. So, especially if you are fair-skinned with dark hair, you can be left with a dark shadow under your arms. Shaving can also cause irritation that can be unsightly and cause skin discolouration. Hair removal creams dissolve the hair below the surface of the skin, so it takes longer for the hair to grow back and so you are less likely to have a dark shadow. Always do a patch test before you use hair removal cream, to ensure that you do not react badly to it, and again it is best to choose a hair removal cream that is designed for sensitive skin, is organic and paraben free. It’s not for the faint hearted, but underarm waxing takes out the whole hair from the root, and if you wax on a regular basis you will probably find that the hair starts to thin out as the roots get damaged and less hair grows back. The most permanent solution is to have your armpit hairs removed by electrolysis. To remove the hair permanently, a very fine metal probe is inserted into the hair follicle and an electric charge is delivered that destroys only the hair follicle. This has to be done for each individual hair, so it is likely that more than one treatment session will be required, and this can start to become quite expensive.

There are quite a few natural methods of whitening your underarms that you easily use at home. Perhaps the simplest natural method is to slice a lemon and then rub the lemon slices across your armpits. Lime slices would be just as effective, but this needs to be done regularly to keep those pits white, and because lemon or lime juice is acidic, you might find that it dries your skin out and that you need smooth in a moisturiser afterwards. A variation of this is to mix a tablespoon of honey with a tablespoon of lemon juice and smooth the mixture over your underarm skin. Leave the honey and lemon juice mixture on for around thirty minutes and then sponge it off with warm water and rub in some skin moisturiser. Some of the best skin moisturisers for this delicate underarm area are coconut oil and Vitamin E oil. Lemon juice mixed with turmeric paste can also be applied to your armpits at bedtime and left on overnight. This is rinsed off in the shower the next morning and moisturiser applied to your underarm area. This is one that needs to be done regularly to keep them pale, so it is a method that might not do much for your love life!

Surprisingly, potato juice will also bleach the skin, so you could try chopping some peeled potatoes, putting them through the juicer and then applying the juice to your underarms. Allow the potato juice to dry on your skin and then rinse of off with cool water. A rather more exotic and appealing mixture to use is sandalwood powder mixed with rosewater, which you then apply to your armpits in order to reduce the darkening of the skin. I wouldn’t mind betting that it smells rather better than the potato juice as well! If you would rather drink something to whiten your underarms, rather than using a lightener on your underarm skin, soak some fenugreek seeds overnight in a glass of water and then drink the liquid first thing in the morning on an empty stomach. You then have to wait for about half an hour before you have your breakfast, to give the fenugreek water the chance to work.

There are also a wide range of skin lightening and bleaching creams on the market, which are designed to fade out those dark patches under your arms. The problem with some of these lightening creams is that they can contain very harsh chemicals. The main culprit seems to something called hydraquinone. Hydraquinone has been associated with an increased risk of developing several serious medical conditions, such as problems with your adrenal glands, the symptoms of mercury poisoning, cancer and a rare metabolic condition called ochronosis that damages the skin and tissues around the joints, eyes and ears. In the United States, the Food and Drug Administration has proposed a ban of the sale of over-the-counter skin lightening products, and it is worth noting that this ban is already in place in Australia, Japan and the European Union. So try to choose an underarm whitener that does not contain hydraquinone, and if you are determined to use a whitening cream that contains it, try to ensure that is not more than 2%. Skin lighteners are very powerful creams or lotions to smooth onto your body, so you must do a patch test first to see if you get a bad reaction and you must never use them on broken or irritated skin.

So, as you can see, you do not need to suffer the embarrassment of dark underarms any longer. You can slip into that skimpy evening dress with confidence, play tennis in a vest and wave your arms in the air with abandon. Most of the ingredients for the natural remedies you will already have at home, but if you do want to buy whitening products, you can find everything that you need online. Amazon has a great range, so go and have a look today. If you are going to a salon to get your armpits whitened or for laser hair removal, make sure that the therapist has the correct training and certification. Meanwhile, back here in our chilly English summer, I’m just going to slip my jumper back on and really not worry too much about my underarms. I just knew that there had to be some benefits to living in a cold climate!

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