I Tried Baking Soda Beauty Hacks And Was Surprisingly Impressed
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Baking soda’s all over the internet. This makes me realize that you don’t need to be a big shot celebrity to be famous on media, social or otherwise. You could always just become sodium bicarbonate to become famous overnight. “Hello Mr.Sodium Bicarbonate, I absolutely love the role you play when it comes to my acne, you are such a superstar” sort of a scenario right now. After listening to the million things baking soda could do, I finally decided to experiment, and here’s my take on each one of my trials.
1. Bath Bombs
Bath bombs! The very word (or maybe phrase – like, there are just two words, I don’t really feel like calling it a phrase) feels so exuberant and so luxurious. There’s color, there’s aroma, and then there’s the fizzzz. It is an absolute delight to plunge into the bathtub where this bomb is all going fizz in the warm water. Look what Wiki says about bath bombs: “They are used to add essential oils, scent, bubbles and color to bath water.” Bwahaha, it was definitely a man who wrote it. Girls just can’t be so flat when they are talking of a bath bomb.
Coming back to baking soda, which is the protagonist of today’s play, here’s a recipe where he is sharing a sizzling camaraderie with our dear citric acid. It is both literally and figuratively the chemistry between baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) and citric acid that does all the fizzing.
- Take a bowl and add 1 cup of baking soda and 1/2 cup of citric acid along with 1/2 cup of Epsom salt. Make sure you mix these dry ingredients first.
- Take another bowl and mix the wet ingredients. Mix 3 tsp of any oil (JSYK, I used olive oil), 2 tsp of any essential oil (again, JSYK, I used cocoa and vanilla), food coloring drops ( I used purple and blue and pink and white – whether you want to know or not), and 1 tsp water (obviously, I used water. There’s no variety here, sorry!) .
- This is the tricky part now. Take the whisk and add just 1 spoon of the wet mixture each time and blend it well with the dry mixture until both the mixtures are incorporated into each other.
- Use a bath bomb mold or any mold of any shape and fill the mixture. Make sure you press it properly and make a nice and tight ball.
- Allow it to dry out completely, or you could also freeze it for a while. Remember, if it is the fizz that is important for you, like it is for me, the ball has to be COMPLETELY dry before you throw it into your bathtub.
I am a little lazy, so if you are searching for a proper list of things you’d need, please look for the words in bold. My take on this? Need I specify? It was relaxing and therapeutic. I curled up like a baby and went gliding into one of the deepest slumbers post the bath bomb experience.
2. Baking Soda For Acne
Baking soda is an effective way to treat acne. This ability of baking soda to be able to treat acne can be attributed to its antibacterial property (1). Millions of women use a mixture of baking soda and water on their acne and are overwhelmed with the way it works. I also add a few drops of essential oils like lavender or tea tree. This gives a nice aroma anyway, but it also enhances the acne-fighting capacity of baking soda. Some say the results are seen overnight, some say it takes them a couple of months to get rid of persistent acne. Also, some women with sensitive skin say that baking soda caused irritation to their skin and made their skin worse than before. To avoid any such repercussions, always do a patch test and use it on a moisturizing base if you have sensitive skin.
I did try it on a zit or two, and it seems to be working. But I have chosen two contrasting reviews from two obscure corners of the internet for you to decide your take.
User Reviews:
- I) “After many hours spent Googling acne solutions (it’s a major component of my browsing history), I didn’t quite believe the validity of one solution I landed upon. It was something so simple and cheap it had to be fake: Baking soda.”
- II) “I have sensitive, and acne prone skin and this product made my skin worse. It also made my skin really dry and it was really irritating.”
Haters gonna always hate, and sometimes, this natural stuff just doesn’t work the same way for everybody. So, just try it on one acne and find if it is working for you before you smear it all over your face.
3. Baking Soda As A DIY Dry Shampoo
Going from an obsessive twice-a-day (sometimes) hair washing session to once in two weeks was quite a jump for me. I absolutely hated the fact that I had to wash my hair every single day to keep it clean and fresh. I put my foot down and decided to tie a messy bun and let the oils do whatever the heck they wanted to. I quite succeeded, but in this attempt, baking soda gave me a slight push to stick to the stubborn decision. Here’s what I do:
I sprinkle some baking soda all over the scalp and allow it to absorb all the oils. Also, I sprinkle it on my hairbrush to remove some of the oil from the strands. On days when I feel I need a lot of it to remove the grease, I might end up making my hair appear gray and hence add a pinch of cocoa powder to it. You could add arrowroot powder if your hair color is on the lighter side. Initially, it feels dry and maybe gritty, but that’s what a dry shampoo does, doesn’t it?
4. Baking Soda As A Tooth Whitener
You can’t have an ultra clean and beautiful face with a stretch of yellow teeth hanging on the bottom of your face. Not a great combo at all! Oral care should be an integral part of your grooming activities. Realizing this, I decided to try this baking soda and lemon juice mixture on my teeth. I was a bit apprehensive about using lemon juice on my teeth, for, the citric acid might deteriorate the enamel on my teeth. So, I stuck to just baking soda. What I did was, I applied some baking soda mixed with water on my teeth and allowed it to sit for 3 to 5 minutes, then brushed my teeth and rinsed my mouth with clean water. It did clear away some superficial stains and made my mouth feel fresh (P.S: It tastes horrible). Also, its antimicrobial properties are known to reduce the plaque build-up in the teeth. Regular use of baking soda did make my teeth cleaner and whiter than before, but although this is a bummer, do NOT expect immediate and drastic results.
5. Baking Soda For Microdermabrasion At Home
If you are broke and are looking for an at-home microdermabrasion treatment or if you are an all-natural and refuse to allow aluminum oxide crystals to dig through your skin (Though aluminum oxide is a naturally occurring chemical compound, my bad! All I am trying to say is that if you are like me who takes immense pride in doing EVERYTHING at home and are obsessed with anything close to a DIY), this alternative is for you. Touch baking soda, and it is evident that it is an abrasive. This is exactly why it helps in clearing away that layer of dead cells on the skin.
Sensitive darlings, this whole at-home microdermabrasion thing sounds super tempting. But, please do a patch test and spare the internet reviews that include your precious little cuss words. Sometimes, if I feel baking soda is making my skin too dry, I either massage some coconut oil on my face after the treatment or, better still, add some oil into the baking soda and enjoy a nice soothing scrub.
After this super long post, I hope it is clear to all you women as to why baking soda had garnered such massive attention overnight. Just a word of caution before I wind up – remember that baking soda is caustic and can mess with the pH of your hair and skin if you don’t use it carefully. Do your research and understand why something works for something. That’s the best way to stay safe and beautiful. Which one did you find most interesting? Bath bombs, right? Comment below and let me know.
