3 Things Happen When You Reduce Artificial and Strong Fragrances
1. You think everyone wears too much perfume.
In reality they are probably wearing a normal human amount. But when you are stuck in an elevator with someone or pass by them in hall, its almost as if they prayed their favorite scent on you.
I even make my husband wear unscented deodorant.
2. You start shopping less.
Or I should say you start shopping less in stores – because so many are laden with fragrances. You know how Abercrombie and Fitch stores smell universally overwhelming to most of the population? Imagine that, EVERYWHERE.
It also adds another barrier to purchase of beauty products. Besides worrying about parabens, I’ve found I can’t use a product if the scent is too strong – even if it claims to use only essential oils.
3. Your washing machine becomes your best friend.
Because you just hugged someone with perfume. Or you were traveling with friends or family and had to use – GASP- Tide detergent. I’m not the only one who feels this way…or feels ht need to wash clothes a few times after in “my” special detergent.
For years I’ve used unscented (at the very least) washing detergent and natural body wash and shampoo, but it wasn’t until I removed the last of the scented products in my house that I noticed how powerful and pervasive artificial fragrances are.
Miss Dior Blooming Bouquet Perfume and Volupsa French Cade Lavender Candle
My last hold-outs had been Volupsa French Cade Lavender candles and the cutest, tiniest bottle of Miss Dior Blooming Bouquet. (Truth be told I still hold onto Volupsa Moso Bamboo candle…it was a much more subtle or more natural scent).
I barely used the perfume and when I did, I only sprayed the tiniest bit. And it was heaven.
I would light candles a few times a week however and I would leave the top off the candle jar when I wasn’t burning it.
Then one day I came home from work, still smelling the perfume I had dotted on my wrist that morning. I went to light the Volupsa candle and then stopped, thinking to myself: “This is too much…too much scent.”
I didn’t want to believe I felt that way. Scents are sentimental. We always burned a subtle-scented candle in my house on special occasions when I was growing up. Or we sprayed Thymes Goldleaf mist- that scent still makes me nostalgic.
A few weeks later the tide turned more for me when I was on a hike. As I finished my run and walked back to my car, and an older lady wearing a new looking Patagonia jacket stopped me. Unfortunately, I took off my earbuds. What happened next was a 12 minute diatribe from this old woman about the radiation from my giant cell phone on my arm band; NPR not allowing her on their “show”; the President using a speech writer – A SPEECH WRITER CAN YOU BELIEVE IT; the president listening to her through her television; the president stealing ideas from her “book” and finally: scents are poisonous.
A few minutes in she was so impassioned she was essentially foaming at the mouth. I tried to make a graceful exit but then had to run to my car. As I sped away I couldn’t help but thinking: “that lady’s crazy and unbalanced. No one is trying to poison me with fragrance, but it’s certainly not good for me!”.
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