What the hell did my sweat do to my shirt?

In My Humble Opinion
1

This is weird; I’m hoping someone’s got some idea as to what might have happened. And since I don’t have the shirt in question anymore, I figure a factual answer will be impossible, so IMHO seemed appropriate.

Anyway:

A few weeks ago, my wife and I were visiting family in Orlando. One day I got up in the attic of my stepdad’s house to poke around through some old stuff; this being Florida, I was sweating like a whore in church. I was wearing a t-shirt, which got good and soaked with sweat.

So I took the shirt off and put it in my suitcase, and at the end of our trip we came home to Memphis and did laundry. When the shirt came out, the armpits of it–only the armpits–were somehow “stiffened.” It was as if they’d been coated with a semihard plastic, or as though the shirt’s armpits had been dipped in hot candlewax and then cooled in a refrigerator. That’s the best way I can think of to describe the texture of it.

There was nothing visible ON the shirt; whatever did this had soaked into the fibers somehow, apparently stiffening them.

The shirt was 100% cotton. It was exactly like this one, except that mine was dark green.

Anyway, my wife put some spot-cleaner on it–Shout or some such–and we ran it through the wash again. No change; whatever had happened was unaffected by laundering.

So I threw the shirt away, but it’s been preying on my mind. What the hell happened?

[ul]
[li]Did I, just for one day, begin exuding some kind of plasticine polymer through my armpits? [/li][li]Was there something in the environment that day that would react with my sweat, but only if there was a sufficient amount of it? That would sort of explain why the rest of the shirt wasn’t stiffened, anyway.[/li][li]Was it something inside the shirt itself all along, and finally the armpits, which take most of my sweat (I’m a sweaty guy and I live in a hot region) eroded away some kind of barrier that had hitherto been keeping the stiffness soft? I know, I’m reaching here.[/li][/ul]
I wish I’d kept the shirt so I could post a video or something. I really have no idea what this could have been, and it’s been bugging me. Help me out, Dopers! Whatcha got?

2

Human sweat is corrosive. I don’t have any cite for this other than the spots on my bike frame–that coincide exactly with the center drip line of my body.

3

It could be the combination of human sweat and deodorant that did it. Can anyone get the straight dope on this?

4

Not the SD but some personal experience and speculation:

I have this problem if I use a regular solid antiperspirant but not if I us a liquidy gel. I vote for it’s the antiperspirant and that heavy sweating gets more of it on your shirt.

I have gotten this out of clothes with a stain stick and boiling water.

5

Good thoughts, all. I use one of those liquidy-gel antiperspirant/deodorants. The weird thing is that it’s not at all uncommon for me to get good and sweaty in a t-shirt; I was sweating pretty heavily that day, but no more heavily than I have on countless other days. I’m wondering why it happened this time and not all the other times I’ve sweated a lot, while using the same deodorant and so on.

6

I’ve had the same problem. Changing my deodorant immediately stopped it. I wonder if exposing your regular deodorant to some unusual conditions caused this somehow. Did you wash it in the Florida water?

On preview, I see that you didn’t. I got nothing. You aren’t making armpit plastic though, if that makes you feel any better. I threw my shirts away too.

7

It’s apparently a combination of salts from extreme perspiration mixed with solids from your deodorant/antiperspirant. #5 on this list

My mom used to use some mixture of Cascade dishwashing detergent and liquid dishwashing soap to get those stains/stiffness out of my white uniform shirts when I was in Catholic schools.

8

Maybe you accidentally grabbed your wife’s deodorant that morning instead of your own? Probably not but I thought it might be worth mentioning.

9

I hate to steal a post from another thread, but maybe you’re a superhero.

10

I think the reason it happened this time was the length of time between gooping up the pits and washing it.

11

Or the extra factor of the extreme heat in an attic in Florida in summer.

12

That seems possible. I’m pretty sure I didn’t use my wife’s deodorant that day, Tikki, though that would have been an interesting possibility.

Now that I think about it, I don’t think I took a shower that morning. I think I knew I was going up in the attic (and playing golf later that day), so I didn’t shower beforehand, but I probably DID put on deodorant before I went over there. Hmm. Maybe the double-dose of deodorant (that morning’s, plus the previous day’s unwashed residue), plus the funk of unshowered pits, plus the extreme sweating, plus the week or more before washing the shirts all conspired somehow to plasticize the shirt.

Interesting…

And gigi, I appreciate the idea, but the ability to secrete some kind of soft plastic from one’s armpits would rate right up there with super-spelling as the lamest superpowers one could have.

13

The pits are just how it starts. And truthfully, did you think to check whether the shell was bulletproof?

14

How? The shirt I’m wearing now has this and I’d love to de-stiffen it.

15

Take the shirt off before applying the boiling water.

16

:smack: