Guy finally took a bath recently and died.
94 is not a bad run, and it’s also noteworthy that he died after his first bath, presumably because life-supporting bacteria were washed away.
It’s only a sample of 1 but anecdotally it seems a strong case for the health benefits of not bathing. Obviously more studies are needed, preferably conducted by researchers who are deficient in the sense of smell, or else equipped with military-grade gas masks.
…or possibly because he was 94 years old.
Maybe the water he washed himself with was loaded with pathogens (different than what he had on / in his body).
Not many people get to die feeling fully and completely vindicated about their life choices, but I bet he did.
Exactly my thought, too.
I saw this thread back when it was first created, and read the story about Amou Haji. Not bathing, smoking animal dung or five cigarettes at a time, sleeping on the ground - that sounds like untreated mental illness, to me. There’s a difference between tolerating a certain funk and living with ground-in dirt.
Just to add another data point to the discussion, one of the formative experiences of my young adulthood was camping in the Wind River Mountains for a month, in a National Outdoor Leadership School wilderness course. NOLS strongly stresses minimum impact (to the extent that we were taught to swallow our toothpaste and use smooth stones instead of toilet paper), so the only daily hygiene we had was brushing our teeth. The consensus among the group was that each noticed his or her own reek, but no one else’s (and each small cookgroup of about four slept huddled together for warmth - even in July, the Wyoming Rockies get cold - so we were in pretty close contact).
When we got back to town at the end of the course and everyone took their first showers in a month, all the women remarked on how well their hair looked and felt after not washing away the natural oils. It was the only time in my life that my beard was soft to the touch.
Epitaph: “I told you.”
Some data points…all from people who did bathe regularly:
I had one roommate whose sweat could best be described as rank stale damp laundry. He showered daily, but the slightest physical activity or hot sunny day and, pow, you could smell him from two rooms away.
I had a coworker with chronic kidney stones, and frequently smelled strongly of sourness and urea. This is a known medical effect of that condition.
I had a former girlfriend whose body and breath smelled heavily like rotting vegetation, similar to a compost bin or a bag of greens that had gone bad in the fridge. I think it was diet related as she lived primarily on vegan powder smoothies, and gin martinis.
Interesting.
I never wash my beard. It’s always felt soft to me.
“8 years later” (originally posted by Discobot, I suppose)
Came into this thread at the begiining; and for a moment I thought @Annie-Xmas had resurfaced.
Years ago a friend of mine took medication that made him smell and he knew it and washed multiple times a day to fight it.
I was just in the grocery store the other day and there was this seriously psychotic looking person who reeked. I could smell him from the next aisle over. I had to go to the opposite side of the store to get away from the smell. I seriously thought about picking up a can of Lysol in case I couldn’t get away from him at the checkout.
Reading the OP I thought it sounded just like Annie… and it was! But only a long time ago.