Lemon is the first thing that comes to mind whevever you want to remove anything dark from your skin! Nothing is as good a bleach as lemon is. Lemon is not only a natural cleanser (why else would restaurants use washing bowls with warm water having lemon wedges in them!) but also has anti-bacterial and anti-septic properties. Its acidic properties help extensively in lightening your skin along with exfoliating dead skin cells. So, why not use lemon for lightening your dark underarms?
Take a thick slice of lemon and rub your underarms daily before you go to have bath. Apply some moisturizer after bath as lemon also tends to make skin dry. You may also use lemon in different way, as told in the next point, to ensure it doesn’t dries up your skin.
Add a pinch or two of tumeric, honey or yogurt to lemon juice. This will give you something like a paste. Apply this to your dark underarms and leave for about 10 minutes. Now wash off with water.
2. Use those Cucumbers too:-
If it’s a competition among veggies, you’ll have to use those cucumbers lying in your refrigerator too because they too have skin lightening properties. What’s even better is that if you want to get the benefits of bleaching properties of lemon, you can do so by combining lemon juice with cucumber. While lemon works to bleach your skin, cucumber soothes the skin avoiding any itching or irritation.
Mix lime juice with cucumber juice and add a pinch of turmeric to it. Lemon bleaches and removes dead cells, cucumber provides cooling effect and turmeric prevents discoloration. It is actually an ayurvedic remedy- so easy that you can do it everyday without any hassle!
You can also simply cut roundels of cucumber and rub your underarms with it.
Or apply the pure juice of ccumber to your dark underarm. This can also lighten your skin there in few days.
3. Exfoiate Underarms with Natural Scrubs:-
Sometimes it’s nothing more than the accumulation of dead skin cells that causes your underarms look dark. In such case you have to gently exfoliate your skin under your arms. A soft loofah is also sufficient but scrubs can give you really white underarms. I am talking about natural scrubs and not the harsh chemical laden commercial ones. Before telling you about some natural scrubs, I like to emphasize on the need of exfoliation for those who sweat excessively. They should more often exfoliate their underarms because it’s where most of the body sweat accumulates and sometimes doesn’t find way to escape. However, excessive exfoliation too can cause harm and scarring which can lead to infection in hair follicles, pores, and sweat glands in your armpits. So exfoliate but gently and with care. Avoid using harsh scrubs and even things like pumice stones or brushes. Now have some recipes for natural homemade scrubs for your underarms.
Take some lemon juice and add brown sugar or granulated sugar. Appy on underarms and leave for 5-10 minutes. Then with little wet fingers, rub your underarms gently feeling the granules of the sugar. This will excellently exfoliate your skin along with lightening it. Wash off after few minutes. This scrub is particularly useful for you if you got your dark underarms as a result of shaving.
Take some walnuts or peanuts and grind them to make powder. Now take 1 tablespoon of lemon juice and 1 teaspoon each of honey and powdered walnut or peanuts. Mix them to make a paste. Apply this to your underarms. Leave for 10 minutes. Wash off.
4.Take Help from White Baking Soda:-
White baking soda can also make your underarms white. Baking soda can be used to make an excellent scrub for your underams. In fact, if you use baking soda for underarms, you can avoid your chemically made deodorants and antiperspirants, another cause for dark underarms. Baking arms can prevent body odour too. Not only this, a scrub made with baking soda can also get you rid of damaged and dead cellleading to unclogging pores. It also kills the germs to give you a clean odor-free and lightened underarm.
Take some baking soda and water. Mix them to make a thick paste. Apply them to your underarms and gently scrub the area. Wash off and pat dry the skin.
If you don’t want such an elaborate exercise, mix the baking soda with a little water and just wipe your underarms with this solution.
5. Orange Peels for Fruity Treatment of Dark Underarms:-
Yet another natural scrub for your underarms, and this time its fruity and fragarant because it is made with orange peels. Orange, belonging to the family of lemon, has bleaching properties that can be used for lightening your dark underarms. Here are the steps to make this scrub.
Dry the orange peel in shade.
Grind the peel to get its powder.
Take some rose water and milk.
Add the powdered orange peel to this rose water and milk and mix well to get a thick paste.
Apply this paste to your underarms and gently scrub the area for about 10 minutes.
Wash off with cold water.
This scrub removes your dead cells, bleaches the skin and leaves you fragarant with the effects of rose water and orange itself.
6. Milk for Milky White Underarms:-
Vitamins and fatty acids in milk are very effective in lightening the dark skin under arms. When mixed with curd, the lactic acid too do wonders for whitening your dark underarm.
You will need:
Milk- 2 tablespoons
Curd- 1 tablespoon
Flour- 1 tablespoon
Directions:
Mix milk, curd and flour to get a paste.
Apply to your underarms
Leave for 15 minutes.
Wash off with water
7. Oily Way to Get White Underarms:-
You might avoid oils for various reasons but there are many oils that are beneficial for our body including skin even underarm. You just need to know which oil and how to use it for whitening your underarms.
Olive Oil
Olive oil with all its antioxidants and other components is great for your skin.
You will need:
Extra virgin olive oil- 3 tablespoons
Brown sugar- 1 cup
Directions:
Mix brown sugar and olive oil.
Wet the skin under your arms.
Apply the sugar-oil mix there.
Leave for about 5 minutes.
Wash off with water.
Use this remedy at least twice a week. You can even do this before you take a bath. This will keep you care free about the oil damaging your clothes.
Coconut Oil
Coconut oil is good for skin in general. It can also lighten the skin due to its vitamin E contents. You need not to know much about using this oil. Just rub a little coconut oil under your arms before taking shower and then wash off with a mild soap and lukewarm water. Some people think it to be a natural deodorant too. Howver, many people do not like its smell. If you are one of such people, there is pure vitamin E oil for you using which means you don’t have to use coconut oil.
Vitamin E Oil
There are good reasons for which doctors too depend upon vitamin E oil when it comes to skin treatmnets. This oil not only makes your underarms light but also make the skin there soft and smooth. Just rub a little oil daily for few minutes and wash off. You can even buy Vitamin E capsules, puncture one capsule at a time and apply the oil to your underarms. This will also ensure that you do not waste this expensive oil.
A Mixture of Multiple Oils
There are many skin friendly oils available and you can get benefits of each of these oils just by mixing them and applying them to your underarms.
You will need:
Olive oil- 3 drops
Jojoba oil- 3 drops
Wheat germ oil- 3 drops
Any citrus oil of your choice- 3 drops
A little water
Directions:
Mix all the oils and water
Mix well
Apply to your underarms
Wash off after few minutes.
You can even store this mixture by taking all the oils in greater quantity (which should be equal for all oils).
You may then everyday use this mixture with a little water.
The beneficial vitamins and fatty acids of the oils moisturize your skin to keep it smooth and healthy whereas the citrus oil bleaches your skin for making it white without being harsh on your skin.
8. Give Herbal Treat to Underarms:-
There are many herbs too that can come to your help in whitening your underarms. Use them for best experience regarding lightening your skin under your arms.
You will need:
Licorice root extract
Aspen extract
Raspberry extract
Directions:
Mix all the three herbal extracts.
Apply them on your underarms.
Leave for about half an hour.
Wash off with water.
All these herbs have medicinal properties and with their mixed action, they stimulate the production of pheomelanin compound in the skin which helps in lightening your skin. Also because they do not have any side effects, you can use this remedy daily for first couple of weeks and then once or twice a week to get rid of your black underarms.
If you want to save yourself from hassles involved in mixing and applying and then waiting etc. you may like to have herbal supplements in place of making these extracts mix. Cinnamon capsules or fenugreek are great remedies if you have them daily to cure your darkened underarms.
9. Don’t Do These Things:-
Prevention is always better than cure. If you are reading this article after seeing someone else’s dark underarms and want to know how to prevent this dreadful thing for your own arms, you better take some precautions by avoiding the causes of dark underarms. Here is a list of som ‘don’ts’ for those who do not want dark underarms and even for those who have successfully whitened their underarms and now don’t want it to recur.
Don’t shave your underarms. Shaving only removes hair from surface leaving an ugly stubble to give an appearnce of dark underarm. Also, your skin becomes rough with time when you shave again and again. Instead, wax your underarms. Take help of some professional and everytime you need to clean your underarm, get waxing done at a parlour. Waxing removes hair from its roots as well as remove the dead skin cells to give your underarm a soft and brightened feel. When you start waxing underarms, you will feel intense pain but only for a couple of sittings. After that your body, mind and skin becomes used to the procedure. If your skin is sensitive, ask your beautician to use some herbal wax or special wax formulation made for sensitive skins.
Don’t use hair removal creams. Almost all of them contain harsh chemicals that are so unfriendly to your skin. They lead to rashes, itching, irritation and sometimes serious skin disorders. Prolonged use of hair removing creams and lotions can cause permanent damage to your skin. Best option is to adopt waxing to remove your underarms hair.
Don’t do electrolysis. If you are not a woman with dark skin, you have the risk of hyperpigmentation due to electrolysis. Waxing again is the solution for you.
Don’t use deodorants and antiperspirants. At least limit their use if you can’t totally stop using them. Their harsh chemicals can give you dark and rough underarms. They can even cause pigmentation resulting in permanently darker underarms. Those which do not contain parabens, PEGs, synthetic ingredients and hormone-disrupting fragrance and antibacterials, petrochemicals, alcohol or aluminum compounds. Even better, start using natural deodorants and antiperspirants like baking soda, coconut oil, sandalwood essential oil, rosewater etc.
Don’t skip having shower. More so if it’s hot weather. In fact, in such a weather, you should bathe more often. Not taking bath can lead to build up of bacteriacausing smelly sweat and pigmentation. You may like to mix few drops of certain citrus oil to your bathing water so that you smell heavenly all through the day and the citrus oil may prevent darkening your skin under arms.
Don’t wear too tight clothes. If possible, avoid wearing synthetic clothes too. Tight and synthetic clothes lead to friction leading to rashes and then pigmentation. Synthetic clothes doesn’t let your skin breathe and trap the sweat inside to give birth to bacteria that may cause skin darkening. As far as possible, wear cotton or other skin friendly fabric. Keep your clothes lose enough to give your arms enough room to move without friction.
Don’t let your weight go out of control. Lose weight if you are obese. Not only tight clothes, even fat of your body that gets accumulated under the arms rub against the clothes and lead to dark underarms.
Don’t take birth control pills. There are other contraceptives that you can use instead of these oral ones. These pills sometimes lead to such hormonal imbalances that may lead to dark underarms.
Don’t compromise with basic hygiene. When you do not properly clean your underarms, it leads to accumulation of dead skin cells under the arms causing bumps and dark spots there. Regularly exfoliate your skin under the arms too. However, be gentle while exfoliating your underarms because it is a thin skin and harsh scrubs or rough handling while rubbing may cause scars and rashes.
Don’t let your diabetes go out of control. If you suffer from Type 2 diabetes, high levels of insulin can lead to overproduction such skin cells that may cause pigmentation.
10.Visit the Doctor if No Home Remedy Works, Know Why:-
You may be suffering from the medical condition called acanthosis nigricans. This may be the cause of your dark underarms and this can not be cured with home remedies. Acanthosis nigricans can cause dark spots and marks on your body, especially around the underarms, groin, inner thigh and neck. You are at risk of this condition if you are obese or some of your glands are not working properly or even if you have type 2 diabetes. As we have already listed this in ‘Don’t's’ section, you should keep a check on your sugar levels. High levels of insulin can lead to pigmentation. If obese, you have to lose weight and if there is disorder in glandular level, you must consut some endocrinologist. Sometimes, acanthosis nigricans is inherited or may develop due to certain medications as well as oral contraceptives. All of these conditions can only be handled by your doctor and not by any home remedies for dark underarms. So, if you have tried any or every home or herbal remedy without any positive results, do go to your doctor to get rid of your dark underarms.
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