An observation after spending the holidays away.
Just before Christmas we spend ten days with my mother in law, one of her cats like to eat soap so I was using a store bought body wash (soft soap) with my usual arrangement of deodorant. I thought it was travel stress, but I found myself stinking more by the end of the day than usual. After we got home the stink got worse, at the end of the work day I was stinking through a heavy sweatshirt. Then I noticed I had red marks under my arms that would sting when I applied my eo blend. I switched to using the gentlest soap I have (100% lard) and plain MOM for a few days, my skin feels back to normal and I'm normal levels of stinky.
I'm figuring to was probably a combination of travel stress and then jumping into house sitting and a 8 day work week or a previously unknown sensitivity to soft soap (though it was the brand I used to use before learning cp). I was just wondering if anyone else had an instance of needing to return to a commercial product and noticing extra stink or if it was a case of stress and sensitivity. (Just trying to narrow it down. I have a feeling I'll be experimenting with liquid soap making soon to prevent this)
I did have a similar experience although not with a liquid commercial soap. It was with a hard bar commercial soap, however. I was also traveling so considered it could be related to travel stress. But I travel all the time, so don't know if I can actually attribute anything to travel stress any more than normal stress. IMO in my case, I really think it had more to do with the commercial soap and it's affect on the integumentary system (skin as an organ, which it is, btw). But then I thought about another factor...
What about diet? Sometimes dietary changes alter the fine balance of body odor as well. During travel, dietary changes are common, at least for me. When I am at home I don't eat in fast food restaurants. When I travel, I do. Otherwise I'd have to cook at rest areas, and that's not at all convenient and often frowned upon. I used to prepare all my on-the-road meals and snacks ahead of time, but I just don't bother with that anymore as it is so time and space consuming. So I eat veggie burgers at Burger King or potato tacos at Taco Bell. Sometimes even french fries, or potato chips, which are never allowed in the house most of the time. Once I get where I'm going, my diet is still altered because, either I am not the one cooking, or I don't have all the same ingredients I would normally have at home so cook and eat differently than when I am at home. So travel diet will affect what my glands are sweating out.
So yes, I suppose it probably is travel-related when this happens. But is it the diet and not the soap? I think it's probably a bit of both. The purpose of skin is to safeguard the rest of the body by performing as an intact encasement as well as to regulate heat. When it is compromised by being too dry (as what happens to my skin over time when I use commercial soap) or cut or whatnot, it can't do as good a job as intended, so in that regard I believe the soap plays a part in the process. Mainly because dry skin wants moisture and sweat is moist, so the dry armpits and other body parts may try to re-absorb some of the smelly sweat. That's what I think happens. Diet, of course, also plays a part because the food has to be processed and in that process we produce certain odors which we expel through our skin (example: when we eat garlic or onions or asparagus, etc.)
But in your case, the redness and stinging would indicate a new sensitivity to something like the liquid soap or some additive in the liquid soap. Maybe the formulation has changed since you last used it or maybe it is a newly developed sensitivity to an ingredient in it all along. I would look at the ingredient list and use that for comparison purposes if you do start making your own liquid soap.
Just some rambling thoughts on my part. I could be totally off on all of this.
