I love to swim laps in summer for exercise. Swimming is great, it increases your cardio fitness really quickly and gently tones every muscle in your body. I swim with flippers which is cheating a bit I know, but I love to go fast and flippers are a great way to easily be a super speedy swimmer.
The problem is, public pools are totally crap for your skin and hair AND a big problem if you’ve got acne.
Chlorine is a heavy chemical that is needed in public pools for hygiene. Trust me, no matter how bad it is for your body you’d much rather have it there just so you don’t get sick from other swimmers nasties …and little kids accidents.
Fran, the super spotty chlorine monster
When I get out of the pool, I feel myself drying up straight away. I have dry skin to start with so it’s noticeable how much worse it gets. If I don’t rinse the chlorine off straight away, my body starts to almost preserve like cured meat! My face especially gets really tight and sore and strangely, my skin tone goes weird. The chlorine brings out every freckle, mark and pimple on my face. I’m quite spotty really. I have a lot of freckles on my face and a few pimples, so I turn into a super spotty monster.
It gets worse. My hair also gets really brittle when it dries and kind of blonde at the roots. Not a good look for a red head. Admittedly, if I wore a swimming cap I could probably fix this problem but I still haven’t gotten over the dag factor on that one yet. Swimming caps are so uncool! Anyway, my hair dresser said I’d protect my hair a lot better if I put a heavy moisturiser on the tips of my hair before I went swimming. I’ve tried it and yeah, it does keep the tips nice and moisturised, but what about the rest of my hair!!
And then …even worse! is the fact that after you’ve had a shower the chlorine smell doesn’t go off your skin. So you’ve got all of this chlorine clinging onto you, seeping in your body and adding toxins to your liver. It’s really nasty. Chlorine does not smell like french perfume, it stinks and I don’t particular want to smell like it.
So why is it bad for acne?
Swimming in a heavily chlorinated pool is really not good for you when you’ve got benzyl peroxide on your face or if you’re planning to put it on your face. Last time I went swimming, I put the benzyl peroxide on that evening and it really stung my whole face. It must have reacted badly with the chlorine. Either that or my already dry face from all the chlorine couldn’t handle getting even dryer from all the benzyl peroxide. Chemical + chemical = disaster, always.Why can’t they made bacteria free natural organic swimming pools? A pool where we can all swim and be happy and clean and chemical free. A place where we can do laps without worrying about drying out or toxins getting into our liver.
I guess I can only dream for someone to invent something like that.
What you can do until they invent something else
In the meantime, be careful if you’re a keen swimmer. Make sure you rinse the chlorine off your body as soon as you get out of the pool and carry a moisturiser around with you so you can apply it as soon as possible. Oh, and get over thinking you’ll look uncool and wear a swimming cap.
Fran
Fran Kerr is the founding editor of High on Health. To cure your acne, sign up to Fran's FREE acne cure mini-course or download her latest how to guide, Eat Away Your Acne.
5 responses ↓
Hi Fran,
Thanks for your great post on Chlorine in pools. I often worry about the chemicals in pools. Once after swimming I suffered extreme tiredness and aching joints & musles for 24hrs. A workmate told me that this was probably due to the pool chemicals not being balanced properly and that her husband had actually been bedridden for 8mths from swimming in their home pool. Have you heard about these affects at all? Being a new pool owner I get to read chemical packaging & freak out a bit when I read “fatal to children”, “wear protective clothing and mask”, “do not smoke, eat or drink while handling product”, “do not inhale”….. It worries me a bit and those pool test kits don’t seem that accurate.
Omigod that’s crazy! I might start swimming in the ocean oly from now on.
If you’re worried about daggy swimming caps, why don’t you go all out and get a retro one? I love the waffle weave or flower petal ones. Not sure if you can buy them in Oz but there’s some great ones at http://www.headcovers.com/item.php?cat=Swim+Caps&next=0
Hey Fran, thanks for the information, I didn’t know that chlorine could be dangerous for skin and hair! I’ll keep this in mind the next time I feel like swimming
I know this is an older entry, but there are actually salt water filters and solar filtering for pools, I think also. So, there is no need for the chlorine. =)
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