The Best Hand Soap Is NO Hand Soap

When I first started researching moisturizers a few years ago, the first thing I did was to put bottles of lotion beside every sink in the house. Every time I washed my hands, I followed up with some lotion. And HOLY COW, that made a huge impact on my fingees. It basically transformed my gnarled old claws back into dainty digits.

See? Not a claw.

After that, I wondered whether I could skip the lotion and just find a hand soap that was moisturizing on its own. So I tested all the hand soaps. And, spoiler alert,  they all SUUUUUCKED. Cheap hand soaps sucked. Expensive hand soaps sucked. Hand soaps labeled "moisturizing" were invariably the OPPOSITE of moisturizing. Eventually, I decided to give up on hand soap altogether, and I suggest you do the same.

Instead, I wondered whether body wash might give better results. So I bought every kind of drugstore body wash I could get my hands on. And let me tell you, the results were nearly as tragic with the body wash as they were with the hand soap. In most cases, so-called "moisturizing" body wash was anything but. The vast majority of the body washes I tried were drying and overly fragranced. But one product worked like a charm.

Aveeno Skin Relief Fragrance-Free Body Wash. Whenever anyone asks me how to pick a good moisturizer that won't break the bank, I always recommend they look for a product that contains colloidal oatmeal. Turns out, the same goes for body wash. Aveeno's formulation is not only a fantastic body wash and hand soap, but if you stick with the fragrance-free version, it's also phenomenal as a hydrating face wash. 

I know oatmeal seems mundane as a skin care ingredient, but it actually punches WAY above its weight. Here are some of oatmeal's impressive benefits.

Hydrating

This is what we're here for, right? We're looking for a hand soap that won't dry out our phabulous phalanges. Oatmeal won't do that. Ingredients that hold onto water are called humectants, and oatmeal is a fantastic humectant.  

Antioxidant

Oatmeal is PACKED with antioxidants, including vitamin E and ferulic acid - both of which have powerful anti-aging properties.  

Cleansing

Oatmeal contains chemicals called saponins which act as gentle cleansers. When you add oatmeal to a cleansing product, you don't need to add so many additional surfactants and detergents. 

Anti-Inflammatory/Anti-Itch

Oatmeal is used to soothe insect bites and rashes thanks to its anti-inflammatory and anti-itch properties.

Oatmeal provides still more benefits, but this list is long enough me'thinks. Google for more info, but here's the tl;dr 

Oatmeal good. Real, real good.

WTF is Colloidal Oatmeal, anyway?

Colloidal oatmeal is just plain-old oatmeal that has been ground very, very finely. Due to its powdery texture, colloidal oatmeal dissolves easily in water which makes it a popular ingredient in cleansers and lotions.

Target's Up&Up Skin Soothing Body Wash is a best value 

Do It

Do your hands a favor and stop buying hand soap. Make the switch to Aveeno body wash or one of her many knockoffs. Target has cheap-ass versions of both the regular and fragrance-free products.  Walmart has this, but it's only available in-store. Even Bed, Bath, and Beyond has a store-brand oatmeal body wash. So do it. Just do it already. Your hands will thank you, and then you will thank me.