Water Damage: Skin vs. Hard Water

Did you know that Hard Water can Wreck Your Skin?

Everybody knows that many factors affect your skin as it ages. Exposure to sun makes skin lose its elasticity more rapidly, for example. Things that dry out the skin are particularly unkind, and one of those things may surprise you- it’s the water that comes out of your shower head.

Water- or specifically, hard water- can speed up the aging process by drying out your skin every time you shower or bathe. Hard water is simply water that has a high content of minerals or heavy metals in it. Of course, in small doses minerals are good for us, and we get some of our minimum daily requirement of minerals from drinking water. Calcium and magnesium, for example, which often leach into water supplies from surrounding rock, are necessary for our health. Calcium and potassium in our bath water, though, can cause trouble. Iron, lead, zinc and copper can be in our water in unhealthy concentrations as well, causing serious health troubles other than dry skin. Luckily, there are ways to “soften” the water in your home to avoid some of the unhealthy effects of hard water.

Hard Water in the Home
There are other symptoms of hard water that you may recognize. Hard water creates mineral deposits which can clog up dishwashers and other appliances. Soap dissolves less easily in hard water. You get less lather, which makes washing dishes harder and less efficient. Soap and dirt residue are commonly left behind.
Eighty percent of American homes are supplied with hard water. Chances are, you already know whether or not you have it! If you want an inexpensive test, leave a humidifier running over night. If there’s a chalky film on objects surrounding the humidifier, you have hard water.

How Hard Water Wrecks the Skin

Every time you wash your skin in hard water, you are drying your skin out. First of all, you have to use a lot of soap to work up a lather that will remove dirt. And when you rinse the soap, it doesn't all dissolve in hard water. So you have soap and grime residue left on your skin, along with your own dried flakes of skin. This residue can irritate dry skin even further. This is why creams and lotions often fail to relieve dry skin. The lotions are just laying down a protective layer over the residue that exists on your skin.
Hard water introduces heavy metals onto your skin, which can combine with your natural body oils and make them waxy instead of fluid. The solidified oils clog your pores and fail to lubricate your skin.

What Can You Do About It?
Rather than compensating with lotions and visits to a dermatologist, it's best to avoid contact with hard water in the first place. If you have hard water at home, don't wash your face in the shower. Use cleansers you can tissue off instead of rinsing. Buy distilled water to rinse your face if you must continue living with hard water.
Another solution is to add borax to your laundry detergent. In hard water, your clothes aren't getting rinsed adequately, either. The residue left behind will irritate your skin. Borax, or washing soda, will soften the water.
You can filter the water you use for washing. Add water filters to your shower head and to your bath tap to get water that is softer and rinses more completely. The most efficient and cost-effective method for avoiding hard water is to use a water softener and filter. These are not hard to come by, as they are sold and installed by most plumbing companies.
Hard water is hard on the skin- and there’s no reason to have to put up with it. Keep your skin soft with soft water, and you'll look younger longer.

Gracie Gardner is an interior designer and writer originally from Colorado. She has had articles about home repair, healthy eating, skincare, and much more published all over the internet.