You are flushing gold down that toilet, and I am not talking about dropped earrings and wedding rings. I’m talking about your pee: that stuff that we have grown up believing was an icky waste product from our bodies. It is being used, and has been used for centuries, by some as a cure all for a multitude of maladies. What is urine and isn’t it bad for you? Scientifically speaking, our urine is 95 percent water. Urea, an ingredient used in skin beauty products, makes up another 2.5 percent of our urine. The remaining 2.5 percent of our urine is made up of minerals, hormones, enzymes, and salts. Deadly, toxic waste is nowhere on the list of urine ingredients. In fact, your pee is a byproduct of your blood. Called urine therapy, people are using their own sterile urine to treat skin problems. From moisturizing their skin to treating bug bites, pee is used topically as a cure all and fix all. People are also drinking their own morning pee. They claim that when taken on an empty stomach, it acts as a laxative. Some have reported that it has cured them of hair loss, increased their immunity, and some folks gargle the stuff to get rid of sore throats. Whether the claims are real or are the result of the placebo effect, it is fascinating how people have used pee as a free health and beauty alternative.
Age Spots
There is nothing worse than looking in the mirror in the morning and discovering an age spot on your face. It’s enough to make you want to grab your purse and make an emergency run to the drug store to buy magic creams and serums that claim to lighten these horrible spots. But wait. According to some skin experts, all you need is a bit of your own urine to clear up the spot. The next time you to have to pee, put some of your urine on a cotton ball and dab it onto the age spot. Let it dry and apply your makeup as you normally do. It supposedly works better than aspirin at lightening up dark spots on your skin.
Athlete’s Foot
Urine as a remedy for athlete’s foot has been around for a long time among athletes, but it hit the mainstream on the David Letterman show. While interviewing Madonna, she told him that “Peeing in the shower is really good, it, it fights athlete’s foot. I’m serious, urine is like an antiseptic, it’s all got to do with the enzymes in your body.” Some claim that the only reason why this remedy isn’t more well known is because it is free to do and the pharmaceutical companies don’t make any money from home remedies, but that they do take urine, break down its components, and use it in various medical treatments.
Moisturizer
The urea in urine is used in some of the more expensive skin moisturizing products, so why not save yourself a few bucks and add your very own, homemade urea? Take a small amount of your moisturizing cream and add a few drops of fresh pee to it. Mix it together and apply it to your face. People who have done this claim that their skin is so much softer than it normally is after applying the moisturizer and some resourceful ladies have taken this a step further by making homemade moisturizer out of coconut oil and adding their urine to it.
Teeth Whitener
Urine as a teeth whitener has been around since the time of the ancient Romans. The process was recorded by Catullus, a Roman poet. He wrote about a man who brushed his white teeth and red gums each morning with his first pee. With people seeking natural alternatives to buying fluoride toothpaste, it is no wonder than this ancient urine use has resurfaced once again. Many processes are described online for using old urine to bleach teeth, ranging from fermenting urine to boiling old urine and bottling the stuff in jars for later use. Yum.
Chicken Skin and Razor Bumps
Do you have a bunch of bumps on your arms and legs? Are they worse after shaving? This condition, commonly called chicken skin or razor skin, can also be Keratosis pilaris. Both of these conditions can possibly be relieved with your own pee. What some women are doing is washing the affected areas off with urine or applying urine soaked cotton balls to the areas. The chicken skin is coated with the urine, left on until it is dry, and then rinsed off. The exfoliating properties of the urea in urine is said to help with this condition.
Acne
Got an outbreak that nothing seems to clear up? Look no further than your own pee. It is believed that washing your face each morning with your pee will clear up an acne outbreak. After the pee wash, rinse your skin off with cool water to remove any residue and to close the pores. Urine has antibacterial and anti-fungal properties that can help clear up skin problems. The only exception to this is if you have a urinary tract infection. In this case, you will need to seek medical attention to clear up the problem before you try out urine therapy.
Lighten Scars
Do you have any small scars you would like to reduce? Urine users say that pee has lightening agents in it that will help reduce the appearance of scars. To test this out, put some pee on a cotton tip swab and dab it onto the scar once a day. Allow the urine to dry on the skin and leave it on until it is time to bathe. Not only will this reduce the scar’s appearance, but it could also help soften your skin around the scar.
Mouthwash
Yeah, you read that right: mouthwash. As stomach turning as it sounds at first. a bit of research reveals that people all over the world have been using urine as a mouthwash for centuries. The ancient Romans used to buy bottled Portuguese urine to rinse their mouths. Urine and sometimes vinegar solutions remained main ingredients in mouthwashes until the 19th century when alcohol became the main ingredient of choice to kill mouth germs. While pee has stopped being used by the mainstream population, people who practice urine therapy are turning to urine as a free source for mouthwash and dental care.
Softens Hair
This one takes golden showers to a whole new level. Apparently people wash their hair with their own urine because the urine acts as a hair softener and removes buildup on the scalp and hair. Who does this? Eric Nies from the first season of The Real World and the dance show host of The Grind washes his hair in urine. He did this on camera for Confessions of a Teen Idol and turned off a lot of his former fans. He says it makes his hair shiny and who are we to tell him differently, especially since many cultures have been using urine as a hair wash for centuries.
Psoriasis
Psoriasis is not only a painful skin disease, it is also a problem that attacks a person’s self esteem. For these reasons alone, it is not surprising that so many people who suffer from psoriasis have turned to alternative methods for dealing with the dry, patchy areas on their skin. One method used and believed by some to help clear up psoriasis is to simply apply urine, using a cotton ball, to the dry, scaly patches. The urine is said to help relieve the symptoms of psoriasis by moisturizing the skin. Other sufferers have taken more drastic measures by drinking their morning urine. Since urine is sterile when it exits the body and contains trace minerals that have been filtered from the blood, drinking urine is not considered harmful and many believe it has curative powers.
Reduce Wrinkles
Urine is 95 percent water and in that 5 percent that is not water, there are traces of a component called urea. Dermatologists say that this urea is what is so great for your face. Believers in the benefits of urine say that you should wash your face in urine on a daily basis to help remove and reduce fine lines on your face. The best time to do this is in the morning with your first pee because it is the strongest pee of the day. Collect your urine and use it to wash your face. Rinse off in cool water and continue with your normal face routine.
Aftershave
The next time your man complains about being out of aftershave, tell him to use his own pee. After the weird looks of disbelief, explain to him that urine is used in beauty products to soften and moisturize the skin. It will also help reduce razor burn and he will have a manly, pheromone filled musk scent afterwards that just can’t be beat. And while you are at it, remind him that musk scents found in perfume and cologne comes from the anal gland of the civet cat, scent glands from deer, and the urine and scent sacs from beavers. A bit of his own urine won’t make much of a difference compared to the other stuff he’s probably been wearing.
Sunburn
You did it again. You fell asleep in the sun and now you are too sore to even move let alone get in your car to buy some soothing aloe vera juice. Why not turn to the one thing that people are claiming is great for sunburn: your own pee? Urine has been used for centuries to treat skin problems, including sunburn. The trick is to catch your pee midstream for the best stuff. It is suggested that you let out a bit of your pee into the toilet and then catch the pee that comes after it into a cup. Let the last remaining pee in your body go into the toilet and flush. The pee in the cup can be applied to your sunburn with cotton balls or you can stand in the shower and pour it onto your red skin. Allow the pee to dry on your skin before taking a cold shower.
Hair Growth
People suffering from thinning hair or baldness are trying out the urine therapy hair treatment, often as a last desperate act before giving up on ever having a full head of hair again. What they do is pee in a cup that they keep in the shower and then massage the urine into their hair and scalp. This is said to help remove product buildup on the scalp and hair, soften the skin, and stimulate new hair growth.
Bathing
Apparently, peeing in the bathtub can be a good thing. Wealthy women from France and England would bathe in urine and, for a quick fix, they would pee on their hands and dab themselves with it to give their skin a healthy, fresh glow. In the U.S., the Inuit would urinate on hot rocks to create a steam bath inside tents. Even the pilgrims that came to this country used their urine to make soap for bathing. People have probably been bathing in pee since the dawn of time, and now it is a “new” trend for daredevils to try out and the onlookers to wrinkle their noses at. But, if the claims are true, a bit of pee in your bath can help soften your skin, make your skin look younger, and help reduce wrinkles. With all the benefits, you just might want to put the “P” back in your “ool”.
