One doctor has finally settled the internet debate of whether or not you should be washing your legs in the shower, and the answer might be shocking to you.
Every now and then the internet is taken over by a raging debate about something rather mundane, whether that be deciding if that dress is blue or gold or if we're pronouncing "GIF" correctly.
One of the most recent of these debates, is whether or not you should wash your legs in the shower, or if just letting the soapy water run down them is enough.
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The question seems to date back to 2019 when a poll was put out on X (formerly Twitter) asking: "Do you wash your legs in the shower?". This led to countless other polls on Reddit, Instagram and more on X asking the public the same question.
And safe to say people were divided, though most polls seemed to have the leg washers coming out on top, with most of them being utterly disgusted with their non-leg-washing counterparts.
Thus, the debate continued to rage on.
But now, we finally have a doctor to officially weigh in on the touchy subject. And their answer may surprise you.
On an episode of HuffPost's 'Am I Doing It Wrong?' podcast, the hosts asked Dr. Divya Shokeen founder of a dermatology institute, the question on everyone's lips: Should I be washing my legs in the shower?
Shokeen responded: "I don't think you do [need to wash them", "unless you're like, aggressively sweating and you just biked 20 miles, then yes, please wash your legs."
Shokeen's response comes down to the fact that our legs are usually covered by clothing which protects them from all the nasties in the outside world. They aren't so called 'hotspots' of bacteria like your armpits for example, which do need regular dedicated washing.
Shokeen continued to say: "I think water dripping down or soap dripping down is okay [for cleaning your legs]".
It's those hotspots that you should be more concerned with washing properly. Shokeen says it's important to spend one to two minutes cleansing these areas to ensure that the product you're using there has time to work. Of course, you need to be careful for those more sensitive areas, using gentle products (or none at all).
It's the same with shampooing you're hair too, Shokeen says most people tend to whack on their product, suds it up for 30 seconds and then wash it out. However she suggests putting on some music, and working the shampoo into your hair for three to five minutes (roughly the length of a song) to allow the shampoo to do its job and cleanse your scalp properly.