Hello my beautiful friends!
I hope you’re all having a lovely start to the week. Today I wanted to share with you something that I have been trialling for a few weeks now. As you can tell, it’s the Kosas Chemistry AHA Serum Deodorant (such a mouthful). You may remember this little number from my wish list, well it’s finally mine! My lovely friend saw it on my wish list and decided to gift it to me for my birthday.
If you follow me on IG, you know I’ve been using AHAs (alpha hydroxy acids) as deodorant for a while now. I’ve previously used glycolic acids and they worked pretty well. My main reason was to see if there was a difference in my skin tone after using them. My second reason was using it to kill bacteria and thus reduce (or eliminate) any odour in that area. We’re all human, we sweat, we have pigmented skin in certain areas, it’s all normal and nothing to be ashamed of.
So my friend got me the unscented version, and as with all unscented products, it means there’s no added scent. This one was a unique scent, it’s just the combination of the ingredients but it doesn’t smell awful. Not great, tolerable, but not awful. They do make a scented version but obviously I haven’t tried that yet.
If you’re familiar with the Kosas Deodorant, it’s made of a combination of AHAs – including mandelic acid, shikimic acid and lactic acid. How I remember the difference between AHA and BHA is AHA is ABOVE the skin, so A for above. It helps exfoliate the skins surface, whereas BHA (beta hydroxy acids) is BELOW the skin, and penetrates deeper and that’s why you’ll see products related to pores, having BHA ingredients. I’m no expert or scientist, but that’s the easiest way for me to remember them.
We’re getting sidetracked here, so the shikimic acid helps to fight odour, whereas the mandelic acid helps fade discolouration. They recommend using it everyday for a week to see results so that’s what I started off with. As with any AHA usage, ensure your skin is protected with sunscreen, protective clothing and try to minimise sun exposure if possible. Since I started using this in lockdown, I haven’t gone out when I was using this so I was fine. However, since lockdown has been lifted, I have been more careful of when I’m using this so I can still protect my skin when I’m out the next day and if my underarms will be exposed.
So it’s been over 3 weeks of using this and I can confirm there is a slight difference in the skin tone of my under arms. They are not as dark, but definitely not “airbrushed” looking. I am assuming with continued use, it will only get better (hopefully). Maybe I will do an update at the 6 month mark or so – keep an eye out on my IG as well, I might post it over there.
As for the smell, I feel like I still smell a bit. It’s not as strong, but I’ve had better results (when it comes to fighting odour) when I used other acids. I definitely can tell, there is still some scent. Once again, I am hoping this will eliminate 99% of odour with continued use, so keep an eye out for the six month review. Who knows, with continuous use, maybe I’ll finish it even sooner than intended!
And that’s it – so far, I think it’s doing a pretty decent job with lightening my underarm area, but the odour fighting could be improved. I will definitely do an update in a few months time!
That’s it for today, I hope everyone has a lovely week!
With love,
VQP. usu BEAUTY