Why am I so itchy after a shower?

Do you use extremely hot water?

no, cool to cold.

Have you recently changed soap or moisturizer? If you have recently changed you may have a small allergic reaction to it.

Do you know if you have hard water? That could be part of it. You could try a different soap to see if it is your soap that is causing the problem.

when i am really cold then i get in a hot shower i sometimes get super itchy afterwords. also sometimes when i go from being outside in the cold to inside in a warm place i get hives so maybe the temperature change has something to do with it.

Yes, that could be. I do get allergic to shampoos and soaps fairly regularly, and yes, this is a new brand.

My bet is your body isn’t used to this new soap and it is reacting. You can either keep using it and wait for it to get used to it or switch back to the old. I say go with the old.

The water can possibly be high in clorine.
Try changing your soap to dove. (the one for sensitive skin) Its a moisturizing soap that doesn’t have any soap.
As for shampoo. I recently changed to DHS Shampoo. It helped get rid of my itchiness.
I also got a filter for my shower head to help bring down the clorine.
Most shampoos and soaps have perfumes in them. The perfumes is what you may be reacting to.
Hope this helps.

Moisturize while your skin is still wet, then pat yourself dry afterwards. Showering washes away all the oils from your skin leaving it dry and thus itchy.

Used to have the same problem myself, and moisturizer didn’t help one bit. As others have said, it’s either the water or your soap. Change your soap (I use oliver oil-based) and get an inexpensive filter. The combo is bound to help. Good luck—I know how aggravating that itching is !!!

Sodium Laurel Sulfate is a degreaser, and is in some skin washing products, and it is in some shampoos. S.L.S. has transdermal qualities; it can go just under the top layer of your skin on your body or your scalp to strip out all of your oils.

Too much dissolved calcium in your water (hardness) can leave a film on your skin that makes you itch. A general allergy to your washing product can produce such results, and too much Chlorine in your water can make you itchy by drying out your skin. Remember that chlorine is ’bleach’. It is added to water to kill bacteria but bleach is also very drying on the skin and scalp.

I suggest baby liquid soap.

I’ve always had this problem, and it is definitely more intense with hard water, hot water, or any soap other than Dove.

This is almost always a combo of mentioned possibilities. The most common of these I’ve noticed is hard water, hot water, excessive/bad hygiene products, prolonged showers. Usually your dry skin symptoms can be resolved through use of a water softener which requires maintenance once every couple months (adding salt, changing filters). try dove soap or oil-based soap, alternate lotions. May just be moderate eczema.

I use “Dove, gentle exfoliating, nourishing body wash, with nutrium moisture”, it’s the new one, but I’d been using the old one, Dove body wash, that exfoliates and moisturizes. I find, if I don’t exfoliate, the skin will feel dry and itchy. Try getting rid of dead, dry, skin cells, I find it helps, makes your skin soft and smooth. I would do commercials for it! I don’t have to put lotion or moisturizers on. I use another type of soap and do moisturize my face.

Oh, another tip: Gently pat your body dry rather than vigorous rubbing.

It seem it was an allergy. Anyway, make sure the soap is right for allergy problems because sometimes soap also get more worst the skin allergies.

The worst thing that could explain this is polycythemia vera

Maybe you are allergic to the soap you use

Thank you for the great answers – I can’t control the water hardness or softness where I live, but I can switch to a hypo allergenic soap like a Neutrogena or the Dove. I think it was an allergic reaction, too, because the soap I used before was very mild. Even though it’s a few days later I still hives! I think I will also cut out the loofah type things…

Would you by any chance be taking extra vitamin A supplements?

There are two possible explanations:

1) Using cold water—Cold water seals the pores, so moisture can’t get in. Warm water can actually help moisturizing soaps absorb into your skin. But do not get the water too hot, or else it will dry your skin.

2) Chemicals in the water—Your skin may be reacting to chemicals that the water treatment plant puts into the water. For a while, when I was living in a city with highly chlorinated water (it smelled like a swimming pool), my skin was very dry and prone to eczema.

no vitamin A sups, but yes to evil city water! I could warm up the shower a bit….good idea.

Tea tree soap works best for me. I use it for my dreadlocks so I wont get dandruff and itchy scalp. Its anti-fungal and anti-bacterial and completely organic (if you look for the right one). It doesn’t come with harsh chemicals and stuff that can possibly irritate your skin, and also taking cold showers helps reduce skin irritations.