soap, toothbrush and cotton buds for personal hygiene

5 Tips to Improve Your Personal Hygiene

2022-12-14T08:00:12+00:00

By Rody

Have you ever been in a situation where you were speaking with someone, and they discreetly covered their nose? Or you boarded a bus, and the stench from the next person almost affected your breathing?These two situations are mostly due to poor personal hygiene. It causes people to give weird looks, not take you seriously and even avoid talking to you.Not taking note of your hygiene can lead to health imbalance, self-esteem issues, and poor overall well-being.

What is personal hygiene?

Personal hygiene entails the steps involved in taking care of yourself regularly. Following these steps can help prevent you from multiple illnesses, make you feel good, and improve your well-being.Good personal hygiene would involve actions that require taking care of your physical body and health.

Types of personal hygiene

There are different forms of personal hygiene. While this list is not exhaustive, these are the most common forms:

Body Hygiene

Taking care of the body helps to prevent body odour which is a total turnoff for people around you and a hindrance to your well-being. In order to maintain proper body hygiene you can start by:

Bathing properly at least twice daily, using the right type of soap/cleanser for your body. This includes careful washing of all intimate areas and areas susceptible to sweat like the armpit and the private parts.
Exfoliating your body at least once a week to get rid of dead skin cells.
Using deodorants
Using the right sponge
Ensuring that you wear clean clothes and use a mild body spray.

Oral Hygiene

This is a common part of hygiene that affects a lot of people. The teeth need as much care as our skin. Not taking care of your dental area can pose a lot of health risks to you, from toothache to numerous dental-related ailments.Taking care of your oral hygiene would involve:

Brushing your teeth twice daily to avoid buildup of plaque that could potentially damage your teeth.
Regular flossing.
Going to the dentist when you have a painful tooth.
Avoiding sugary food.
Using mouthwash for fresh breath.
Rinsing your mouth after meals to get rid of all the leftover residues in your mouth.

Hand washing

The mere usage of soap and water to wash the hands can protect a person from a lot of things. It can protect from diseases, ensure bacteria are not spread from one person to another, help prevent infections, amongst many others.Washing the hands is very important because the nails can harbour lots of dirt capable of harming their host. While this can hurt a person, there is a possibility of spreading this bacteria to others too, which enables the spread of diseases.So, it is important to always wash your hands after activities that involve your hands.

Toilet Hygiene

This is a very important one as it forms a base to contact most diseases. As clean as your toilet might be, there are bacteria everywhere (not to mention having a dirty toilet).Having good toilet hygiene includes:

Washing your hands after every use.
Deep cleaning the toilet at least once a week.
Avoid touching the knobs in public toilets.
Cleaning yourself properly with water and soap where necessary after relieving yourself (using tissue will still leave residues)

Having this proper hygiene would help you not to transfer bacteria from the toilet to your food, your clothing, and other people.

Hair hygiene

If you do not take proper care of it, your hair can turn into a home for lice and dirt, and cause itch and uneasiness. Proper hair hygiene would involve washing your hair regularly, using gentle products on your hair, and not leaving braids on for a long time before they start to smell.

Importance of maintaining good personal hygiene

Good hygiene can improve your self-esteem.
It can make you feel comfortable with others.
It boosts your confidence.
It keeps you in a healthy state.

5 Tips to improve your hygiene

Knowing what good personal hygiene is and how important it is, you can see that maintaining it is a must for everyone.So how can it be improved?The following are some of the most important things to take note of to ensure the improvement of your hygiene:

1. Keep yourself, and your environment clean:

Most times, people are a reflection of their environment. Ensuring that the environment where you live is clean is a huge plus to your well-being because the air would be fresh, and the house will be clean leaving no room for dirt that may affect your health or looks.To do this effectively, always ensure that you constantly keep the home clean, wash your hands to prevent diseases, your body to prevent body odor, and your clothes to remain fresh.Also, wash your nose, and ears, the usually neglected areas, and make sure to eat clean. Being a clean person helps to protect you from diseases, and make you more presentable.

2. Wear clean clothes

Ever heard of the phrase ‘The way you dress is the way you are addressed’?This phrase is not limited to what you wear alone but also how neatly you present yourself. Make sure to always dress neatly as this is the first thing people notice about you when they see you. It helps with creating a good social standing for you when people are able to attribute cleanliness to you.

3. Nurture good oral hygiene exercise

It is no news that becoming someone that people have to avoid speaking to because of mouth odour is not a good representation of oneself.Improving dental care would help to enable a better representation, and enhance one’s social standing.

4. Invest in a good deodorant

Smelling good is very important! Regardless of how much you bathe daily, you’re bound to get sweaty during your day-to-day activities.Therefore, using a good deodorant would help keep you fresh and not make you affect other people with sweat smell or odour. Body odour is not a good thing, and preventing it entails doing this with other personal hygiene practices.

5. Maintain good food hygiene

‘You are what you eat.’This statement shows that the things we consume have an effect on us. When you constantly consume sugary food, you have a high risk of having tooth decay, or a hole in the tooth, which can cause bad breath.Also, when you eat food that is not healthy, it affects your gut, body, and overall health. Investing in eating food that helps to improve your quality of living is crucial.Furthermore, all consumables should be thoroughly cleaned, prepared, and consumed in a clean manner, to avoid infections, and food poisoning, amongst others. There are other ways aside from the above mentioned that can improve personal hygiene like constantly trimming your nails, drinking water, and dental appointments, amongst many others. Imbibing these habits help to keep your mental and physical state in check as the body and mind are happy.

Conclusion

Poor hygiene can be detrimental to your health and also affect your social standing.You must try to incorporate good hygiene habits such as using deodorant, bathing twice daily, and washing your hands regularly. This should be a daily routine, in order to keep you clean and free from radicals. Rodiat Ajuwon