r/laundry

How do I get body oils out of merino shirts?

It's huge patches so spot treating with a dab of dawn isn't gong to work. They are my husband's favorite shirts and I cannot figure out how to get them clean without ruining them. We were using woolite delicate laundry soap. Is there anything better?

i’ve washed the same load of towels twice now and they still have this damp smell as soon as they come out of the washer. i’m not leaving them sitting overnight or anything. using regular detergent and warm water. washer itself doesn’t smell bad either. what usually causes this?

I was in Lisbon last summer and noticed a very distinct soapy, super clean smell while walking around the city. It also reminded me of my hotel bedsheets, which had the exact same scent.

I asked reception what detergent they use, but they didn’t know.

Does anyone know what causes that smell or what detergent/softener that could have been? I’d love to recreate it at home.

I live in Switzerland where the water in my apartment is very very ‘hard’. As a result, my cotton clothes always come out almost immediately ‘crunchy’ and completely lose their softness immediately and pretty noticeably. This includes T-Shirts, Jeans, Sweatshirts etc.

I’ve been using less detergent, and tried using vinegar in the softener section, but not really any luck. I also bought Calgon 4in1 which I threw as a tab in the drum, but because the final rinse cycle doesn’t use it, it re-applies that hard water and the clothes are still uncomfortable.

Aside from literally speaking to my landlord about adding a softener to the piping, anyone have any brilliant ideas?

Hello!

A friend recently told me that they could smell a faint smell of cigarettes on my clothing. My family *does* smoke inside our house, but I didn’t know the smell would stick so easily onto my clothing, even after washing.

Are there any products or tricks I could use to mask the smell? I cannot ask them to stop, but I also don’t want to smell like cigarettes.

New detergent spotted recently at Corona, CA Costco:
Ensueno Liquid Detergent – (2) 100 oz. bottles - $17.99

Looks like it contains a decent selection of enzymes. Did not get to check out the fragrance as it's in a box.

Ingredients: Water, C10-16 Aketh Alkylbenzene Sulfonic Acid, Sodium Citrate, Sodium Laureth Sufate, Propylene Glycol, Sodium Hydroxide, Fragrance, Sodium Chloride, Caprylyl Pyrrlidone, Encapsulated Fragrance, Protease Enzyme, Cellulase Enzyme, Lipase Enzyme, Amylase Enzyme, Pectate Lyase Enzyme, Mannanase Enzyme. Colorants, Calcum Chloride, Disodium Distyrylbiphenyl, Disulfonate, Dimethicone, Silicone Emulsion, Benzisothiazolinone.

I guess I need to ask this to either get affirmation/not feel alone/ or be gently told I've been doing it wrong. I'm on the cleaning sub and it was pointed out that dirty water from cleaning/grey water should only go down the toilet. Not even the tub!

I'm not disagreeing. It makes sense. I just feel like, "have I been so ignorant?"

What are people's thoughts?

I don't know what kind of help am I expecting, but let me explain:

- I wash my own laundry, which is completely normal (I'm 15)

- The clothes washed by my father of course smell often after being in the washer for too long

- I try my best to put them dry when I find them, but I have a lot of school work before summer holiday and can't do it always

- I have tried to tell him that the laundry smells, but he's gotten annoyed because of it, he tells me that it's difficult to not have laundry in the washer for a long time because he has lots of things to do, which is partly understand + sometimes says I have cancer in my brain and smell things that don't exist

- I have a little sister who has to wear clothes washed by him and I'm worried she'll be bullied for them. It's crazy how easily you'll be bullied for something small, but smelling clothes increases the risk a lot more since they're easy to notice...

- I've thought about washing my little sister's clothes, but my father would be hurt by that so I'm bit scared to do that (and as I said, I have lot of school work)

- My father actually cares about us, but doesn't seem to understand/care/believe about the damage smelling clothes have on your social life. Or maybe he has gotten used to the smell and doesn't recognize it. This all causes me a great amount of stress.

Hello everyone, I am new to reddit and to this sub, so please bear with me.

I have been having issues with a weird smell coming from my shirts for YEARS now. It started in 2020 during COVID lockdown where my t-shirts started getting this weird smell. Over the years, I have tried hard to describe the smell; it is elusive. It smells musty, and mildewy, but mostly burnt (?). I, naturally, have tried many remedies. I have used different detergents, have moved 3 times (not for laundry reasons), have soaked the clothes in vinegar, have cleaned out my washing machine, have rewashed, have air dried, etc. Nothing has worked. The only time the smell didn't occur in newly bought clothes was when I was living in a building for one-year that had coin laundry and the industrial machine/landlord provided detergent kept the smell at bay. This smell only takes hold in my shirts, especially t-shirts. If the smell sometimes starts in a long sleeve shirt, or in a pant, usually rewashing and air drying will get rid of the issue. But not in t-shirts. No matter how many times I wash or whatever method I use, right out of the machine it keeps that smell or will develop the smell while drying. I am at my wits end. I have lost all my t-shirts to this plague. I have a whole laundry basket filled with just these unusable shirts that I hope to one day recover. I have read lots of posts and watched tiktok videos and god knows what else to fix this problem, to no avail. Back when this problem first started in lockdown, and now, I am living with my family. We all use the same washer/dryer, the same detergents, but I am the only person who experiences this issue. Additionally, when this problem first started, I had some breathing issues that would require me to use a humidifier in my room at night, which I have not used in years; I thought that might be causing the problem but apparently not. I thought it was a hygiene issue but I genuinely shower every day, change my bedsheets biweekly, regularly sanitize, air out my closet, and have used baking soda for deodorizing and dehumidifying.

Currently, I am using the Purex ultra concentrated cold water detergent, Downy Unstoppable Scent Booster, Tide Pods, and Kirkland ultra soft dryer sheets. But as I mentioned above, I have used many different detergent combinations. I always wash with cold water.

This is the last straw. I am willing to do what needs to be done to finally bring this agony to an end. So many vintage and sentimental shirts have been lost to this. I beg for help.

hey all, my cat has been urinating on any laundry left on the floor since her vet said she needs to go on a diet, so she is retaliating against us. (she’s already been seen by the vet for this, the vet just said she is retaliating, no UTI or anything like that.)

my husband leaves clothes/towels down on the floor sometimes after showering before work and if our cat sees it then she will do her thing on them. i’ve tried vinegar and cold water soak and also tried natures miracle to soak and then rinse, then oxi-clean to wash then dry on low temp since we can’t hang laundry to dry. i’ve washed all of our clothes a million times it feels like and i don’t know what to do anymore.

please what can i use to get rid of the smell? the laundry smells fine when it is dry but my husband says when he is at work the smell starts to come back on some of them since he moves around a lot in the heat.

also i believe some of the clothes were washed and dried without him treating the clothes properly so i think those may be the ones that are still stinking but i cant identify which ones just by the smell since they don’t stink unless he is moving around in them.

thank you all in advance!