People suffering from eczema often have difficulty finding products that care for their dry, sensitive skin without irritating it or provoking an outbreak. Part of the challenge stems from the multitude of ingredients in most commercial soaps, cleansers and cosmetics --- multisyllabic chemicals that can cause redness, itching and excessive dryness. Black soap, however, is soap in a simple, natural form without these potentially harmful additives.
Identification
The National Eczema Association defines eczema as a collection of skin conditions that include contact dermatitis, seborrheic dermatitis and nummular eczema. All of these conditions cause your skin to itch and turn red; more severe forms cause blistering or peeling. The most severe kind of eczema, it notes, is atopic dermatitis, which causes itchy skin rashes and is usually diagnosed in infancy.
Treatments
According to the National Eczema Association, eczema treatment usually involves a combination of lifestyle adjustments, topical medications and oral medications for severe cases. Most often, doctors prescribe topical steroids or topical immunomodulators, non-steroidal drugs that also can help halt an outbreak. In terms of lifestyle adjustments, the hardest part is often finding gentle, fragrance-free hypoallergenic cleansers and cosmetic products that don't irritate your sensitive skin, which is why some eczema sufferers have turned to black soap.
Black Soap
TreeHugger notes that most black soap comes from west Africa, where each local tribe has a unique recipe. They make the soap with the ash of local plants and trees, combined with oils such as palm or coconut, and nourishing ingredients such as shea butter or cocoa pod powder. The color and consistency of the soap varies with its ingredients and, in bar form, looks like a striated black or black-gray rock. You can buy black soap online, in ethnic grocery stores, and in some specialty fair-trade shops.
Benefits
Black soap might help reduce your eczema outbreaks because it's gentler on your skin that most chemical-laden commercial soaps. TreeHugger notes that the soaps often contain plantain skins, which provide your skin with iron, vitamin A and vitamin E. The nourishing ingredients such as shea and cocoa butter also can soothe and moisturize dry, flaking skin. The National Eczema Association advises against commercial soaps because of their high pH; your skin's pH, it notes, is between 4 and 5.5, while most soaps have a pH between 9 and 10.5. African black soap, in contrast, usually has a lower pH. Retailer SheaByNature, for example, offers a black soap with a pH between 7 and 8.
Purchasing Black Soap
Jeanne Egbosiuba Ukwendu, African culture editor for BellaOnline, urges you to buy black soap from fair trade marketplaces. Most often, the tribe's women are in charge of making the soap and fair trade retailers can ensure these women receive fair payment for their work. Ukwendu also notes that buying genuine African soap helps ensure the product contains no artificial ingredients or fragrances, which American and European companies tend to add.
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