The human body has a way to signal everything that goes on inside our body with some symptoms or others. Vaginal itching too has certain symptoms and as the itching and irritation slowly begin to put a damper on our social life and even the mundane everyday activities, you have got to do something about it.
In order to address vaginal itching, we need to understand what causes it, what, and how it can be dealt with. Often called ‘below the belt itching’, vaginal itching, even if very mild, can cause great discomfort and hamper many of your everyday activities.
As great discomfort as it is to have vaginal itching, we often do not need to rush to a medical professional for every discomfort that we experience. However, if the pain and discomfort persist for longer than 3 days, it is a clear go-to-your-gynecologist signal for you. Vaginal itching isn’t uncommon or something many women don’t know about. In fact, on the contrary, statistical data reveals that a big chunk of women and girls experience it on a regular basis.
Scary, isn’t it? However, you can very easily take care of vaginal itching with some guidance for making healthy changes in your everyday lifestyle. To figure those out, we need to understand the reasons behind the cause of vaginal itching.
What causes vaginal itching?
Let us look into the various factors that constitute an important part of our everyday routine life which is essential to understand how to take care of vaginal itching. Let’s see them, one by one:
- Sexually transmitted diseases: If proper care is not taken while having sexual intercourse there are very high chances for sexually transmitted diseases by which one can be affected. If it happens, it can lead to severe irritation as well as vaginal itching creating discomfort. Hence, if immediate attention is required, do visit a healthcare professional.
- Chemical irritants and douching: Our skin down there is too sensitive to be messed with. Hence, we should be really careful with regards to what products we are applying down there as they may contain harmful chemicals that can cause infections and vaginal itching. Chemicals present in the products can irritate our skin due to which even seemingly harmless things like soaps, intimate washes, etc. can end up causing vaginal itching.
- Yeast infections: It may come as a surprise to us but yeast is a bacterium that is ever-present in our vagina. Then, why don’t we have yeast infections all the time? It is because when the level of yeast is disrupted due to any cause whatsoever, we begin to experience vaginal itching which develops as yeast infections. Yeast infections can be very painful and should be treated right away. If it persists for too long, we should immediately seek professional medical help. Lifestyle and daily habits can go a long way to deal with these kinds of infections.
- Urinary tract infections (UTIs): Given the nature of lifestyle and work for most of us, we spend most of our time outdoors. Hence, going to public restrooms is absolutely unavoidable. Why this fuss about public restrooms? They are almost like a pandora’s box for a wide variety of diseases, urinary tract infections being one kind. UTIs cause a release of a pungent-like smell discharge as well as a yellow and cloudy discharge. These are pretty painful for some people as they cause vaginal itching of varying scales depending upon the severity of the disease.
- Menopause: For women, menopause often leads to human body atrophy. This, as a result, causes excessive dryness and, naturally, this dryness is also experienced in our intimate body parts as well. This, coupled with hormonal changes – like a huge dip in the estrogenic levels, can cause severe vaginal itching, making it one of the major reasons for women hitting menopause.
- Waxing or shaving-induced irritation: Many women wax down there while others shave. However, within a couple of days when the hair starts growing back again, certain itching is experienced. Also, the skin down there is very sensitive, and the tug and pull of waxing or any possible cuts from blades can be a great source of discomfort as well. All these factors can end up irritating vaginal skin which then causes vaginal itching.
- Medical conditions like eczema or psoriasis: Certain medical conditions related to our dermatological health can have a big impact on the skin anywhere in our body. Conditions like eczema and psoriasis can be very difficult to deal with even for the skin on, say, our limbs. Sensitive skin is ever more prone to experience drastic irritation. Since our skin down there is pretty sensitive, it is very probable that our skin is affected and ends up with vaginal itching.
- pH imbalances: Often, the products we use on our vaginal skin, for cleansing and hygiene purposes, are chemically infused. The skin down there being sensitive has a very sensitive pH level balance as well. Douching can really disrupt the pH levels of our skin as well. It is very important to check for the pH levels of products before we begin using them down there.
Is it possible to have itching without discharge?
Yes, indeed! Some of the causes that we have discussed above, that cause vaginal itching, are not internal to the body and can cause irritation and itching in our vagina without any discharge. Some of the causes may be razor burns upon shaving down there. Eczema and even pubic lice can be certain factors for the same without a discharge.
Home remedies for vaginal itch
Remedies for prevention of vaginal irritation and itching are plenty but most of them require us to make changes in our hygiene and alter our lifestyles a bit and the job will be done. Some of them are:
- Regularly washing down there with a mild cleanser on a daily basis.
- Let your skin breathe, try wearing cotton underwear mostly.
- Use protection during sexual intercourse to prevent STDs.
- Avoid scented washes and soaps down there.
- Try using products that help maintain and balance pH levels down there.
- Avoid wet clothing for too long.
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