@Kendrah I hope you're take a high quality magnesium supplement like Magnesium glycinate or "Natural Calm". I was crazy allergic to dust & pollen for most of my life until a doctor found I was magnesium deficient due to undiagnosed food allergies. I fixed the deficiency and my sensitive skin and horrible allergic responses disappeared.

"Magnesium is needed to make the enzyme, DAO, which mops up histamine when it's been released, if you can't make DAO, histamine levels in the blood increase 16. Histamine release from immune cells causes many of the symptoms of allergic responses to, for example, pollen and insect bites." "low magnesium intake may be involved in the development of both asthma and chronic obstructive airway disease."

There are natural cleaners made by essential oil companies. I have one called “Thieves” but it definitely has a mild scent. It is usable on everything, and works. It’s a concentrate to which you add water, which makes it economical. Not sure if these types of scents also trigger your asthma.

I’ve found that a handheld steamer with a nozzle that accommodates a variety of scrubbers works wonders on my on tile and grout and doesn’t trigger my asthma.

I don't know why Dawn is called for by name as opposed to other dish soaps for non-dish washing stuff. Always seemed a little weird to me too!

Try using whatever you use on your dishes instead.

Maybe citric acid occasionally for deep cleaning? It's concentrated SweeTARTS. :P (Test on a spot of grout first.) It's really good for toilet bowls.

(I believe these bacteria have only been found to be a health problem for immunocompromised people in hospital settings. Don't rub your privates or open wounds on it or anything, but don't get freaked out about a perfectly natural microbe that is pretty much everywhere anyway.)

@RedRyder Unfortunately essential oils are just as bad for my asthma as synthetic smells.

@Sarah I have never heard of this kind of device. Do you use it for regular weekly cleaning or is it more of a deep cleaning tool? Do you add any cleanser to it or is it just water? Thanks for the suggestion.

I just use distilled water with no added cleaners of any kind for the tile and grout in the shower for my weekly shower cleaning.

I use the steamer for both regular and deep cleaning. When I first bought my house, I needed to use the brush attachments that came with the steamer to get the tile and grout properly deep cleaned, but now I can usually just let the steam blast away until I’m left with clean tile and grout.

The steamer looks like a great option.

For dish soap I’ve seen 7th Generation get good marks in “best” articles like Good Housekeeping as an unscented alternative to Dawn. I think it’s more concentrated than some, but I also like Ecover and Biokleen. (Just depends on what’s on sale at my grocery store.) I think you’re on the right track with Bon Amis or Bar Keeper’s Friend (not sure how you do with that one) or even just baking soda. Clorox does have some Free & Clear products, but I haven’t tried those. Last, a tenant of ours left behind Fantastik’s foamy bleach spray, so I’ve been using it up. I think it’s much milder than 409 and regular Clorox products, so maybe it would okay for you if your cleaner uses it, windows open, fan on? But maybe too risky since it sounds like you are more sensitive than I am.

@Fori Dawn has donated 1000's of bottles of their soap for the washing of birds after they get trapped and covered in oil spills. I think it kind of lead to that brand name to stand out as a grease cutter that was gentle. Genius marketing.

The one bit of marketing that has everyone playing along here is LVP flooring. Luxury Vinyl... haha. I'm using it in my rentals but please... nothing luxurious about it.

7th generation unscented instead of dawn.
Bleach is the only thing that works on pink algae.

Liquid body wash instead of soap bars makes a tremendous difference in clean showers.

The steamer might work on pink stuff, it likes cool water.

Is liquid body wash better on tile and grout too or is it just a glass door soap scum thing? We have a shower curtain. I much prefer bar soap because it usually has fewer additives and ingredients and way less packaging.

Haha Paul. That is probably it. Now it's recommended to clean tubas and deskunk dogs and...everything. I'm pretty sure it's just dish soap.

Can you handle some Clorox cleaner with bleach? You don't have to spray the whole shower, just the areas with the pink stains. Rinse well and run the fan.

There is a simple green “pink” cleaner concentrate forn bathrooms that is fragrance free.

I've read a number of articles on common pink bacteria. It's airborne bacteria so it's everywhere in that room and stubborn to eliminate. You may have to have a deep clean and avoid the room for a bit. Pink bacteria can also aggravate respiratory issues so you might want to take an aggressive approach then find a long term maintenance product that doesn't irritate you. My understanding is that soap residue and hair products provide a good medium for it to grow. A spray of bleach will get rid of the color and initially kill it but only scrubbing will remove the problem. To kill it, the products need to dwell for a while to do the job. IMO the entire room should be scrubbed and treated to get rid of the bacteria, including the walls, ceiling, and fan parts as well as toilet and tank. Every item in there likely has some bacteria on it. Long term, the room needs to be kept very dry - ventilate longer than you have been and keep the shower aired. If there's a shower door, keep it ajar. If it's a curtain get an antibacterial liner. I'd remove any superfluous or decorative textiles that may hold moisture that this pink stuff loves. Dry towels thoroughly and change every few days. Dry dry dry.

Try using any shampoo that you use on your hair on the walls. Switching from bar soap to body wash would reduce the soap scum buildup, if you can find some that meets your sensitivities. Buy a fresh new uncontaminated scrubber (bristle or pad) (hang it in the shower) and use it on the walls with a squirt of shampoo every few days. Your housecleaner can use it, too. A shower squeegee for the walls will also help reduce buildup and make it dry faster, discouraging growth.

Random thoughts:

- I'm fussy about very few name-brand products, but I do stick to Original Dawn dishwashing liquid.

- I do like half Dawn and half white vinegar for the shower. Works great.

- I have a bit of pink film in my shower right now, but it's from using The Pink Stuff on my grout; it's hard to wash it all off after cleaning. I won't buy The Pink Stuff again. Soft Scrub works better at half the price. Lesson learned.

- I try to limit the plastics I buy, so I stick to bar soap instead of body wash. If I need to wash the shower a little more often, it's worth it not to send yet another plastic bottle to the landfill. Literally every plastic bottle that's ever been made is still in a landfill.

Kendrah have a tried Dawn or do you just assume it will trigger your asthma? I cannot handle most cleaning products, and some years ago discovered the half vinegar/ half Dawn in a dish scrubber method. I can now clean my shower without coughing and wheezing. What if she cleans the shower when you are out and rinses well afterwards? There is no unscented Dawn, but the original formula is much less noticeable.

@User - You make a good point. It has been years since I've used Dawn. I should try it again. Plus, if it has time to air out while she is cleaning, perhaps it won't bother me. Some things like bleach and Mrs. Meyers will continue to bother me for days, but others are more of an in-the-moment irritant.

@Mrs Pete - I'm with you on the landfill and plastic bottles.

@apple_pie_order - Who knew that shampoo was good for cleaning the walls? I assumed it would leave residue like soap. My shampoo is insanely expensive holistic stuff. I can't believe I spend that much on my hair and don't think I can stand to use it on my walls too.

I had no idea that this pink stuff was a terrible bacteria! We do not have an exhaust fan in our bathroom (NYC coop building, not allowed to install one) but I leave the door open and a window open to try to get some air flow.

Kendrah have a tried Dawn or do you just assume it will trigger your asthma?

Good point.

I'm with you on the landfill and plastic bottles.

Yeah, I can't eliminate them altogether, but I do what I can.

Maybe experiment one time and see. Diluted bleach I can handle outdoors but not indoors. I cannot handle Lysol products at all.

Bar soap contains something (often talc) to keep it solid, which also makes it stick to everything. I use aveeno fragrance free body wash, no soap scum on you or the shower. If you like feeling squeaky, that is actually soap scum.

I put a ceiling fan on a timer in my bathroom to help dry it out but I also have exhaust fan.

Once you get the bathroom clean, always put a fan in the bathroom and run 24/7 to keep it dry. This will help prevent mold/mildew

Kendrah, the dawn, she is talking about is the original blue dawn. I do have asthma and I use it all the time. That is the type of dawn, that is used to clean the oil from ducts and birds etc too. Not the other dawns, that some do have a heavier scent to them. I have no idea however, if it works for showers.

Note on Dawn - we've used it forever. Going so far as using it on the race car for degreasing when we're working on it.

All the formulations are confusing now (original, ultra, platinum, etc) and yet - none of them work as good as the "old" stuff. I recently needed to bring some tires / rims to get mounted. We took wheels off car and I was going to clean them off in the driveway and FOUND a small container of "old plan Dawn" that was in a race kit box that's probably 15 years old. I used it.

Holy cow - suds galore and cleaned the brake dust / road grime like magic.

Sigh. How I miss the old Dawn.

I do use the Dawn / vinegar mix in the shower. Easy peasy to always have on hand. There's a Dawn / peroxide mix too. (And window cleaner is isopropyl alcohol, water and a few drops of Dawn too)

With respiratory issues you don't want to be breathing in the pink bacteria.

I would want the bacteria completely killed. When I used cleaners in a medical environment you had to spray the anti bacterial/ anti viral solution on the surface and let it sit for at least 10 minutes before wiping. It needs time to work. Boiling water also helps kill bacteria (I boil kitchen towels and dishcloths before washing to remove any bacteria), so I would have the cleaning person clean and disinfect and then rinse with pots of boiling water.

If the cleaning products bother your asthma get a hotel room for a night or two after the initial clean.

Once it is eliminated I would use a squeegee and then an old towel to wipe down the walls and surfaces and throw that towel in the dryer for use again the next day. Buy a small fan type space heater and run it for 30 minutes after your morning shower and get a heated towel bar to help your towels dry faster.

Killing the bacteria and keeping the room clean and dry will be your best long term answer.

What kind/ brand of dish soap do you use in the kitchen? Why not try it for the shower?

Can you get an in window fan to exhaust the moist air after your showers?

window mount fan

Aveeno liquid body wash was mentioned further up in the thread. Amazon sells an "ecofriendly" refill pouch for the fragrance free product. Yes, it's still plastic, but less of it.

A lot of recyclers will take the bottle but not the bag so check the rules where you are first.

Valid point - in fact the current pouch does indicate it's not recyclable. But it's made with 30% post consumer recycled plastic and Aveeno has made a commitment to 100% recyclable, reusable, or compostable packaging by the end of 2025. As with other purchasing decisions, it's a tradeoff between many factors - starting with soap scum and allergy concerns in this conversation!

I use Dawn as my default cleaner for almost everything. I detest scented products also, but I find that this does not leave a scent that is pervasive, as do some other detergents.

I bought some Spic n Span some time ago and could not use it. The sick sweet smell lingered and penetrated everything . I use to use it and it had a scent but not one that was as pervasive as the new version. I wont buy it again.

vinegar and baking soda are good for some things, but those things are limited. I see it so much and think if to be highly over over rated. And, you cant make your own home made cleaning solution with it unless what you are washig will be rinsed. It will leave a gritty film on many things.

One of the best grout cleaners I have used is hydrogen peroxide mixed with dawn soap and enough baking soda to make a paste. It’s great for cleaning dirty/scummy stuff. Go heavier on the peroxide if you want to kill the pink bacteria. It does have to sit for 10 minutes or so, then use a brush to scrub. Peroxide kills it, the soda helps scour. Citric acid also kills it - Method bathroom cleaner uses citric acid. It does stain white grout if it’s not cleaned regularly. Wiping down your shower walls and floors after every use helps tremendously. My husband and I do so religiously, our son not so much and his needs to be scrubbed much more frequently. The pink bacteria does feed on the fats in soap scum, so getting that out is helpful (which dawn will help with). I don’t notice a scent with the dawn that I use.

Cleaning lady is coming today and I'll see how I do with the Dawn. I got a teeny bottle of the blue stuff to try out.

I have no way to put a fan in this tiny bathroom. There is only one outlet and it sits right next to my sink that has no ledge or area to put a fan. It is right next to the door so I can't even put something on the floor or I'd walk into it.

You can't install a vent fan in NYC? Why not? Seriously, I don't know why anyone lives there.

How did it go?

Been there, done that.

Low crime rate? Haha, are you serious? Garbage/rat problems, migrants overrunning the city, people getting pushed onto subway tracks, homeless relieving themselves on the streets, should I go on?

And I live within a 30 minute train ride to Penn Station and have access to all of that if I want. And I can live in a beautiful suburb with space to breathe the clean air and high quality schools and services. And a home built in the 1920s with vent fans :)

Everyone values something different and apparently a lot of people love living in NYC. Others love San Fran or Los Angeles and many love living in suburbs or in the mountains or out on a 100 acre farm.

What I really don't understand is how the smell of dawn triggers your asthma while the pollution levels of living in the city don't make it impossible to breathe. Everyone I know with severe asthma has focused on air quality inside their home. An old building like this with no ability to have a vent in the bathroom would be a big issue. Mold spores are hideous for asthma sufferers.

The math just doesn't seem to add.

@Jennifer Hogan - The immunology of asthma is complex. Triggers manifest differently in each person and can change over time for each person. Genetics and co-morbidities account for variations between people too. I have adult onset asthma and nothing ever bothered me until I was 30 years old. Cigarette and fire smoke, dust, and mold now trigger me but scent is by far the worst whether it is a sprig of lavender or chemical cleanser.

A silver lining of the pandemic was learning that N-95 masks greatly filter out my triggers when I'm in environments I can't control. In my home I dust compulsively and luckily, our bathroom isn't moldy despite not having a fan. Our towels dry quickly, our mirror never fogs, two of us take short showers at different times of day with the door open, we squeegie water immediately off walls and tub floor, and don't leave sink water running at all, ever. (None of this is intentional, just happens to be our normal routine.) In our old home we ran a dehumidifier year round in the basement and it made a tremendous difference with humidity and mold throughout the entire house. Come to think of it, I have never had a bathroom fan in any home I have ever lived in both in childhood and adulthood.

While NY metropolitan area has bad ozone days - ranked 12th worst in the country, I've very thankfully never noticed smog as a trigger. And, the area ranks much lower for other asthma triggers than many other urban and semi-urban areas. https://www.lung.org/research/sota/city-rankings/most-polluted-cities

The only time I've had asthma from being outside in NYC was last week when wild fire smoke came down from Nova Scotia. Through my husband's job, he has deep knowledge of detailed pollution data, calculations, and maps. We select our homes and neighborhoods based on proximity to various kinds of emissions, but we do so out of concern for long term health impacts rather than for my asthma.

As for Dawn dish soap, I can easily go back to a life without it. And I'm glad that my experiment with it just showed it as an irritant and didn't cause a full blown asthma attack.

@Diana - I'm quite serious about violent crime rates in NYC. Look up the data. Having moved here from Philadelphia, the trash situation in NYC feels pristine. I have zero problem with migrants, and far more people die at the hands of another person's car in the suburbs than are pushed on to the tracks of a subway. I have probably peed outside as much in my lifetime as any homeless person. But, I will give it to you on rats. Oh my god. It is just absolutely, horrifyingly disgusting here. I'm glad you live so close to Penn Station and get to enjoy all that you want to partake in of the city. I'm lucky to have a car, live near the GW Bridge, and can escape to beautiful nature so nearby when I need a fix.

People who aren’t sensitive to smells have a really hard time understanding. I was surprised (& kind of worried for you) by all these people claiming Dawn doesn’t smell. It does. I don’t live in a big city, but my area has horrible air quality & no emissions requirements. Our area has ranked above major cities for poor air quality before. It’s sometimes impossible to breathe outside and it’s not necessarily due to the smog. Between the smelly car exhausts, lawn mowers, leaf blowers, fire pit smoke, cigarette & cigar smoke, it is hard to do something like enjoy your deck or yard, go for a walk (even in the neighborhood or park), sit on a restaurant patio, enjoy an outdoor concert, etc. That does not count all the various pollens that give allergies to people who may never had had them anywhere prior in their lives to living here. I am now sensitive to all kinds of scents & smells that I didn’t used to be, so I completely understand how certain scents & irritants may be triggers while others aren’t (even if it doesn’t make sense to those who don’t suffer!).

It is hard to find unscented products, whether it's for cleaning your house or your body. I'm moderately sensitive to smells, but my mom is very sensitive and gets migraines from smells that most people wouldn't notice. Chamomile tea is one that really gets to her. Years ago my daughter used a shampoo that made the whole house smell like fake wildflowers and nauseated me and my son. Luckily she switched to an unscented version.

I use Dawn and honestly never noticed a scent, but believe you that it bothers you. I noticed that even the "free and clear" Dawn has a lemon scent. Palmolive does advertise a fragrance free version of its Ultra Pure & Clear soap.

@kendrah, and others who suffer from fragrances - I'm glad you found help with the N95 masks.

I react to nearly all chemically scented products, as well as essential oils, candles & even flowers.

We had to leave our new kitten at the vet yesterday for a minor procedure, and when I picked him up he reeked of scent! Called to ask what they used on him, & it turns out it was the tech's perfume! It took all day to wear off!

People also don't realize how strong a scent most dryer sheets leave on their clothes.

I could go on, but I'll stop for now.

One other tip - I carry Lifesaver's real peppermints at all times. If I find myself in close proximity of a bad (for me) odor, putting a mint in my mouth will fill up the olfactory nerve, and give you time to escape to fresh air.

I’m sorry it isn’t going to work for you, but glad it didn’t trigger a full on asthma attack. Is your cleaning lady willing to work with you and just use your unscented Method cleaner? Or what about just water diluted white vinegar 1:1? I can’t remember if you said you can tolerate vinegar or not. Spray it on, let it sit a few minutes scrub, and rinse. It works pretty good on the pink “mold” . Maybe once you get rid of it and kill it, you can prevent regrowth with squeegee after every shower and wipe downs using just hot water and a microfiber cloth like Norwex.

Years ago someone tried to sell me on lavender essential oil for my migraines. Um no…smelling lavender gives me a headache almost instantly. She gave me a headache. Lol.

I am a big fan of Norwex products, I use their cloths everywhere. I even use on my mirrors instead of smelly Windex. I have never used their bathroom cleaner because it is pricey and Dawn and vinegar works for me, but I just looked it up, and it is fragrance-free.

https://shopus.norwex.biz/en_US/customer/shop/product-detail/600002?categoryName=Bathroom

I just looked up Norwex. They are a multi-level marketing company. (AKA pyramid scheme.) I never purchase from those. It is also $31!

Yes they are. I bought a few cloths at a party and have been happy, but I am not into signing up for stuff like that. I looked up their cleaner for you, because I knew chemical free was their shtick. I am a cheap Dawn and vinegar girl . Lol

I don't usually buy Dawn but have once in a while. I've been reading about their newish stronger version that I thought I might like to have on hand for some tough cleaning jobs. I bought a bottle from Target a few weeks ago and decided to try some on a tough stain on a pair of jeans. OMG, it was that horrible smell that is everywhere now, like the laundry aisle at Costco and just about every person on the planet's clean laundry. I smell it everywhere, from the person in line next to me at a store to service people who come to the house, to the air outside when the neighbors are drying their laundry in the dryer!

I decided to return to Target and they credited my account and told me to keep it. So now I have to figure out what to do with it. I hate to foist it off on anyone - I know the homeless shelter would use it, but what about people there who might be sensitive. Ugh.