How many of you have accidentally let that one red shirt or colorful pair of underwear end up in your load of whites? Trust me, it happens to all of us at least once or twice in our lifetime. As parents, it seems like our laundry to-do is never ending, and when we finally get to the chore, only to find out we turned everyone's whites pink, it's frustrating! While television ads make it seem like there's no hope for your whites that newly turned pink, you can actually return your white items to their naturally bright white look with less work than you'd think.

Reasons Your Whites Might Turn Pink

When doing laundry, most people sort their clothing based on color and washing requirements. Since whites contain undergarments, socks, and towels, people usually wash those in warm or hot water. When you wash a new or non-colorfast item in warm or hot water, the dye can bleed out of the fabric. Although this can happen in any load, it's more noticeable when it happens to a load of whites because there's no other color to hide the bleeding.

Similarly, items like ChapStick or markers can transfer dyes and colors onto your clothing when the items run through the washing machine. Although you may not notice these stains or bleeds in a load of black shirts, you will definitely notice the discoloration on your whites.

white-textile-1122167
Via Pexels

How To Fix Your Whites

If you open your washing machine to find a load full of pink items that once were white, you can use the following steps to fix your white clothing. Before completing these steps, though, make sure that all affected items can be bleached (a triangle with a cross through it stands for "do not bleach").

  1. Remove the colored item, then separate all white items that appear discolored.
  2. Soak all affected garments in a weak household bleach solution (1/4 cup of bleach diluted in 1 gallon of cold water) for up to 15 minutes.
  3. Rinse all items thoroughly and repeat Step 2 if needed.
  4. If the discoloration persists or if you notice blotches of color, re-wash the stained garments in the washing machine with one cup of non-chlorine bleach plus your usual amount of detergent.
  5. Check items carefully before transferring to the dryer — applying heat will make the discoloration permanent.
  6. If the whites remain discolored after multiple treatments, consider using a specialty product such as RIT Color Remover to treat the clothing and remove the discoloration.

For items that cannot be bleached or for lightly colored items that are also affected, you can try doing a pre-soak and washing with a color catcher.

What About Stain Removal?

While color transfers can frustrate us all, removing tough stains from white clothing creates a whole other level of frustration. However, experts say that you can easily remove red or other colored stains on your whites if you follow these steps.

  1. Blot away as much of the stain as possible with a cloth or tissue.
  2. For makeup stains, try treating the stained area with rubbing alcohol or hand sanitizer. For all other stains, you can scrub with a specialized stain remover or, if that's not available, a small squirt of liquid laundry detergent or dish soap.
  3. If the stain remains, cut a lemon in half, rub the lemon juice on the stain, then place the clothing in direct sunlight for a short amount of time.
  4. Once the stain no longer looks visible, try washing the affected items again.
  5. Remember, do not place any clothing that is discolored or stained in the dryer as the heat makes these stains permanent.
mom laying on pile of laundry
Credit: iStock

How To Prevent Accidental Color Bleeding

Obviously the easiest way to prevent color bleeding is by separating your clothing and checking the washing machine thoroughly between loads to ensure no stray items remain. If you specifically own items that say they are non-colorfast, you can wash these independently with similarly colored articles of clothing or hand wash them to avoid color transfers.

If you aren't sure which clothing items are colorfast or not, you can perform a simple trick to find out. Wet a small area of the garment you want to test with water. Then, blot the wet area with a paper towel, stick under the clothing, then iron the top of the clothing. If any coloration transfers to the paper towel, then that clothing item isn't colorfast.

Whether a stray red sock fell into the load or your daughter's ChapStick fell into the load, discolored whites can make even the coolest, most collected mom lose her sanity for a moment. However, if you follow these tips, you can quickly restore the brightness in your whites with relatively little fuss. Just make sure you handle this sticky situation right away — because it's all over once the load hits the dryer.

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About The Author

Megan Glosson (660 Articles Published)

Megan Glosson is a mother and freelance writer based Nashville, Tennessee. She enjoys writing on a variety of parenting topics, but loves taking on anything with a personal connection to her own life. When she's not writing, you can probably find Megan building Legos or playing board games with her two adorable daughters. To check out more of Megan's work or to contact her about freelance opportunities, visit http://meganglosson.com/.

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