I can confirm that you really don't want to breathe in any of that crap.

A year and a half ago I developed symptoms of what was some form of bronchitis. Lots of mucus, constantly coughing, etc. I was pretty freaking sick. I tend to wait some things like this out, but it wasn't going away so I went to a doctor and got some medications including albuterol and some kind of steroid (prednisone, I think). It got a little more manageable, but didn't seem to be getting any better.

One day, I realized how much of a dumbass I was the whole time.

The apartment I was living in had a laundry room, but it was tiny and I got tired of both hauling laundry up and down multiple flights of stairs and having to fight for time with the few machines that were there. I bought a small washer and dryer pair from Black & Decker which were designed for apartment living. Kinda off topic, but there were no hookups in my unit, so I had to jerryrig a water connection using some collapsible garden hoses that connected to my shower and its drain. Was kinda hilarious but worked great.

I made the mistake of thinking that I could just allow the dryer to blow through two sets of lint traps and have a fan blow air out of the window to manage moisture and remaining lint making it through. What I didn't realize was how inadequate the traps were. Because I worked from home, I spent a lot of time in that bedroom, including when the dryer was running. I was breathing in all sorts of stuff without knowing it.

Once I stopped hanging out in that room while the dryer was running, bought an air purifier, and made sure to frequently clean my apartment of dust, my symptoms rapidly started to go away.

If I had to do all of that again, and I couldn't just have the dryer blow directly out the window, I would find some way to have it do a second pass through a HEPA filter, perhaps after drying the air with something like calcium chloride.

I shudder to think of all the microplastic fibers that remain somewhere in my body.

There's still good fabrics out there you just have to pay for them. I've mostly replaced my wardrobe now with natural undyed cottons and wools from the likes of "unbleached apparel" and "industry of all nations". There is cotton grown in new mexico, socks spun in north carolina. "Filson" makes a few things in Seattle. Don't skip the stuff made in Peru or India neither.

I don't have any clothes as old as yours though for sure, but line drying generally helps your clothes last longer. I'm so glad I live in Colorado. It's a warm winter, but it takes like 3 hours to dry stuff on the line (especially synthetics). Of course that means all my synthetic fibers are literally billowing into the air I guess. Still, we've been going without a dryer for about five years now and I've had no regrets.

Do not dry your cotton shirts in the dryer. It's as easy as that. You hang them up and let them air dry. They'll last forever.

I have recently started refusing to buy all of this plastic filled clothes. If I see any % of it I don't buy it. Period.

I spend much more upfront for clothes, but I gain a lot long term. Clothes don't look terrible after few washings and they tend to last forever.

Yeah, I've started being a bit concerned about inhaling all the tiny plastic fibers every time I clean the filters and wondering what could be doing to my lunges.

My following comment is not about clothes, but not long ago I washed some curtains that were hanging in a window for some fifteen years. The amount of lint that came out in the dryer was incredible. I'm talking inch-thick wad on the filter screen, growing another inch with continued drying, after being removed.

It was probably due to years of UV breakdown of the fibers from daylight.

I hold my breath when I clean the lint trap, replace it and start the drier, then leave the laundry room and take a breath. I’m still probably inhaling some fibers but it makes me feel like I’m doing something.

I had the exhaust vent disconnect. Still think of the amount of microplastics I must have inhaled then

You are actually seeing something the linked article doesn't even mention: fiber length.

Not all cotton is created equally. "Egyptian cotton" was long prized because of the long fiber lengths. Cotton fibers are very smooth and slick, and only stay together in thread because of friction along their length as they lay with neighbor fibers (often twisted, where friction becomes exponential instead of linear). Short-fiber cotton is cheaper and easier to source; ergo, cheaper clothing tends to be made of it. Short fibers are also much more likely to slip within the thread under heat, lubrication, and motion (washing and drying). Obviously, they are also more likely to completely fall out of the thread, creating lint.

This is really only true for cotton and very similar fibers. Linen fibers are generally all multiple inches long, so there's less of a quality issue (they are made from rotting away everything but the longitudinal support fibers of the plant stalks).

Wool varies greatly in surface texture, especially after modern chemical processing, and fiber length isn't an issue because the fibers are also inch-long or better. It shrinks, however, because its friction is SO HIGH that it won't give up (stretch back) once it gets bound up.

Silk fibers super slick, but are several yards/meters long; a single cocoon is made from a single thread. They are much slicker than cotton (and therefore harder to hand-spin), but by the time they are made into thread they have plenty of surface friction maintaining their position in the thread.

Artificial fibers are as long as the production shift lasts, so effectively infinite.

> Is anyone else freaked out about cleaning their dryer's lint filter given all the new fabric materials?

I used to be. So I spent quite a lot of time researching the issue. Not just google searches, but actually speaking with biologists.

I think that the current microplastic scare is overblown. The "credit card worth of plastic in brain" articles are just ridiculous. Biologically, the body has defenses against microscopic contaminants in blood. There are special immune cells that "eat" insoluble particles and then get excreted (typically in bile).

It looks like I'm not alone in my bafflement: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2026/01/scary-research-... or https://www.vox.com/climate/475004/microplastics-research-fa...

I wish I lived in your world. It is very rare I find a long-sleeved garment whose sleeves are long enough, and it usually only takes a wash or two for them to become too short :(

There have been changes in the manufacturing process to "pre-shrink" fabrics.

Similar improvements have been made to improve colorfastness. Mixing new reds and whites used to consistently produce pink. Not anymore.

I can only wear tall-size clothing, and generally I've found that none of my t-shirts shrink "in", but they _all_ shrink "up". I can make them last longer washing them delicate and "air-drying" (in the dryer, light or no heat), but eventually they all get shorter. I have to replace most of my undershirts annually, and I rarely bother with t-shirts anymore.

I've had the opposite problem where I hadn't had shrinking issues in years until I got a new LG dryer with one of those auto sensing modes that it defaults to. The "smart" feature is terrible. I had a number of shirts shrink on me because it sometimes goes absurdly overboard with the drying.

Once we figured out the problem and stopped using all of the smart features it started working fine. Unfortunately the interface really wants you to use the fancy modes and requires an annoying amount of steps to manually set a drying run. Easily the worst dryer UX I've ever had. I doubt I'll buy another LG appliance, although there are probably plenty of other offenders these days.

I had the same experience until this year, when a shirt I got in the airport on the way home from Philly suddenly became a present for my girlfriend.

A lot of cotton is pre-shrunk. Simple as that. Synthetics resist shrinking.

The last thing I had shrink on me was a wool sweater, which was over twenty years ago.

I used the hair conditioner trick to stretch it (same as in this article), which sort of worked.

I have a moisture-sensing dryer from the 80's that lets me select between multiple dryness levels, and it is extremely repeatable, as opposed to my parent's modern moisture-sensing dryer that that adds a fixed amount of drying time after the sensor trips, in hopes that the clothes will be dry enough. Sometimes they are and sometimes they aren't.

I still find it to be the case that most 100% cotton shirts shrink over time (even pre-shrunk) and have switched to blends just to get some more longevity out of them.

Modern heat pump dryers also work at a lower temperature because they cool the air to evaporate the moisture so they don't need to be as hot to start with.

I think a lot of things use pre-shrunk fabric these days. I've got t-shirts that haven't shrunk, and t-shirts that have. Unfortunately a lot of band shirts bought at concerts fall into the latter :(.

New clothes also tend to include synthetic fibers that seem to not shrink as much. 100% cotton, or especially wool garments will shrink if you’re not careful, but are becoming increasingly difficult to find.

It's not just moisture sensing. Modern dryers also use patterns to prevent shrinking in terms of reducing the heat and then bringing it back as opposed to a constant temperature until dry.

I've had the opposite problem with several of my t-shirts stretching/expanding going from M to something equivalent to XL size and I fail to understand why.

I am not using a dryer, only a washing machine.

Can UV do that?

It's rarely an issue with coton, but it's still a problem with cashmere or wool. Even on the most delicate settings you can have surprises

Most cotton is preshrunk now

I've killed a bunch of stuff lately mixing some wool socks in with towels. Oops. The towels stay wet long enough that the wool got overheated, and then my 8 year old spent the next week yelling at me for ruining his socks. :)

Check your (wet) pockets and waistbands more often.

Those sensors, across brands, are absolute garbage.

Make sure they are pre-shrunk cotton. It can still shrink, but far less.

Make sure the shirt is sized so that when you extend your arm laterally, the cuff approaches your knuckle.

If your idea of a fitting shirt happens to be that the cuff just covers a wrist watch when you extend your arm, then you have no spare headroom for shrinkage.

I find clothes labels are way too conservative. Half of my stuff says don't dry, hand wash only, or cold wash on delicate.

Unless it's a particularly expensive or dry clean only, I just wash at 40 degrees "daily" programme, except for underwear, towels and bedding which go in at 60.

Most stuff is fine. On the rare occasion something gets ruined, I don't get that brand again.

I take the opposite approach: wash everything on the default setting and whatever survives (almost everything) is now confirmed safe for that setting. Keeps things simpler and has the advantage that you can cut of those scratchy labels that are always attached in the most uncomfortable places possible.

I have a similar one, but all it says is wash anything and everything except sheets and towels on cold/permapress/delicate with half the recommended amount of detergent, and use your head when deciding what to put in the dryer on a setting that leaves just a little moisture. Sheets and towels get the hot water treatment with a full drying cycle.

What the hell does "Do not dry" mean? You have to keep it moist forever?

I have a heat pump dryer, and I can confirm no shrinkage.

It's very gentle on clothes, but it does take a bit longer to dry.

Do you have pointers to good sources you've found about that? I've been wondering about exactly this from an optimization-of-the-laundry perspective.

(I've been tempted to just yolo buy one to try it out but installing it in my house is a pain in the rear because of the location.)

I think it's definitely possible to gain weight between wash cycles when living in America.

do you dry on high or wash on hot? I'd recommend low and cold.

I'm with you 100% -- shrinking tees and shrinking sleeves were the bane of my existence, I'd buy my proper size but they would only be wearable like 5 times until they got too short. But if I bought a size up, I'd be swimming in them horizontally even after they shrank. (The people here saying that shrinkage isn't a problem anymore, I have no idea what they're talking about. Maybe they wear a baggy/long style of clothing so it doesn't matter? And I don't care how supposedly "preshrunk" cotton is, it's not preshrunk enough.)

Now I just wash on cold and hang dry all my cotton shirts, tees and button-ups. Just use a folding drying rack as simple as this:

https://www.ikea.com/us/en/p/mulig-drying-rack-indoor-outdoo...

It's a little annoying to have to leave the rack out in the middle of some room to dry overnight, but zero shrinkage ever. The way it fit in the store is the way it still fits three years later.

And no, stretching with conditioner/shampoo doesn't work, because there's no easy way to stretch it the "right" way -- as you tug on spots at the neck and the waist to pull them apart, they stretch but in weird, inconsistent, lumpy ways. The final result just looks like you've had small kids trying to hang from different spots on your shirt and it's all out of shape. Maybe in theory if you had some kind of stretching system with long clamps or something it could work, but who has that? Doing it by hand, it's definitely not a solution.

You can use a dryer, just don't get all the way dry. Low heat until the shirt is 'damp', then hang to finish drying is what I used to do.

Hang-dry your tees. It's a slight annoyance vs just bombing everything into the dryer, but it's very worth it to not have sleeves that are too short. I usually hang mine on the shower's curtain rod to dry.

And frankly, this seems like less effort than trying to apply some hack to unshrink them after the damage is done.

Higher rise pants help. I have a long torso and started buying higher rise pants for the aesthetic difference, but they also make me less concerned about a t shirt becoming a belly shirt

Yes. It works. I bought my wife’s cashmere jumper back from child-sized. Pins, a sheet of ply, and a bunch of time.

You need to be constantly updating your knowledge in this area. Laundry detergents and garment materials have evolved a lot in the last few decades. A lot of conventional wisdom is outdated.

You don't need to wash Hot. Detergents work in cold water now.

Cotton is often pre-shrunk but YMMV.

Personally I do not use any of these chemical additives for clothes. The best wash is unscented detergent with vinegar in the pre-wash (where liquid fabric softner goes). Vinegar does the job of deodorizing, getting rid of static, and fabric softening. You don't need a dryer sheet. I'll use spray and wash still for stains. Dish detergent for oil stains.

I stopped wearing plastic so I'm not sure what modern polyester shirts are like.

Washing cold and drying low means you'll rarely shrink something. My favorite shirts I'll hang dry.

Uniqlo and Patagonia specifically test their products through wear and tear and wash//dry cycles sources (others, too) - https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2025/09/22/inside-uniqlos... and Let My People Surf. I think most other stuff we commonly see at retail has degraded to fast fashion and meant to only last a short time. The lifetime warranty and repairs offered by Patagonia speak for themselves I think.

Cotton shrinks, and that your dryer is too hot or running too long. Born in the late 80s, I think this was even a joke on sitcoms at one point (I have this vague memory of a husband pulling his favorite shirt out of the dryer and wearing it while it was still damp just so it wouldn't shrink), so it seems more like previously-common knowledge that was lost.

It’s not an em-dash, but an en-dash. So it’s incorrectly used.

Difficult when the options are Medium and Large!

All jeans relax by about 1" in the waist after a few wears, because you're literally just mechanically stretching them every time you sit down.

Cotton tees would stretch like that too if you wore them as tight as jeans are worn around the waist. But we don't wear them that way.

Denim and duck cotton tend to "break in" after a few wearings. This happens with a lot of cotton work clothes and also with a good pair of technical or work boots. They tend to mold themselves to your body shape. It doesn't happen at all with nylon work pants like the ones Carhartt makes.

That's probably not the washes but due to wear.

That doesn't even make sense. Banana Republic cotton is fine. I have a bunch of their shirts and machine wash cold and hang-dry and zero shrinkage.

Did you put it in the dryer afterwards or something? Like I know that sounds dumb but I'm struggling to imagine what could have possibly caused what you describe.

There's zero "enshittification" of the cotton at a brand like Banana Republic.

I'm sure some day we'll notice the consequences. Real soon now...

I hardly have anything that I'd trust to a mechanical washer or dryer, these days. The things I do (mostly underwear and socks) still need cold-wash and extra-low-heat dry.

Eh, selvedge denim these days is just a fashion trend. It's fine, yeah. But there are other clothes one has to wear besides denim.