Healthy Skin Care: Moisturizers

The third step of a solid skin care routine is moisturizing.  If you have taken the time to research the appropriate cleanser for your skin type, and found a hydrating and balancing toner, then let’s make sure the moisturizer you select is going to complement and enhance your healthy skin profile, and not create havoc on your face.  *Note: this entire discussion is regarding over-the-counter moisturizers, not pharmaceutical-grade products.

What a moisturizer is, and is not.  A moisturizer is a product that we place on our skin to condition, protect, and help slow down the evaporation of water from our skin cells.  Technically speaking, a moisturizer does not “moisturize” our skin at all; if using the right product, it facilitates the body’s natural ability to hydrate itself.  Think this through for a moment; most moisturizers you have used are somewhat thick, as compared to water, right?  When you put them on your face they don’t immediately get absorbed do they?  No, they don’t, and the reason is that the molecular size of the combined ingredients is too large to be absorbed by our skin cells.  So what happens is that the product gets moved around the surface of your skin, and absorbs the already dead skin cells.  This is why your skin looks good immediately after applying moisturizer, and why make-up goes on smoother.  Now remember, the moisturizing product has not been absorbed into the skin, it is only sitting on top.  This is really important to understand, especially if you are considering investing in a $300.00 jar of moisturizer that is going to ‘plump up your skin to it’s youthful radiance’.

So now that you know what a moisturizer cannot do, you should know what it can do.  First, there are two types of moisturizers; occlusive, and humectants.  An occlusive moisturizer lies on top of the skin, and helps to prevent the loss of hydration from your skin, awesome right?  Well sometimes, but not for daily use.  An occlusive moisturizer keeps hydration in, but it also clogs the pores, and prevents oxygen from getting to the cells, Oxygen is critical for your skin’s overall health.  Preventing oxygen from being absorbed makes your skin more susceptible to the spread of harmful bacteria.  Since bacteria cannot live in the presence of oxygen (it oxidizes), it is a skin care best practice to allow oxygen to reach the skin by not preventing it with occlusive products.  So how do you know if a product is occlusive?  Look on the ingredient list for items like mineral oil, petrolatum, and lanolin to name a few.  Naturally, there are valid reasons for wanting to use an occlusive product, but this should be done for a short period, not on a daily basis.

The second type of moisturizer is a humectant, that is, a moisturizer that works to attract hydration. Humectants draw moisture from the dermal (living layer) of the skin, to the epidermal layer.  Additionally, when the relative humidity is above 70%, a humectant will pull moisture from the air.  How great is that?!  Humectant-type moisturizers are what you find most commonly in spas, medical offices, and in the beauty aisle. Humectant moisturizers make an incredible delivery system for active/performance ingredients that you want to work in conjunction with the ingredients from your toner and/or serum.  If you read yesterday’s post on toner, you may now being seeing how this all comes together for the benefit of your skin.  When you apply a moisturizer over skin that is damp from toner, you are creating a layer of hydration between the two products, that lasts longer, and works to more effectively hydrate your skin.

A note about sanitation: Generally, any product you put your fingers into will be fully contaminated within three weeks time.  For some reason, product manufacturers L.O.V.E to put moisturizers in jars. Yes, yes, they usually include a little spatula so you won’t stick your fingers in there, but you do anyway, and so do I (BTW, bad choice if you have just spent $300 for that jar).  Please, I implore you to only buy facial care products that are packaged with your safety and sanitation in mind.

So here are the Pro-tip’s for moisturizer:

1.     Only purchase moisturizers that come in sanitary containers.

2.     Apply moisturizer to freshly washed and toned skin, while the skin is still damp from the toner.

3.     Place the moisturizer on your forehead, nose, cheeks, chin, and neck.

4.     Starting with your neck, using your hands, make small circular movements in an upward direction, all the way to the top of your forehead. Be gentle.

5.     Repeat two times a day.

Tomorrow we will finish our baseline skincare series with sunscreen.  Until then, take what you’ve learned so far, and get started.  Your skin will love you for it.

© 2011 OC Skin Solutions

Healthy Skin Care: Toner

 

Toners are one of the most misunderstood components of a healthy skin care routine.  Some people think that they don’t do anything, and some think that only people with acne need it to “dry” out their pimples.  It is confusing, but I am going to try to separate the fact from the fiction on this, and show you why toner should be in everyone’s skin care kit.

Toners are often lumped into the same category as astringents, even though they function completely differently.  Traditionally, an astringent is made up of alcohols, and other such ingredients to “shrink “the pores and dry up acne.  Perhaps some of you remember Bonnie Bell, or Seabreeze—these astringents felt bracing and stung when they went on, so we assumed they were doing what we were told.  Fortunately, cosmetic science has come a long way, and we now know that it is (currently) physiologically impossible to shrink the size of a pore by using an astringent, or toner.  We also know that alcohols strip the skin’s surface of it’s natural lipids (or barrier layer), and causes photosensitivity.  This paves the way to premature aging of the skin, and an increased susceptibility to sun damage.  As a skin care professional, I cannot, and do not recommend astringents for facial care, for anyone; I see no up side.

Toners are a different story.  There are all different types of toners, some terrific, some are just astringents being called “toner.”  As always, really look at the ingredients in your product.  If an alcohol is listed as one of the first few ingredients, you are probably looking at an astringent.  If it is near, or at the end of the list, it is probably a component of the preservative, and fraction of a percent of active ingredient. 

Typically, an effective toner will contain highly concentrated ingredients that will benefit, hydrate and nourish the skin.  Most toners have the consistency of a thin liquid, which makes it possible to penetrate the skin’s surface more easily than a cream, thereby delivering the ingredients more efficiently.  And this is the root reason for my love-affair with toner—if used effectively, toners make it possible for the performance ingredients in your serums, moisturizes, masques, and spot treatments to work more successfully.

Here is how to make your toner work for you. 

1.     Make sure you choose a toner that has ingredients appropriate for your skin type.

2.     Look to see if the toner is in a spray bottle, or if you need to put it on cotton first (see note below).

3.     Close eyes, and apply a fine mist over entire face and neck.

4.     Important: while toner is still damp, apply the next step of your skin care routine.

5.     Re-apply during the day, whenever your skin needs a boost in hydration.

Note:  If a toner is in a spray bottle, you can be reasonably assured that there is little or no alcohol in the product.  If the toner has no spray bottle, it does not necessarily mean that it has alcohol in it, it just means you need to check the label carefully.  If you do need to apply with cotton, place a thin coat all over face a neck, then proceed as directed above.

You can expect to read more about toners in future posts, but as a component of your baseline skin care routine, please understand that toner is the workhorse—it makes all your other product work more effectively.

Healthy Skin Care: a.k.a “Baseline Routine”

      Billions of dollars are spent every year on skin care products and cosmetics in an effort to “fix” or cover up some type of skin issue.  Each month we open up the pages of a magazine, and get bombarded with advertisements selling “the-next-greatest-skin-care-technology.” It’s easy to get sucked into these ads—“hmmmmm, maybe that is the product that is going to make my skin fresh looking again.” Unless you have a solid, daily routine, it is likely that you will spend the money, and not get the results you seek.

     As a Medical Esthetician, I typically see people who “have tried everything” and are still not getting the results they want.  After a very thorough assessment, we usually discover that the foundation of their routine is not effective; therefore the products they are using are less effective, and or completely ineffective.  I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to spend $45-$75 on a hydrating serum if the active ingredients will never get to the cells they are intended to affect.

     So here it is, the baseline routine to pave the way for better skin. I will go into each component more completely during the week, but for now, here is the formula (my “prescription” if you will):

Two times a day:

1.     Cleanse

2.     Tone

3.     Moisturize

4.     Sunscreen (sunscreen should not be worn at night, however, it should be reapplied often during the day if you are outside a lot.  If you are in an office all day, you still need to apply it in the morning—more on that later).

      That’s it. That is the most basic routine that can improve your skin, and keep it healthy.  Tomorrow I will start to be more specific with each part of the routine.  Until then, follow the routine tonight, eat healthy food, drink a lot of water, and get a good night’s rest—your skin will love you for it!