I hear from a lot of you in the winter months that you are DRY. Your skin is dry, your lips are dry, your eyebrows and lashes are dry. This is not normal. If you are exfoliating, hydrating AND moisturizing and using the right skincare products for YOUR skin, your skin should be hydrated, soft, moisturized and glowing no matter what the weather is doing! The first of these I’d like to address is HYDRATION.
When skin is at its driest, a daily and nightly hydration boost is exactly what it needs and serums pack the biggest punch, in some cases raising hydration levels by 200% after just one use. Layer one under your moisturizer morning and night to comfort dry skin.
When you have dry skin, moisture leaks out and the environment can come in. Your skin gets these little fissures or tears and it gets chapped and cracked. Pollution, hot air, cold air, bacteria, pollen can get in and touch the vital live skin and that’s when you get redness and irritation. Plus, dryness prevents skincare products from working as well as they could. When the skin is dry, it usually has a pileup of dead skin cells; it’s like having flakes on top of your skin. Your moisturizer just “sits” on top.
Our Active Hydration Serum provides skin with a continuous drink of water and instant hydration and relief. In an 8 day clinical study, It instantly raised hydration levels in the skin by 200% after just one use and kept it there for 8 hours. It helps skin look, act and feel younger.
The best time to quench dry skin on your face, hands, kips, and body is right before bed. Make moisturizers, overnight creams and anti-aging products part of your nightly skincare routine this winter and wake up to a more luminous, younger-looking you!
I know how hard it can be on cold winter nights when you are snuggled on the couch up with Netflix and a glass of wine and REALLY don’t want to get up to wash your face. But, you must continue to wash our face every single night before bed. Did you know that NOT WASHING your face just ONE night ages your skin by 18 DAYS?
At night the skin’s most important function is to renew itself. Regardless of whether you wear makeup daily or not - the oils you produce on your skin during the day, as well as environmental pollutant buildup, continue to contaminate, deteriorate and damage your skin at night. Not washing your face makes pores larger, while harvesting bacterial growth.
Think about it... How much are you involuntarily aging your skin by not washing your face? Toxic buildup damages the tissue and strips your skin of its youth and healthy glow.
R+F makes it easy to treat your skin and keep it healthy for life! If you do nothing else for your skin, at least cleanse it nightly!
Rodan + Fields newest launch, Radiant Defense Perfecting Liquid is an all-in-one product that is GOOD for your skin, offering protecting and perfecting benefits. This product is non-comedogenic, non-acnegenic, and protects skin from environmental damage - PLUS it evens out skin tone and creates a sheer glow!
Starting today - thru January 31st - If you order our Active Hydration Serum for your face along with our Active Hydration Body Replenish Cream with you current skincare Regimen - you will get an EXTRA 20% off your already Preferred Customer discount! A great time to ensure your skin is hydrated going into the deepest winter months!
I use both of these products nightly and swear by both of them!
Here is a photo of my friend Beth's forehead after just using the Active Hydration Serum 3 nights in a row. Hydrated skin is healthier, younger-looking and younger-acting and less prone to irritations and sensitivities. Message me today to get in on this amazing limited time promotion!
January consistently presents itself as a perfect blank slate in which to write all kinds of fresh goals. While strengthening one’s fitness game often gets much of the new year love, it’s also prime time to finally get your skin looking better than it’s ever looked before. But as you’re becoming more diligent about ingredients and building up a foundational skin-care routine, it’s important to not forget about the basics that also lead to a healthy complexion.
Take it from Miranda Kerr, supermodel, mother, Well+Good Council member, and beauty brand CEO who’s all about taking a holistic approach to beauty. While the multi-hyphenate loves a good skin-care product, she’s also always preaching the importance of living a healthy life in other ways in order to reap the glowy skin benefits. To get her secrets, I spoke with Kerr about her tips for ensuring your complexion stays radiant year-round. Keep scrolling for her healthy skin advice.
Miranda Kerr’s 4-step plan for glowing skin in 2019
1. Take time out for yourself: “I feel that it’s so important to take a little time each day for yourself,” says Kerr, who just had her second child (in other words: finding that time is hard but essential). “For me personally, I find if I can take 15 minutes to do a meditation or set aside some time to exercise, I feel much more balanced and am able to give so much more to my family, work, and friends.”
2. Prepare for sleep: As you well know, getting sufficient ZZZs is key for everything from lower stress levels to getting healthier skin. “Sleep is so crucial for your overall wellness,” says Kerr. Her trick for getting enough? “Incorporate a nighttime ritual to help yourself wind down from the day and to encourage a restful night’s sleep. I like to do a meditation, turn off the WiFi, and then mist my face and pillow with aromatherapy - very soothing and relaxing.”
3. Practice facial massage: “A new step to my morning and evening beauty routine is using a rose quartz gua sha stone to practice the ancient healing technique,” says Kerr, who swears by the lymphatic drainage and blood circulation benefits of massaging your face with the stone. “It’s used to massage your face and neck to stimulate circulation and reduce puffiness while lifting, toning, and sculpting. I use this technique daily for a 5-minute facial massage with a facial oil as it also helps it absorb deeper into your skin.”
4. Drink cold-pressed celery juice: Turns out Kerr’s a fan of the wellness green drink du jour: celery juice. ” I have been starting the day with a cold-pressed organic celery juice,” she says. “I drink a glass on an empty stomach, first thing in the morning and at least 30 minutes before I eat breakfast. Celery juice has many anti-inflammatory properties.” So take it from Kerr and sip on that for an added glow.
At this point, I’ve got the whole staying-warm-during-outdoor-winter-runs thing down to an art form. Fleece running tights? Check. A heat-bonded jacket? Check. Insulated gloves, socks, and a hat? Check, check, and check. However, while keeping my body warm during sub-zero sprints is a no-brainer, my skin is a totally different story. No matter what I do prior to hitting the pavement, after 30 minutes in the elements my face feels like it might fall right off. So I asked a dermatologist: What should I be putting on my skin before working out in cold weather?
The answer, according to dermatologist Heather Woolery Lloyd, MD and founder of Specific Beauty, is three-fold. “You want a barrier, so a ceramide-based product would be helpful because the wind can strip your skin,” she explains. “The wind against your skin is in a way mechanically removing the top layer, so you want to have a barrier. So ceramides are important because that’s truly what they are: barrier repair.” You’ll want to prevent moisture from leaving your skin by way of transepidermal water loss (which will ultimately dehydrate it), so look for the phrase “barrier repair cream” on your labels for a hint that they’re packed with ceramides.
In addition to this protection from the elements, you’ll also want to look for an ingredient that pulls the moisture from the air to help hydrate your skin. Dr. Woolery suggests hyaluronic acid, which can hold up to 400 times its weight in water, or (rather surprisingly) glycerin, which also helps raise the moisture levels of your skin when applied topically. And even if it’s below freezing and cloudy when you lace up, it’s important (as always) to layer up with sunscreen.
Pimples are a pestilent, diverse breed. One thing that makes them particularly annoying is that you never know how they’ll make their grand entrance. Sometimes, you wake up with a fresh, juicy whitehead on your face, but then there are other times—just as undesirable times—in which you essentially get the message from beneath the surface that a pimple’s a-brewin’ weeks before anything shows up on your skin. That’s how you know you’ve got cystic acne.
When the cyst is in ghost mode (AKA you still can’t see it on the surface quite yet) it can be helpful to know what you’re up against. “It’ll usually appear as a round, red bump under the skin that is sore or tender to the touch,” says Marnie Nussbaum, MD, a New York-based dermatologist. “There will be no whitehead at the top.” It could also be warm to the touch, since it’s actually a bacterial infection of your skin, according to skin-care guru Jenefer Palmer, Osea’s founder and formulator.
“Bacteria’s getting trapped inside the follicle and causing swelling as well as inflammation,” explains Dr. Nussbaum. This is why it’s pretty painful.
Along with a slew of other factors including genetics, you can expect these to typically pop up around that time of the month. “An imbalance of hormones is often to blame,” explains Palmer. But it’s not the kind of thing you can slap your regular pimple treatments on, like benzoyl peroxide or hydrocolloid patches, and call it a day—cysts require a strategic plan. Despite the fact that you can’t see anything, you should still start treating it as soon as you feel it coming. “Start treating it ASAP,” says Palmer. “Even with treatment, cysts can take several weeks to go away. When you start tackling it before it reaches the surface, I’ve seen infections clear up in two weeks or less, versus a month or more.”
Of course, despite how tempting it is, the solution is not to attempt popping it. “Once you feel a cyst, do not try to squeeze it as it’ll only pop under the skin, which will cause more swelling and inflammation,” says Dr. Nussbaum. “It’ll also take longer to heal, and possibly cause an infection.”
Ready to attack? Keep scrolling for your cystic acne treatment plan, according to the pros.
Your cystic acne action plan
1. See a dermatologist
First of all, if you can, head right to your derm’s office for a cortisone shot. “The best thing to do is get a cortisone injection, which will shrink the cyst within 48 hours,” says Dr. Nussbaum. Though it’s not in everyone’s get-rid-of-acne-stat repertoire, it does work.
2. Hit the ice
Know that ice cubes are your friend. “Place an ice cube in a paper towel over the cyst for 10 minutes on, 10 minutes off, for an hour to vasoconstrict the blood vessels, which will decrease inflammation,” says Dr. Nussbaum. “Don’t leave it on for too long since you can burn your skin with the ice.” Then wash your skin with a salicylic acid cleanser followed by a tiny bit of moisturizer.” She recommends then, after a few minutes, to apply a tiny bit of topical benzoyl peroxide.
3. Exfoliate
Palmer notes that any exfoliating cleanser is helpful as well. “Use a gentle exfoliating cleanser–one with lactic acid or other naturally plant-based chemical exfoliating agents,” she says. This will rid the pores of bacteria and the top layer of dead skin cells so it’s easier to reach that cyst.
4. Keep it clean
It’s key to look for antibacterial ingredients in topicals to keep things clean and to prevent the infection from spreading. “Apply products with naturally antibacterial properties such as tea tree, rosemary, and thyme,” Palmer suggests.
5. Stay hydrated
Whatever you do: Do not attempt to dry your pimple out. “Keep your skin lightly moisturized, since drying it out will just lead to increased oil production and further infection,” says Palmer. One way to do this is with a hyaluronic acid serum, which binds moisture into the skin without depositing breakout inducers.
6. Lay off dairy
Bonus points for avoiding dairy, particularly during a cystic breakout. “We’ve had customers eliminate dairy from their diet,” says Palmer. “Not only does it often reduce the severity of cystic acne, but it seems to help prevent its occurrence.” Plus there are studies backing up the tie between dairy and inflammation—and at the very least, you want that inflammation gone.
Out with the old; in with the new: It’s the perfect January skincare mantra. If extreme weather or too much holiday fun has left your complexion dull and dry, one of the fastest and most effective ways to make a change is to exfoliate — that is, to remove old skin cells, revealing newer skin underneath.
Exfoliating helps with cell turnover, the natural shedding of dead cells that slows down as we age. If these cells accumulate, skin can feel rough and look dull. Exfoliation helps remove some of that debris, so skin is smoother and reflects light more evenly.
There are two different ways to accomplish this instant New Year’s transformation: Mechanical exfoliators polish away dead cells using granules, such as sugar or salt crystals. Chemical exfoliators, which include glycolic acid, lactic acid and salicylic acid, dissolve the bond between old cells and the newer ones underneath.
So which exfoliation method is better? Rodan + Fields founders Dr. Katie Rodan and Dr. Kathy Fields recommend both. “We’re fans of both gentle chemical and mechanical exfoliation, with the key word being ‘gentle,” they explain in their book Write Your Skin a Prescription for Change. “In our experience, it takes the perfect combination of the two to dissolve the bonds between cells without irritating skin and to sweep away dead cells, leaving skin soft and smooth.”
The Doctors’ advice: “Don’t overdo it.” If you don’t exfoliate regularly and want to start, or if you’ve only used one kind of exfoliator and would like to add the chemical or mechanical product you’re missing, give your skin time to get used to it:
Start slow, and don’t overscrub. If your skin looks red or feels raw, take a break and give it a chance to recover.
Treat your face and body differently. The skin on elbows, knees and heels may respond well to daily exfoliation, while your face may prefer it every few days. And avoid the temptation to use a body scrub on your face; the exfoliating particles may be too aggressive. (If you’re looking for one scrub formulated for both face and body, try our ENHANCEMENTS Micro-Dermabrasion Paste.)
For best results, moisturize after you exfoliate.
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