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Just as you switch over your wardrobe from sundresses to scarves, now’s also the
Lamelle Medical Trainer Karen Bester helps us understand why we need to take extra care of our largest organ this season!
Baby it’s cold outside
Watch the heat. While it might be cold - heaters and hot showers are likely to sap moisture from your skin. With the air already being dry, you’ll just make it worse.
Change your cleanser
The easiest way to prevent your skin from drying out is not to remove its oils in the first place. If you are removing them, replace them immediately. Creamy gel and lipid-based cleansers do both. They may contain surfactants (substances that reduce the surface tension of a liquid when it’s dissolved) that loosen the potentially contaminated oils on your skin - but they replace them with lipids contained in the products. The upshot of this approach is your skin gets properly cleansed of pollutants and free radicals and stays beautifully hydrated at the same time.
Add oils and up your lipids
Dry and dehydrated is not the same thing. If your skin is dry it means the surface layer is lacking in moisture and can present as peeling flaky skin. Dehydration on the other hand is when the lower levels deep within the epidermis are short on moisture and your skin will appear dull. The solution is that you don’t need to wait out winter with these issues and that there are treatment solutions for both conditions.
Rich hydrating moisturisers
It’s a common misconception that simply slathering on extra moisturiser will reverse the effects of winter on your skin. Truth be told: It won’t. Opt for moisturisers with a higher lipid content that are biocompatible (not harmful) with the lipids in your skin. The closer the structure is to the lipids in human skin – the greater the moisturising effect. You can also add more oil (even though oil has a bad connotation) to step up the lipid content of your daily and nightly moisturisers. It’s also important to consider what other advantages the moisturiser will provide. It’s very important to to check which active ingredients your products contain – bearing in mind that at a minimum antioxidants should feature on the ingredient list.
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Serums will save your skin
No winter skin survival kit should be without a serum. They have the ability to penetrate deeper into the layers of your skin. Hyaluronic acid is a complex carbohydrate that traps and shares water in your skin keeping it plump and hydrated. Allow a minute or two for the serum to sink in before applying your moisturiser as the serum will plump skin within an hour and will keep it hydrated.
