When Does Skincare Become Too Much? - Merindah Botanicals

When Does Skincare Become Too Much?

Is there such a thing as doing too much to your skin?

If there is one thing that needs to be taken care of, it is your skin.

There are many things that can affect the largest organ, ranging from the sun, stress and hormones.

When you look into the mirror and see acne breakouts, dry skin or any other condition, it seems easy to just reach for the multitude of products and hope to all that is holy that they provide you with a flawless glow.

However, you should not let emotion run rampant over your decision making process. The skin is a very delicate organ that requires a careful balance of pH levels, micro bacteria and lipid levels.

Lathering your skin up in all manner of products including serums, cleansers, retinol and moisturisers may be doing you more harm than good.

Here are some clear cut signs of the skin in a distressed state that indicate you should cut down on the products or treatments in your skin care regimen.

Acne and Excessive Oil

It seems intuitive to want to exfoliate and cleanse your face regularly when you are experiencing breakouts and oil throughout the day. Although acne is a multifactorial condition, using AHA's, BHA's and other exfoliant daily will strip your skin of its natural moisturising factors and disrupt pH levels.

Red, Sensitive and Flaky Skin

The redness can be a result of over exfoliation, excessive cleansing, using ingredients such as benzoyl peroxide and over stimulating clinic treatments such as chemical peels and regular microdermabrasion.

Aged and Dry Looking Skin

When your skin looks dry and appears aged despite the fact that you are religiously following a skin care routine, it means there is something inherently wrong with your regimen.

Chronic inflammation will reduces the cells ability to function and leads to DNA damage.

What is Happening in the Skin?

These signs of skin irritation can be due to the fact that the numerous products have eroded the acid mantle. What’s the acid mantle, you ask.

Well, this is the thin and slightly acidic film on the skin that deters the entry of bacteria and other contaminants.

Once this layer is removed, it is open season on the skin from these foreign bodies as the layers of skin are unable to operate at their core function.

This means that the skin is more permeable to even yet more irritants which seep in to the nerve endings and small blood vessels in the deeper layers of the skin.

In the case of acne this leads to the skin producing more sebum to protect itself from the external environment and results in a unregulated shine through your day.

Inflamed, dry, flaky or premature ageing skin can be the result of transepidermal water loss – the loss of water from between the cells that make up the layers of the skin.

In this state, the skin is even more likely to be irritated by your products, setting a deadly cycle if you continue to adhere to the beauty regimen.

Regulating your skin care routine, therefore, becomes something that you should take very good note of. The ageing of the skin has been attributed to a slow, chronic inflammation.

With countless products and treatments causing low grade inflammation in the hopes to stimulate collagen, not allowing the skin to heal completely between treatments leads to a chronic inflammation that doesn't allow optimised repair.

It is no wonder that you might find your skin looking a little older if you are having weekly clinic treatments as well as a rigorous home routine.

How Can You Repair the Damage?

At home, Hyaluronic acid and Niacinamide with repair the acid mantle and provide much needed hydration to heal the skin, without the greasy residue feeling.

Vitamin C is excellent at preventing ageing by acting as an antioxidant – neutralizing the reactive oxygen species brought about by exposure of external pollutants and cell damage.

With this information in hand, you might be tempted to go full out on vitamin C application, looking for a serum with the highest concentration of vitamin C. This is a fruitless endeavour seeing as the skin can only absorb vitamin C at a concentration of up to 20 per cent.

Look for serums with no more than 20% to optimise delivery and reduce the chance of irritation. In regards to in clinic treatments, it is just as important to incorporate hydrating, healing and infusion treatments as it is to include chemical peels and microdermabrasion.

If you are already experiencing signs of irritation omitting all forms of exfoliation at home and clinic may be necessary until the skin barrier is repaired.

About the author:

At Aroze Dermal Therapies, the dermal clinicians are well versed with the aspects of skin care and are excellent at guiding you through the formulation of a skin care routine that does not task your skin too much. Marnina Diprose, proprietor and dermal clinician, boasts a Bachelor of Health Science in Dermal Therapy.

Her credentials are beefed up by sitting on the Board for the Australian Society of Dermal Clinicians. Marnina is also an ardent believer in a holistic approach to patient care and has a passion in scar revision.

References

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18254816 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4082169/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24833586