Friday, April 8, 2016

A Skin Care Introduction

Hi Readers!

      My name is Lindsey and I am 21 years old. I am currently in school to be an Esthetician and I'm almost to my 300 hours which will get me my license which is so exciting!! I wanted to start this blog because through the first 300 hours of being in school I have really grown to love learning about skin care and products and I really want to share with other people how to take care of their skin and how to love taking care of their skin.
       I want to share with all of you my skin care story so that you can understand I am not coming for a place of being lucky with my skin. Obviously when we go through puberty we all end up with acne. In my case, as someone with naturally oily skin, I had lots of acne and I had no idea how to take care of it. Hormonal acne is probably the worst acne to have and the most annoying acne. I never was really taught the right way to take care of my skin by my mom. She never really cleansed her skin or used a toner or anything, she mostly just used a moisturizer before bed. She never told me to always wash my skin and make sure it was clean. She did share with me that she also struggled with acne as a teenager and made me feel that it was hereditary and I was just going to always have bad skin and there was nothing I could do about it. I don't even want to know how much money I have spent on useless skin care products in hopes that they would be the cure of my acne.
        I didn't know about the steps you need to take to make your skin good. If you're like me and you have oily skin it's sadly inevitable, but you will always struggle with acne. However if you take care of your skin and do the proper steps to keeping it clean and healthy then you will have great skin and probably only suffer from hormonal breakouts! About 3 years ago, my mom and I went into Lush on Newbury street in Boston and one of the workers there talked my mom into buying all these skincare products for me because my mom knew how much I struggled with my acne and she really wanted to help me get clearer skin. The employee at Lush told my mom about 2 products which were Ultrabland and Eau Roma toner water. Ultrabland is an oil based cleanser which is wicked good at taking off makeup. I'm pretty sure that a lot of people know this by now, but oil fights oil. I know it may sound crazy, but if you use an oil based product on oily skin properly than you won't get more breakouts or feel like there is too much oil on your skin.
        I did only use Ultrabland for taking off my makeup but because I used that product instead of something filled with chemicals my skin improved by 50%. I swear by Ultrabland. I will say that you should never use an oil based cleanser as just your regular cleanser. Always use it as a pre-cleanse to get off your makeup for the day and then go in with another cleanser. The Eau Roma toner water is such a wonderful product too. If you don't know, toners are probably the one step in your skin care that you cannot miss. Toners help balance the pH level in your skin. When you cleanse your skin you aren't just cleaning off all the dirt and makeup from your day, but you also strip your skin of it's natural oils, which is called your acid mantle. The pH scale is acid to alkaline, so when you cleanse your skin you put it into an alkaline state and a toner restores it to an acidic state.
        Without toning you are going to leave your skin without a good barrier which can make impurities, dirt and other things get into your pores which will clog them resulting in acne. Also if you use any kind of cleanser that makes your skin feel tight afterwards and don't use a toner than your skin will produce mare oil which will also give you more breakouts. I could not live without toning my face. It's something I will never skip in my skincare routine. Now for moisturizers I feel like you could use any kind of moisturizer as long as you make sure that it is non-comedogenic which means that it won't clog your pores. I do feel like you can't go wrong with all natural products because they are the best for your skin, but as long as it's a product that doesn't clog your pores you should be fine. My holy grail moisturizer is Skin Drink from Lush. I swear by Lush products if you couldn't tell. It is not too heavy, doesn't leave your skin feeling greasy and it just melts right into your skin. You can't go wrong with it, it's the best.
         Skincare is a very important thing. I know first hand that it is hard to remember to clean your face every morning and every night. If you make it a step in your day then it won't be as hard to forget. Make it as important as brushing your teeth or taking a shower, even eating breakfast! Start off by cleaning your face every night and then once you see a difference in your skin and how great it looks because you've started to make it a priority then you can add it into your morning routine before you brush your teeth. I for one can't go to bed unless I have cleaned my face. I literally won't fall asleep unless I feel like my face is clean. Also remember that drinking water can also play a HUGE part in the appearance of your skin. It will make it more healthy and glowing, even if your forgot to clean your skin that morning.
          I really want to share with people the importance of taking care of your skin and how it can make you feel when it looks good and healthy. I wish I had known how to take care of my skin when I was a teenager because then my skin would look even better than it does now. I know that going to get facials is a pretty pricey thing to do, but you should try and go get a facial every month. Having someone cleaning your skin out properly and tell you what might be happening to it and just using the right products could make a huge change in your skin too. I hope that you have taken something out of this post. It was my first one on skincare and I want it to just be a broad overview of taking care of your skin. If you have any comments on skincare or products that I use besides the ones I have listed then please comment on this.

Thanks for reading!
Lindsey