Looking After Your Skin

Our skin has to contend and survive us a whole lifetime and the acne, pimples and hormonal tidal waves that girl's have to face (and men too) are where the party only just begins! (Errr! I here you groan!) We all need to prepare ourselves as soon as possible to make sure we help our skin survive years ahead of aging and exposure to the elements. Ensuring beautiful healthy skin in the latter years of our lives and beyond, we all need to wisen up and get some skin sense and get it now!

It is important we all get into some preventative skincare now...especially with summer just around the corner because here comes the SUN!

Think healthy body - healthy skin...it does affect our overall health. Most of us know to get a good exercise regime happening of around a half an hour a day every day (well the idea is nice!) and also to clean our teeth and try to eat well with lots of fruit and vegies.

Now it is time to give our skin the attention it deserves!

By looking after our skin we are helping to:

Prevent:
1. Pimples and scars, breakouts, blemishes & acne
2. Premature aging: lines and wrinkles
3. Pigmentation disorders: brown spots from the sun and freckles (they may look cute but they are not always healthy!)
4. Skin diseases such as skin cancer.

And how can we do this?
By practising the following...

1. ADOPT A HEALTHY SKINCARE ROUTINE AT HOME

Start practicing healthy skin routines at home. Even when you are tired, have been out partying and the last thing you want to do is wash and cleanse your face, DO IT! You will thank yourself later in life!

Try to moisturise, cleanse and tone every morning and night. Try to moisturise with a cream that contains UV protection (SPF 15 at least!) and try to exfoliate your skin or use a mask at least once a week.

There are many other things that one can do to help skin stay healthier, such as steaming, scrubs, different lotions at different times...but the above mentioned are just absolute necessities!

2. WHAT WE EAT AFFECTS OUR SKIN

Eating a healthy diet loaded with vitamins and minerals plays a large role in the health of our skin. Skin can be the external view of what is actually going on inside our bodies. So if we are eating vast amounts of toxins, toxins will be coming out. They will show themselves in various forms, pimples, acne, blackheads, unbalanced oily skin, wrinkles etc.

Avoiding toxins found in caffeine, alcohol, tobacco and refined sugar will assist greatly in healthy looking and feeling skin.
Generally, if you know it is not healthy and good for you, try to avoid it...resist the urge!

3. WATER-HYDRATION

Yes, how many times have we heard or read...drink -8 glasses of water a day? Often when we are feeling hungry, it is often that we are thirsty before we are really hungry!

Assist in hydrating and cleansing your skin from the inside out, by increasing your daily water intake.

4. SUNSCREEN - EVERYDAY!

Unfortunately a lot of people are still unaware that damage is done to our skin even on the cloudiest of days! It really is imperative that we use a sun/UV protective lotion on our skin every day. It is now fact that damage is done even in the lowest amounts of UV exposure!

When you are walking to school, the shops, shopping, playing sport outside, walking to your friends house, getting in and out of the car, you are exposing your skin to UV rays. Use a good sunscreen with a minimum of SPF 15 or higher.

The most alarming fact is that most of the skin damage done to our skin is done before the age of 18!

So please, no matter what your age is, you can benefit and start now! Prevent those ugly brown spots called "hyper-pigmentation" appearing on your face later down the track.

Practicing preventative skin measures and giving your skin the attention it deserves will assist in preventing unhealthy skin and help to ensure beautiful skin for life!

So start now!

- Michelle Palmer (michelle@girl.com.au)

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