Spring is a great time to get a facial, as we face summer with a smile and want to show off glowing skin. So let’s talk about exfoliation.
Exfoliation involves the removal of the oldest dead skin cells on the skin’s outermost surface and is something included in all facials, during microdermabrasion and in chemical peels. The reason it’s key to your skin care regimen is that making exfoliation a routine practice results in smoother skin, helps to prevent wrinkles, provides a vehicle for healthy products to penetrate outer skin layers, and aids with acne control.
In the case of exfoliation, however, more is not necessarily better. Skin care specialists recommend exfoliating up to twice weekly, but not more frequently than that, since over-exfoliating or using the wrong exfoliation technique can damage your skin.
I advise my clients to use cream-based exfoliators with round beads, but to stay away from scrubs with pits at all costs, since it will caused micro-cuts on the skin’s surface. Exfoliation treatments I perform include chemicals such as glycolic, salicylic, pumpkin, trichloroacetic Acid, mineral Jessner peels, mineral retinol, and lactic peels. At my fingertips are ultrasonic as well as microdermabrasion tools that help products permeate faster and more completely. But I try to caution my clients about educating themselves when doing peels like these at home. If not done with diligence and caution, just when you think you are doing something amazing to your skin, you may be injuring it just ahead of some special event you prepared for.
On a personal note, one of my clients who is nearing her late 60s now tells me that her once-monthly facials are paying off in spades. As she sees friends her age beginning to complain about wrinkles around their mouths, sagging skin, and discoloration, she realizes that the past 4 years she has dedicated to these appointments have significantly slowed the aging process on her face. Regular exfoliations administered on my treatment table as well as using products at home with detailed instruction has paid off. Of course, everyone’s skin ages differently — all subject to how we treated it when we were younger (ah, those long days in the sun!), diet, and, of course, DNA.
In the end, it seems when we take care of our skin, our skin takes care of us.
For more information about exfoliation and which treatments are best for you to get on track to a more youthful appearance, give me a call at (916) 294-9980 or email me at info@thehealingstation.net.
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