I’m at war with my skin.
My hormones are out of whack, which means my face can’t decide if it’s the face of a 40 year old woman or a 13 year-old girl entering puberty. There’s nothing like having to put wrinkle cream around my eyes and acne medicine along my jaw line. I’m not even going to discuss the dark spots I’ve had crop up out of no where.
I’ve been makeup free for days to give my skin time to breathe, drinking water with lemon, eating clean, you name it I’ve done it.
I blame my epidermis. For the first few decades of life, your epidermis renews itself every 30 days, by the time you’re 40, it takes roughly 45 days.
There’s that magic number again, 40. Don’t get me wrong, I love being 40. It’s great, but not so great for my skin.
I can whine, or I can get off my keister and take care of business. I’m taking care of business with steps outlined here to get my face back to some semblance of normal.
1. When I wake up, I’ll have a cup of warm water with lemon. According to Ayurveda, the warm water serves to stimulate the gastrointestinal tract and peristalsis—the waves of muscle contractions within the intestinal walls that keep things moving. Secondly, lemons and limes are high in minerals and vitamins and help loosen ama, or toxins, in the digestive tract.
Clean system, clear face. ‘Nuff said.
2. I’m marrying my Clarisonic. I’ve not been using my Clarisonic as I should and I’m pretty sure that is part of my problem. My epidermis isn’t renewing as often and I’m not helping it by keeping up with my routine. A few times a week isn’t going to cut it. For it to work like it’s supposed to, I’m going back to twice-a-day use.
3. Clean eating. I’ve been participating in NaNoWriMo and to be quite honest, my good eating habits have fallen off. When you’re staring at a screen, writing dialogue, sometimes the only thing that helps is chocolate, preferably drizzled over vanilla ice cream.
4. Retinoids are my friend right now. OTC, prescription, what have you. I’m clearing my face up (and hopefully plumping up the collagen in my skin at the same time!).
What this boils down to is vanity, plain and simple. I’m vain about very few things, so this little vanity doesn’t bother me on say, a spiritual level. But it drives me bananas on a ritualistic, staring in the mirror variety.
Guess I’ll be bananas a little longer.