Archive for September, 2010

How to Get Rid of Sagging Skin. (And What Causes It?)

Or maybe skin sagging just can’t be reversed?

If you think about it sagging skin is pretty much at the root of skin aging. Wrinkles, fine lines, bags under the eyes and more are really just the visible evidence of skin sagging to one degree or another. So let’s examine what causes sagging skin and what you can do to correct it.

Skin sagging is the visible expression of ageing. As you age your skin starts to lose some of its natural components such as collagen and elastin. Collagen and elastin are both extremely important skin proteins which have a major role in maintaining skin elasticity and suppleness.

If your skin is supple and elastic then it won’t sag. The elasticity shall ensure that your skin remains firm and strong and sag free. And when you were young this was the case.

When you were young your skin was plump and healthy. However, sadly for us, levels of these essential skin proteins start to decrease when we are in our 30s, and by the time we have reached middle age the levels of collagen and elastin are greatly decreased.

There’s a range of reasons for this, age being the first. However there are other reasons as well, and in particular getting too much sun. Sun exposure can break down collagen and elastin and this contributes to the problem. Too much exposure to the sun, or what is technically termed photo ageing, can accelerate loss of collagen and elastin.
Sagging Skin
And there is also evidence that smoking will do exactly the same thing.

As our levels of collagen and elastin decline, and as skin loses it’s youthful elasticity, it begins to sag and to form wrinkles and lines. Different women will see the results in different places. Whether it’s under your eyes, your neck, around your mouth or in other areas, wrinkles or just downright sagging gradually begin to develop.

So what can you do if you’re noticing your skin sagging and wrinkles forming? Obviously you can’t turn back time, but you can start to develop an awareness of the problems of excessive sun exposure and smoking. If you smoke and you care about your skin you need to stop. And avoid sunburn like the plague.

And how do you start to restore the declining levels of skin elastin and collagen? Good question, and one which has engaged the attention of science for many years.

If you examine many of the mainstream skin care products on the market you will see collagen and elastin listed on the label. It’s been known for some time that putting elastin and collagen on the skin doesn’t help restore skin collagen and elastin because the molecule size of these 2 proteins is too large to enter the skin. They just stay on the surface.

In fact the reason you see them listed on the label is to sell more bottles of product.

Fortunately some very clever scientists have found a way to stimulate the skin to grow more of it’s own collagen and elastin. Some outstanding natural skin care products achieve this by use of a a very clever combination of natural ingredients including the essences of Japanese seaweed, the wool of sheep and much much more.

And research has shown that using ingredients that are designed to stimulate the skin to grow more collagen and elastin really does work to improve skin elasticity and to reduce wrinkles and skin sagging.

There’s some very clever scientists out there. There are also some very clever marketers, and you need to know that buying skin care products containing collagen and elastin does very little to improve your skin levels of these proteins. But it sells lots of skin care products.

Education is important, and the same applies to skin care. Good skin care requires some effort, and includes some simple lifestyle changes like staying out of the sun to avoid sunburn, eating more fruit and vegetables and less saturated fats, stopping smoking, using high quality natural skin care products and also supplement in your diet with high quality Omega3 essential fatty acids.

The Omega 3 fatty acids are a big part of optimum skin care as well. Read the rest of this entry

Written by Peter Crump - Natural Skin Health

The Health Risks of Fragrances in Skin Care Products Revisited

You don’t want to find fragrances in skin care products. Here’s why

We have previously talked about the risks to your health from fragrances in skin care products and a range of other personal and beauty products. Today we wanted to go into a little more depth about the health risks of fragrances.

Just to recap, there are thousands of fragrances present in so many of the personal products such as anti aging skin care products, cosmetics, soaps, shampoos, deodorants and much more that virtually all of this use on our skin every single day.

Fragrances are chemicals, normally created in a lab, and the vast majority of them have never been tested for safety for use on people. So the health risks of many are simply unknown.

And in some cases the health risks are known, including neurotoxicity which can potentially lead to brain damage.

If you browse this page at the Cosmetics Database you’ll see a range of skin care and anti aging products listed there. In fact there are hundreds or possibly even thousands listed, however they can only fit so many on the page.

On the right you’ll see a coloured circle with a number in it. The number represents the score that the Cosmetics Database assigns to that product on a scale of 0 to 10, where 0 represents no perceived health hazards from the use of the product and 10 represents maximum health risk.

Of course there is some fluidity in these results, because, as is normally noted in the results, there are some gaps in the data and some other reasons why it is impossible to give a perfect result.

Notwithstanding this we wouldn’t want be using a product that has a score of 8 or above, let alone 10. In fact we wouldn’t want to use a skin care product with any number beside it at all. Data gaps or not we would prefer to err on the side of caution.

Now let’s look at one of the particular products listed there. Click on the one second from the top, namely Home Skin Lab effective Wrink’less The Wrinkle Corrector. The page you are presented with details the particular ingredients which are considered a health risk, together with a summary of the potential health risks. Here’s an image of that page.Fragrances in Skin Care Products

What do you notice about the ingredients? The top listed ingredient with the highest score, marked with a red circle, is fragrance. Click on fragrance and you’ll find out more.

If you’ve read our previous page you will know that the chemical used as a fragrance is often not listed on the label. Scroll down and you will note the statement “Ingredient not fully labeled – identity unknown”.

Need we say more about the risks of fragrances in anti aging skin care products and wide range of other personal and beauty products. Anyone concerned about fragrances, or any one of dozens of other chemical ingredients found in these products should immediately start looking for alternatives.

And spend some time looking at some of the other antiaging products with a score of 10 and see how often “fragrance” is listed there.

As far as skin care products go the good news is that one small niche skin care company recognizes completely the risks of fragrances, along with many other chemical ingredients, and produces extremely high quality natural skin care products that do not contain any fragrances for this reason. They also do not contain any other chemical ingredients which may be suspect to your health.

Not only that but they work extremely well and come with a 90 day money back guarantee. You can’t ask for more than that. Read the rest of this entry

Written by Peter Crump - Natural Skin Health


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