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Bathe or Shower Only as Much as Necessary To Improve Skin Health
Excessive cleansing removes the skin's natural oil layer which increases evaporation of the skin's water.
The skin oils are necessary to retain moisture in the skin and for keeping healthy skin.
It is the naturally-retained water in the skin that increases it's suppleness and softness.
Showers soak the skin less than baths and are less drying.
If you have skin irritations or dry skin, try to use lukewarm water. Hot water is more drying to the skin.
Your skin routine should include trying to limit your time to fifteen minutes or less in the bath or shower.
Minimize soaps and detergents. Bathing should be done no more than once a day. If you bathe too frequently with soaps, you will remove the natural oils from the skin, make the skin dryer make keeping healthy skin more diificult.
Long, hot bathes are wonderful relaxers, but should be limited to once or twice weekly.
Essential Makeup Tips!
Consistent applications and removal of makeup (with its colored salts and chemical dyes) along with makeup removers (which damage both the protective acid mantle and the skin’s protein/lipid barrier) are harsh on skin. For models and actors, the long hours of heavy makeup on the skin, scene changes, and touch ups, lights used in the industry and the stress to keep skin looking blemish-free can take its toll.
1. Before applying makeup, use a light protective layer of a mild copper peptide serum on the skin.
2. Remove makeup with biological healing oils, instead of harsh makeup removers.
3. Only wash the skin with mild cleansers specifically formulated to be mild.
4. Repair your skin with copper peptides followed by a light application of a biological healing oil.
5. Remove damage marks with daily use of 10% hydroxy acids (lactic and/or salicylic).
6. Repair deeper damage with moderate-to-strong copper peptide spot treatment creams.
Use Steam Baths and Saunas as Cleansing Alternatives For Keeping Healthy Skin
Sauna and steam bath users have very beautiful skin. In a sauna, less water is in contact with the skin and there is less removal of your skin's necessary oils, making sauna and steam bath usage a valuable practice in caring for your skin.
Avoid Harsh Soaps in Your Skin Routine
Harsh soaps dry the skin and make caring for your skin more difficult.
Mild cleansers are better for your skin. Avoid harsh deodorant soaps.
When a child's skin is damaged, the wound healing begins rapidly and scars and skin lesions are rapidly removed.
Make sure all the soap is rinsed from the skin before you leave the tub or shower. Limit the use of soap to areas that develop an odor such as the armpits, genital area, and feet.
Dry Your Skin Gently and Use Oils to Moisturize
When toweling dry, gently rub the skin. Blot or pat dry so there is still some moisture left on the skin.
Bath body oils such as baby oil, mineral oil, Herbal Bath Oil, Lubriderm Bath Oil, or Neutrogena Body Oil can be applied to your wet skin after you emerge from the bath or shower as a supplement to your daily skin care routine.
More natural alternative oils for skin are emu oil, or squalane works well to moisturize dry skin areas and are better for keeping healthy skin.
Do Not Use Astringents and Toners
Astringents and toners are very drying to skin and are not recommended to improve skin health.
They can make the facial skin look very clean and smooth by stripping the top layer of oil from the face and briefly tighten the skin.
However, the skin responds by increasing oil production.
Humidify Your Home To Help Keep Healthy Skin
Filling your house with plants is one of the best ways of adding humidity to the air and reducing dry skin while helping you keep healthy skin.
Alternately, a water humidifier can keep the indoor air at healthy humidity levels.
Let Your Natural Bacteria Protect You
Normal skin has about 81,000 bacteria per square centimeter.
These normally harmless bacteria arrive after birth and remain for your lifetime.
They protect you from the establishment of disease-causing harmful bacteria by filling the niches in the skin's environment that harmful bacteria could occupy.
If excessive use of disinfectants removes your natural bacteria, then more harmful strains may infect the skin.
While people worry over environmental bacteria, your best protection against harmful bacteria is a healthy skin with a resistant barrier.
If you work in a profession that requires constant hand washing, your are at higher risk of invasion from foreign bacteria. Use sterile gloves whenever possible as part of your skin routine to keep your hands dry.
Unfortunately, about 15% of people have abnormally sensitive skin and even modest washing can produce serious skin inflammations and hand eczema.
Protecting Your Hands
Protect hands against soaps, cleansers and other chemicals by wearing vinyl gloves.
Have four or five pair and keep them in the kitchen, bathroom, nursery and laundry areas.
Have other pairs for non-wet housework and gardening.
Many people are sensitive to rubber or latex but may use vinyl or nitrile gloves. Always replace any gloves that develop holes.
Dry gloves out between cleaning jobs. Wear your gloves when peeling vegetables or handling citrus fruits or tomatoes.
When outdoors in cool weather, wear unlined leather gloves to protect against dry and chapped skin.
Keep your hands out of soapy water as much as possible, and avoid hand washing dishes or clothes as much as you can.
When you wash your hands, use lukewarm water and very little soap. Remove rings whenever washing or working with your hands. They trap soap and moisture next to skin.
Use an automatic dishwasher. Not only does this protect your hands, but the dishwasher is able to effectively sterilize your dishes which is very difficult to achieve by hand washing alone.
Regular Aerobic Exercise Improves Skin Health And Natural Skin Glow
A regular program of aerobic exercise can markedly improve skin health and overall quality.
Exercise increases the flow of blood to the skin and improves the nutrition and oxygen delivery of skin cells and encourages a natural skin glow.
Three to five hours a week of vigorous exercise increases overall body metabolism and indirectly helps your skin. Moderate exercise improves blood flow and retards many changes commonly attributed to aging as well as promoting a natural skin glow.
Prolonged periods of moderate exercise reduces weight more effectively than short-bursts of muscle-building exercise. People who live to advanced ages have a life filled with long-walks or field work - not condition training.
Mail carriers are the longest-lived occupational group in the USA. The body "wears-out" faster from a lack of use than overuse.
Physical ability decreases less with age than commonly believed. Exercise should be fun and reduce your stress levels.
Keep your hands out of soapy water as much as possible, and avoid hand washing dishes or clothes as much as you can.
Moderate exercise is as healthful as stressful exercise. Golf, hiking, walking, hunting, fishing, and even gardening are healthful exercises.
A ten year follow-up of middle aged men who exercised regularly found none of the expected decline associated with middle age such as increased weight and blood pressure.
At an average age of 55, these men had a twenty percent higher work capacity than men of similar age.
Healthy men in their fifties who exercise vigorously display a tissue oxygen uptake capacity (an excellent indicator of overall cardiovascular function) that is 20-30% higher than sedentary young men
Exercise also increases mitochondria and an enhanced workforce of hormones and enzymes to create energy.
Trained muscle takes up oxygen at a rate 2 to 4 times faster than untrained muscle and generates aerobic (with oxygen) energy two to four times faster.
Five months of training typically reduces the rise in blood lactic acid (which causes muscle cramps) by two thirds and doubles muscle aerobic capacity.
In the lungs, exercise increases both the blood capillary density and the number of air sacs thus improving the uptake of oxygen into the blood and facilitating the removal of blood carbon dioxide.
More work can be accomplished with less breathing effort as aerobic capacity increases.
How Much Exercise is Needed?
Exercise physiologist David Coastal (Ball State University) determined the rate of loss of conditioning after stopping exercise.
The ability of the muscles to produce aerobic energy decreases most rapidly, dropping by 50% in 1 week. Other indices of conditioning drop more slowly. The capillary density decreases by 10 to 20% after 5 to 12 days.
The capacity of the heart to pump blood (cardiac output) starts to diminish after 5 to 12 days of inactivity. Athletic performance - such as distance times of runners - shows little loss with one week of inactivity. Sometimes running performances may improve after 2 to 5 days of rest.
The rise in blood lactic acid following exercise is a measure of physical condition. Person in better physical condition have a smaller rise in lactic acid after exercise.
When persons who normally exercise stop exercising for one week, their blood lactic acid after exercise testing is 22% higher than it was when they were in peak physical condition.
After 4 weeks of no exercise, when they are tested, their lactic acid rises 88% above the level when they were in peak condition.
Keep your hands out of soapy water as much as possible, and avoid hand washing dishes or clothes as much as you can.
Well trained muscle contains more glycogen than untrained muscle, but after four weeks of sloth even this advantage is lost.
Two months of inactivity will wipe out about 90% of the conditioning gained through exercise. Highly gifted athletes perform no better than the normal population after 9 months of inactivity.
The amount of exercise needed to maintain conditioning is 30 minutes of aerobic exercise every 2 to 3 days. To improve your level of conditioning an increased exercise level - 40 to 60 minutes per day - is required.
Questions or Advice?
Email Dr. Loren Pickart at drlorenpickart@gmail.com
Call us at 1-800-405-1912 Monday Through Friday (8 am to 6 pm) PST
