Exfoliate, exfoliate, exfoliate!

Exfoliation is the big buzz word now, from doctors to hollywood stars. It makes your face feel smooth and look great for a few weeks max. But there’s a way to make that feeling last as long as you’re willing to do some of the work yourself.

Basically, if you looked at a plug of your skin, it’s like Grapes, Raisins and Corn Flakes. The Grapes are the plump, moisture filled cells as they’re created. As they start to move to the surface, they lose some of their moisture and resemble Raisins. When they finally get to the surface, they’re completely dried out like Corn Flakes. Everyone touts the benefits of removing the top, dry layers of skin to reveal softer, smoother, younger looking skin. I even saw it on Dr. 90210 and The Doctors last week. You wouldn’t believe the results the first time you get a chemical peel and dermabrasion. But, have you seen the prices that spas are charging for this service? No? I had a client tell me that a local spa in Dallas (not a ritzy one either) wanted $600 for a 6 treatment package, or it would run $125 per session. Give any spa a call and get a price, don’t take my word for it. Not sure about you, but that’s WAY too steep for me.

When you have one of these treatments done at a spa, your skin looks great. But after a week or so, the dullness comes back and you may start to have acne, even if you’ve never had it before. The reason is that your skin’s turnover process has been jump-started and will start producing additional layers more quickly than before. This causes the layers to build up and they might not slough off quickly enough. The biggest problem is that you’ve only had one treatment and probably can’t afford (or don’t have time) to go back to the spa every week, and you really need to do this once or twice a week.

Deep exfoliation can benefit nearly everyone. Do you have acne? Exfoliation can help. Have dry skin? Ditto. Large pores, uneven skin tone, wrinkles, leathery skin? The list goes on and on. This is especially true of underlying UV damage. You’d be surprised what your skin looks like under a UV light, it would scare you! But you can get rid of some of that underlying damage over time by doing regular dermabrasions. You might even be able to help sensitive skin, rosacea or eczema, but you’ll have to do a test patch to make sure your skin can handle it. I have a client with rosacea that uses it in with our Skinlogics Sensitive, and you can’t even tell that she has rosacea. Personally, I have eczema and I do a chemical peel and dermabrasion twice a week. I just have to be more careful during flare-ups.

In part 2, we’ll see how to do regular exfoliation in the comfort of your own home. Don’t worry, it’s easy and fool-proof!

What has your personal experience been? We’d love to hear it!

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