CURRENT SKIN CARE – My internal and external tips for healthy, glowing skin!

Lets talk about SKIN.

More specifically I want to shed light on the factors which influence the health of our skin!

Lets just get straight into it.

For me having good skin has been a lifelong journey! I definitely was not blessed with the perfect skin gene and, like so many of us, my problematic skin started in my teenage years!

Throughout these years I feel like I tried EVERY SINGLE PRODUCT on the shelves at the supermarket (big mistake number 1) to clear my skin. I remember for so long I had this blue cleanser (that was quite literally neon blue) and after using it I’d feel like I literally could not move my face because the cleaser was sooooooooo harsh it stripped my skin of literally everything, leaving me all stiff and tight. I kept using this cleanser because I thought this was a good thing, I was getting all the bad shit off? Right? (BIG facepalm).

Fast forward a few years, I FINALLY realized the little blue bottle that stripped me of everything bar my soul was definitely not the way to go, and I experimented with different products. After this I got into oils, and although I love oils, the oils I used when I first was experimenting were NOT good oils and I literally would BATHE in them. So, basically I went from one extreme to the other.

I was basically stabbing around in the dark trying to nail this skin-care thing, until I finally surrendered and around a year ago I joined Caci’s (a beauty therapy clinic) “skin health plan”. This included a full skin analysis and then 2 weekly facials depending on my skin that week, to help correct my skin from the outside. Alongside this I got regular advice from the girls at Caci around the best skin care products for my skin type. If I learnt anything from the girls at Caci (other than its extremely awkward if you fall asleep during a facial) its the importance of serums!!!!!One word; Life-changing (we will get into that). I have around 2 facials left (I think) and the experience has been SUPER valuable, I have a new found respect for facials and their role in healthy skin, and I definitely would recommend it if you’re like me and come from a place of knowing zero, zilch, nadda little about skin-care. For majority of the skin health plan I used Caci’s Murad and Skin Smiths products, loved them and noticed huge improvements in my skin, however they’re products aren’t cheap (good quality skincare isn’t usually), it was a MASSIVE jump from my fortnightly $8 blue cleanser (cringe) and it just wasn’t really sustainable (I cover the products I use now a bit further on in this blog).

Alongside this, when I competed my diet was obviously cleaned up A LOT and I noticed my skin improved slightly. This turned my attention to the role diet plays in clear, healthy skin, so then, like I do with every other thing I get obsessed with (beau will vouge for me), I brought lots of books on it and basically dedicated my entire existence to finding out MORE.

Through experimentation and elimination of different foods I found foods which worked for me and those which didn’t. Although I found it overwhelming trying to do this blindly, which is one of the reasons why I sore a naturopath for intolerance testing.

The elimination diet and treatment plan I followed with my naturopath (entire story on my previous blog post) to correct my gut health was the biggest turning point for my skin. It was during and after this that my skin was (and still is) the best its ever been.

Throughout ALL of these experiences what became obvious was there are more than one factor at play when it comes to healthy skin. For me, it comes down to 4 factors; diet, daily skin-care, facials and vitamins + supplements.

Let me explain…

Diet.

Okay so we all know what we put in our mouths basically dictates everything, our skin included! Having a healthy gut is directly linked to having healthy, beautiful skin. If our gut is overgrown with bad bacteria or if we have leaky gut then our liver, which is our main detox organ, becomes super overloaded and overworked, so our skin becomes the next best thing for excreting toxins which, you guessed it, equals breakouts.

You can spend $200 on a serum but if your gut health is off, you might as well have flushed that $200 down the toilet because without optimal function internally, those breakouts aren’t going to go away.

Another point, which goes hand in hand with gut health, is eating FOR your body, not against it.

So we all have foods which make us feel good, and we have those which don’t. Those foods that don’t make us feel good (may that be bloating, congestion, stomach pain, diarrhea, brain fog or even headaches) are often actually foods were intolerant to.

Its important to identify which foods we are intolerant to, either through testing with a naturopath (I recommend this, saves a lot of time), or through a process of elimination (which can be lengthy, overwhelming and frustrating, but I take my hat off to you if you can do it). By identifying and omitting these foods we are intolerant to we are decreasing the inflammation in our bodies which consistently eating foods which don’t serve us causes, which can show itself within our skin (no thanks).

Generally speaking, dairy is known to cause a lot of skin flare ups in lots of different people. Dairy products often contain saturated fat, which promotes the production of something called Arachidonic Acid, which put simply causes inflammation in our bodies and can cause or worsen acne.

Too much of these fats can also overload the detox functions of the liver, again leading to elimination through the skin – leading to poor skin or acne.

Perhaps limiting dairy could be a good place to start? Another one is gluten. Gluten also causes an inflammatory response in everyone and inflammation, which we now know, can show itself in our skin. If you’re having a lot of skin issues and eat a lot of gluten and dairy, perhaps slow down or cut these two out for a couple of weeks and see if you notice a difference.

Skin issues like eczema and psoriasis are flared up by dairy also, so this would definitely be a good one to limit if you have either of these skin issues.

Additionally to alllllll of this, (and I know I may become your least favourite person by saying this) I RATE celery juice! I know there is so much hype around celery juicing these days and so many people have completely shut it down, and no, of course celery juicing isn’t the answer to world peace and thin thighs, but in my opinion people are a bit too quick to shut it down.

Celery is highly anti-inflammatory, which is the main thing I notice in my skin when I’m including regular celery juice in my diet. Also, if you’re buying good quality, organic celery then theres a good chance it’ll have all the minerals it SHOULD have in it like magnesium, selenium (game-changer for anti-inflammation and anti-aging), calcium and potassium which aid in bright and glowing skin. Before you completely rule it out I recommend trying it even for just a week.

DAILY SKIN-CARE

Potentially the hardest part to get right. There are soooOoOOoooO many different skin-care ranges, regimes and products out there that its no wonder we all get a bit overwhelmed. Not to mention ya fav influencer on the gram promotes a different range every single week!

The bottom line is, finding skin-care that works well for you, is just a matter of trial and error, but it IS really important to find it.

I found that it was really helpful seeing the girls at Caci because they did all the work for me (love that, work smart not hard). I had the skin analysis, we discussed what issues I had with my skin, they looked over my skin and we made a plan together from there.

I would 100% recommend a skin analysis, I have super dry skin and eczema AND breakouts, so lots to treat, and also lots to try and not aggravate, so it was nice to hand the reigns over to someone with a little (a lot) more experience.

Although I’ve chopped and changed my products, my skin REGIME hasn’t changed since this skin analysis, this is what I find works best for me in counteracting my dryness and keeping my skin calm and to aggrivated. It goes something like this:

- Light Cleanser

- Serum

- Heavy duty Moisturize

- Tone multiple times throughout the day + at work whilst in the intense air con

I do this morning and night, and after getting home from the gym. Even if I didn’t have a particularly sweaty session, the gals at Caci taught me ALWAYS wash your face after the gym because the sweat will clog your pores.

As I said previously, I used the Murad and Skin smith products for a long time and although I RATE them and they worked wonders for my skin, I found them to be very expensive and it was hard to keep up financially.

So more recently I’ve made the switch to Kiehls after becca (theres a theme of Becca recommending things to me throughout these blogs, clearly shes the guinea pig of the friendship) told me she was loving them, and more importantly for the not-so generous nursing wage, that they were affordable, so I went along with her to the Kiehls stand.

The gals there (and Becca) sold me and I walked away with a product for every step of my regime. The things that really sold me about Kiehls products are that they all have naturally-derived ingredients, but they are not completely natural products. DON’T get me wrong I am a big fan of putting the least amount of chemicals into and onto my body as possible, but honestly I am yet to find a completely natural skin-care range, with products for each step of my regime which really work for me. I find all the completely natural cleansers in particular are very, very gentle and although I don’t want to go back to stripping my skin of EVERYTHING, I do want (and need) a cleanser that will give me a good clean.

I’ve been using Kiehls for close to 3 weeks now? It is still early days but, I LOVE IT. My skin freaked a little when I made the switch, which is to be expected, but now since having a consistent routine with these products my skin has settled and I am loving the results.

These are the products I got...

The vitamin C serum was a must for me! First of all I am obsessed with serums. I fell in love with serums whilst doing the skin health plan, they honestly transformed my skin. Within the serums lies the active ingredients which are actually going to have the greatest effect in ‘curing’ your skin of whatever issue it is you're focusing on (there are serums made for correcting lots of different skin issues) and since using serums religiously throughout my skin-health programme, I couldn’t agree more. I notice a HUGE difference in the texture and overall quality of my skin if I, for any reason, stop using my serum. The best part is there are so many serums on the market for so many different uses – if you don’t know where to start and your looking for some guidance, I recommend Vitamin C serums but I am a little beast as I love all skin-care products with vitamin c in them.

The vitamin C in products is usually made to increase vitality through enhancing production of collagen – and I feel like this really works for me, hence why I have the Vitamin C serum and the Vitamin C toner in my regime!

I got the Kiehls calendula cleanser as its really gentle on the skin whilst still giving me a good clean, and I got the moisturizer as it’s quite a nice and thick and super hydrating moisturizer which I NEED for my dry skin.

Another hack, never let your skin get dry! This will only aggravate it and will increase the production of oil, in an attempt to counteract this dryness, leading to more breakouts.

Anyway, the next factor I believe to be super important in the quality of our skin is..

FACIALS

Fun fact; we shed our entire layer of skin every 2-4 weeks. Sounds suuuper grim but also a super valid reason to treat yoself to a facial every so often, even once a month, to encourage cell turnover and to get rid of said dead skin.

I don’t believe we are able to give our skin the appropriate treatment and cleaning it needs every so often by just going in hot with our old shower loofa and facial cleanser, our overall skin quality and cell turnover benefits from good quality facial treatments which cater to our skin at the time.

Of course facials can be expensive and nowadays there are so many different contraptions and products you can buy to replicate it at home, obviously whichever approach you take is entirely up to you, all I’m trying to highlight is ensuring you’re giving ya skin the love it deserves once a month through a good exfoliation or treatment is key to healthy, vibrant and glowing skin!

And finally..

SUPPLEMENTS AND VITAMINS..

There are a few select vitamins and minerals which sometimes our diet can lack due to lots of factors really (soil quality, types of foods we eat) and such deficiencies can lead to poor skin or acne so sometimes we need to add these in in other ways..

FIBRE: if you’re not getting enough fibre you may find you aren’t moving your bowels as often as your should be! I definitely feel like I talk about poop way to much on here, but bowel movements are SO important for detoxing our bodies. If we aren’t regular our bodies aren’t able to excrete the toxins and they build up in our system and can show themselves within our skin. Fibre is your go to guy if you struggle with regularity and think this could be contributing to your skin issues!

ZINC: Zinc is a miracle worker when it comes to skin. Take it every night before bed (as this is when its best absorbed) and you may find some of the inflammation in your skin improves. Zinc is a really important mineral but due to soil quality these days there is often not very high levels of zinc in our foods, so its good to include it as one of your supplements. It also works really well in healing acne scarring as it stimulates the production of new cells.

Its important however to take good quality supplements to get the most benefit, Be Pure has a super good Zinc supplement – 10/10 recommend.

FISH OIL + VITAMIN C: Although these two are really different vitamins, they’re two I hope you're taking regularly anyway! These two have countless benefits for so many of the different functions in our bodies.

Vitamin C is a super powerful antioxidant (which as I mentioned above, is also great In skincare products) and helps to plump and firm our skin through enhancing the collagen production within our bodies.

Fish oil contains omega-3 fatty acids which benefit our skin by regulating our oil production which boosts our skins hydration. Hydration, as I said earlier, is key to not making your skin angry! Again, its another one with great anti-inflammatory properties.

COLLAGEN: This one has gotten a lot of hype lately. There has been an influx of brands creating collagen products recently, so you shouldn’t have any trouble finding this one. Basically, collagen is a major component of our skin, its role being to strengthen our skin + provide it with hydration and elasticity. As we get older our collagen stores decrease, (hi wrinkles) which is where supplements come in. I’ve used the nutra organics collagen and loved that, its flavor-less so perfect to put in literally anything and you cant taste it. I also love the "QT for you" brand of collagen, Belle, which I was sent. It is a sweet drink, kind of similar to lemonade which I take every morning and I rate it. They also have it in a capsule form which is super handy.

And thats basically it! It absolutely can be a bit overwhelming, but like so many things when it comes to our bodies, its just a matter of trial and error.

I hope this blog post gives you some ideas about where to start, or maybe sheds some light on where you could be going wrong!

Don’t forget to let me know what else you want to see on this blog!

Vaida xx