Beauty Tips: Silky Smooth Skin

It's always been my dream to wake up in the morning to a perfect complexion. Unfortunately, fate would have it that acne was a constant source of trouble for all of my teen years and even into my 20s. I wish I had known then what I now know about skin care. It would have saved me some (embarrassingly) misguided facial "treatments".

Things did start to smooth out (literally) just prior to my pregnancies, but I still suffered from occasional break-outs, redness and enlarged pores, as can be seen by the picture below.

I started to study more about skin care and developed a routine that worked fairly well. I researched recommended products (most of which were not budget-friendly) and even bought in to the whole name brand craze, using a serum by Elisabeth Arden which I would only buy in small sample sizes as I couldn't justify spending £100+ just on my moisturizer. The crazy thing was, it did work. -while I was using it. But if even one day went by that I didn't, my face would revert to its former dry, red and unsightly self, and I still had fairly regular break outs.

It was about a year ago that I came across the oil cleansing method. Like many others before me, I was skeptical. We've been so conditioned to think oil=bad that it took a lot of faith to believe that maybe the right kind of oil could =good.

I did a lot of research and finally settled on hemp seed oil. My main reasons being:

#1. It's noncomedogenic.
#2. It helps to balance excess sebum
#3. It contains a perfect ratio of essential fatty acids
#4, Hemp has many health benefits

For more information check out this blog.

Initially, I still cleansed religiously. Morning and night, never skipping a day. While the redness, dryness and enlarged pores saw immediate improvement, I did develop some large, deep, cystic pimples under my chin/upper neck area. Another down side was that my lips became very dry (I now avoid getting the oil on my lips when cleansing).

Eventually, after some trial and error, I manage to figure out what worked best for my skin.

I am now down to only using the oil cleansing method to remove make-up (which I no longer feel I have to wear every day), and whenever my skin starts to feel dry. This varies throughout the year and sometimes I only have to do it once a week without my skin getting dry and red. I no longer do it at night as I prefer to allow my skin that time to breathe and rejuvenate itself.

Over this winter I also started to use coconut oil as a day-time moisturizer whenever I felt that my skin was getting a bit dry, but all in all, my skin is doing splendidly. I was sure that I would be faced with the same skin issues I had in my previous pregnancies, but my skin has never felt better.

Occasionally I will treat myself to my honey, sugar and VitaminC facial mask/cleanser when I feel my skin needs some extra love.

I hope this post will encourage some of you to try out this (by far) more economical and healthier approach to skin care.