Listen Up Y'all

Hiiii. 

I have been a busy little make up artist these past few weeks and not wanting to write a post for the sake of it, I decided to wait till I had something worth talking about. 

I must warn you, this post is most likely to turn into a rant of sorts. 

Enjoy :)

Rant Subject:

SUN DAMAGE!!!!!

Related Topics:

DEHYDRATED SKIN! DAMAGED SKIN! SUNCARE! SUNBEDS! FAKE TAN!

Ok, over the last two weeks I have done hair and make up for around 15 girls from different agencies in the UK. Only one girl out of fifteen had healthy skin. When I say healthy, her skin was radiant, hydrated and plump. Yes, she had one or two spots,  but spots are normal, especially for a 19 year old. 

The rest of the girls had problem skin - a make up artist's worst nightmare! This opened my eyes to how many girls actually are unsure of their skin type and how to look after their skin efficiently! The age group of these girls ranged from 18-28 - and not one of them really understood how important it is to take care of your skin NOW. 


Everybody wants to look young forever, look after your skin when you are younger and you will see the benefit of taking good care of your skin when you reach 40-50 for sure.


I was also shocked at how many of the girls use sunbeds. When I say use, I mean hammer or temporarily live on. Thus, I felt compelled to write this blog post/rant.

Here are TWO examples of "problem" skin:

Dehydrated skin - 
Many of the girls had dehydrated skin, which meant even with a good moisturiser the skin can still look dull and become flaky. Dehydration lines around the eye area can be mistaken for fine lines/ wrinkles. Dehydrated skin is self explanatory. It is thirsty skin, dying for water. Make-up will always look PANTS on dehydrated skin.

Solution - 
Drink more water! ! ! Everybody says it, but I cannot stress how important it is to drink plenty of water. Water flushes out all the toxins your body would otherwise hold onto. Your skin will instantly look brighter. Instead of a fizzy drink, opt for a bottle of water and you can thank me later. Using a hydrating serum helps too. My favourites are: Kiehls Ultra Facial Micro Serum & Chantecaille Vital Essence. Both are great for all skin types including oily skin as they just contain water and algae based ingredients. 

Acne/Breakout skin - 
Some of the girls were either suffering with minor acne or had scarring from where they had previously had chronic breakouts. Acne unfortunately is in your blood. It is a genetic problem. So you will constantly battle against it. But you know what, all that effort to get fresh, clear skin is so worth it. I have suffered with breakouts and it massively knocked my confidence. I completely changed my skincare. See an earlier post here on my skincare routine. (I still get the odd spot!) I can now go out the house and not feel like everybody is staring at my face. 


So what is Acne?


Acne is trapped bacteria in the hair follicles that cover your skin, these are what we call pores. The bacteria comes from sebum getting trapped underneath the surface of the skin. Non inflamed skin blemishes are your white heads and black heads. When you get painful spots and inflamed areas this is when your white cells are rushing to the area to try and heal the broken skin. 

Solution -
Ok first of all, do you have acne, seriously? Or do you have a few spots. If you feel like you have acne (a lot of sore, inflamed spots) go and see your GP or a dermatologist to get a second opinion. Next. Ditch The Harsh Scrubs. Exfoliating your skin is great, but harsh exfoliation is going to make things worse. Moisturise! Do not ditch moisturiser even if you panic about it making your skin more oily. Moisturising daily is so important, just get a light, oil free product. Double cleanse! With a gentle, gel formula that does not strip the skin. See an earlier post for more information on a cleansing routine: Dermalogica. Try skincare with ingredients such as GLYCOLIC, SALICYLIC ACID, LATIC ACID, RICE BRAN, GERANIUM AND SEAWEED.

I will be doing a post very soon, more specifically on treating acne skin, in great detail, so if you have any questions please do not hesitate to ask. 

Now then, SUN DAMAGED SKIN, is the main concern I wanted to tackle in this post. 

See the picture above? Say Hi to Sammi Jo. This girl is a glamour model for Mode Model Management and not long ago she took part in the show Embarassing Bodies. You can see an article explaining what Sammi thinks about sunbeds and the damage they can cause here.

The picture above showed what damage her sunbed addiction would do to her in 20 years time. 

Her skin would look like leather. 

NOBODY WANTS TO LOOK LIKE THE LADY IN SOMETHING ABOUT MARY!!! 

EWWW!!

One model in particular, she knows who she is if she reads this, at 18 years old uses the sunbed 4-5 times a week and goes on them for 12 minutes everytime. To make matters worse she never wears the eye goggles. I was raging. A girl, especially at that age, should never, ever EVER contemplate hammering the sunbeds this much. The place where she goes should not even allow this. Restrictions to limit use should be put in place. GRRR.

This post is becoming a bit of a snore to read, I do apologise, so I shall try and summarise with this:

• Do you know what a tan is? A tan is MILD sunburn. The reason sunburn hurts so much is because your skin is dying and is trying to regrow itself.

• Melanin is your natural skin protection. When you sunbathe, melanin makes its way to the surface of your skin - this is the colour of your tan. If you have been out of the sun for a while, it will take your skin longer to protect itself, therefore you must always wear a high factor.

• People use the sunbeds to "prep" their skin for sunbathing on holiday. I do this, it is somewhat "acceptable" - HOWEVER, six minutes once or twice before you go abroad would be suffice. If you are very fair, I would not recommend this at all. DO NOT go on for more than 6 minutes. DO NOT go on more than once a week. 

• A sunbed is basically a bath of UV RAYS. Yes, it may be in a controlled environment, and when you are outside you can never really judge the strength of the sun's rays -so one could argue they are as bad as each other. Nevertheless, UV RAYS DAMAGE THE SKIN: THEY CAN CAUSE SKIN CANCER. PROTECT YOURSELF. 

• ALWAYS wear sun protection. Factor 30 or above. I personally wear 50 SPF as I do not want to look older than my years when I turn 25. I also burn very easily. REAPPLY EVERY 30 MINUTES.

• The higher the factor you have in your sun cream DOES NOT mean you tan slower. In fact, wearing a lower factor, means you are less likely to burn, therefore when that burnt skin eventually turns brown, it will then shed to let new skin through. If you wear a higher factor, your tan will last longer, as your skin will not be burnt and will not peel.

• I would just like to add that the sun is great source of Vitamin D. Ultimately 20 minutes of being outside every day can boost your immune system and will make you feel better. It's a proven fact that when the sun is out, we all feel more positive. Just don't over do it and alternate when sunbathing with staying under the shade. :)

I will be doing a post on sun care very, very soon so I will not go on anymore about the right sun protection for you. Just go out and buy some fake tan if you want to look bronzed all year round! There are so many on the market nowadays, for all shades and in all different shapes and sizes. It may not be your "true" tan but in years to come when you are contemplating skin peels and botox, or worse: laser surgery for pigmentation. You will sure thank me for giving you the heads up. 

You don't want to look like a crocodile skin hand bag at 30? Right?

I hope for those of you who do use sunbeds this post makes you re-think and act a little smarter :)

See you soon,