Anti-Aging Skin Care

Our skin is one of the most used indicators of our age, and if you ask someone to predict how old you are it’s your skin that they’ll look to to make their estimate. For this reason, anti-aging skin care is one of the surest ways to look younger and healthier to make sure that there are no awkward moments when someone mistakes your sister for your daughter. Using the correct techniques it’s possible to cut up to 25 years off your appearance, maybe more, and not only look better but feel better too.

The first facet of anti-aging skin care is in our diet, and the more healthily we eat, the smoother and healthier our skin will be. This stands to reason when you consider that it’s our food that provides our body with the building blocks required to make look after our skin and every other tissue and muscle in the body. You literally are what you eat, and if you want healthy skin you need a healthy diet.

When thinking specifically about anti-aging skin care, there are three main things we need in our diet – antioxidants, vitamins and oil. First of all the anti oxidants, found in foods such as citrus fruits and fish, will help protect our skin cells (and every other cell) from oxidisation and attack from free radicals. This will mean that the skin cells come under less fire and so appear healthier. At the same time this will help protect the skin and other cells against cancer by lowering the chance of the DNA behind the cell walls being damaged or mutated.

Vitamins meanwhile, particularly vitamin A and E, are used in rebuilding the skin and are a great way to encourage the body to heal both scars and wrinkles. Essential fatty acids meanwhile will provide your skin with oil to keep it subtle and prevent it becoming dry and flaky. Omega 3 fatty acid will act as both a source of oil for your skin and a source of antioxidants, while a multivitamin tablet will provide the rest.

Anti-aging skin care is also about lifestyle, and how we treat our bodies will be reflected in the appearance of our skin. While soaking up the sun will help us to look bronzed and healthy in the short run, over time it will lead to damaged skin cells which will create more wrinkles in our old age. Similarly it’s important that we make sure we get lots of sleep. One of the reasons for this is that our sleep is when our body repairs damage done to our bodies throughout the day and so can rejuvenate our skin that way.

One of the ways in which this works is through the release of growth hormone, or HGH, which is a hormone that encourages anabolism in the body making it repair wounds, rebuild muscle, replace damaged cells and encourage growth in the muscles and bones (though the bones stop growing after puberty when the ‘growth plates’ will seal off). As well as sleep, another way to encourage the natural production of growth hormone (synthetic growth hormone is used a lot by bodybuilders and celebrities, but is unfortunately illegal in most states and countries and very expensive in those that it is not) is to exercise and to take hot showers, both of which will trigger an anabolic cycle.

Then the most obvious aspect of anti-aging skin care – the use of anti-aging cream and products. These will work in multiple ways, both protecting your skin from outside attack from UV rays and environmental factors, and providing your skin with important nutrients. You should make sure that you follow a routine and apply your face creams in the morning and in the night before bed. This routine should begin with an exfoliating cream or face wash which will remove dead skin cells (that can otherwise interfere with the mechanisms of the moisturising creams and nutrients). After this you should then use a protective cream such as Protect and Perfect from No 7, which will protect your skin from UV rays. Finally a rejuvenating moisturiser should be applied which should contain vitamins A and E – both of which are vital in skin repair and collagen, which will help keep the skin plum and elastic (it can be considered ‘nature’s Botox’. The moisturising element will also help give the skin moisture and keep it subtle and elastic. While you apply these creams, you should use circular motions with the pads of your fingers to massage the skin and encourage blood flow in the surface which will help provide it with more vital nutrients and keep the skin tone more even. Use concentric circles moving inwards towards the centre of the face – it’s also very relaxing and will help to keep the skin subtle and soft.

All these are examples of anti-aging skin care and will lessen the appearance of wrinkles over time, but they won’t have any immediately visible effects. For a more fast acting approach then you might consider laser treatment, which offers a painless and relatively inexpensive range of skin treatments. The laser facial for example will do the same job as the exfoliating skin – removing dead skin cells like a peal which will reveal the healthier living skin cells underneath. This will immediately lessen the appearance of wrinkles, help to even out skin tone, combat age spots, and help other skin treatments to be more effective. Another option, laser genesis, will work to stimulate the middle layer of skin cells to produce more natural collagen which will help to smooth out your complexion and make your skin look healthier and younger.

The final anti-aging skin care method is makeup. While this won’t have any effect on the actual health of your skin, it can still shave years off your age by concealing unwanted wrinkles and age spots and adding colour to the areas that want attention. Even for men, a basic self tanning moisturiser can help create a young, healthy ‘bronzed’ look and disguise lines and blemishes. Make sure when shopping for makeup however that you look for products that work with the skin and contain important nutrients and moisturisers as others can worsen bad skin.