1. Don’t Smoke- I know that you can probably guess that the worst of the Beauty Sins is smoking. DON’T SMOKE. Just don’t do it. Smoking cannot only kill you, it will 100% most definitely make you look like a prune long before your time. Next time you want to smoke, think about Magda from There’s Something about Mary (see pic above). If you don’t stop smoking, that is what you will look like.
2. .Don’t Tan- My parents always warned me that I would regret my tanning days, and I really do. I know tanning is especially hard to give up if you are a twenty year old bronzed babe and you think that you won’t care when you are 30 if you start to look like a leather bag (trust me, you will). You may even say to yourself what I once said to myself, “By the time I am old enough to get wrinkles and sunspots there will be a cure for them or I will be married with kids and my family won’t care”. Face the facts, your skin is plump, clear and even now, but by the time you are in your thirties you will probably start to see some lines and discoloration, and the more you tan now, the more damage you will see. See picture above for your future if you don’t stop tanning now. Start learning about self-tanning and start using sunscreen, and if you have any suspicious moles on your body, SEE YOUR DERMOTOLOGIST. Nothing looks hotter with a tan than a big scar across your stomach from where your skin cancer was removed. Don’t believe me? According to the Skin Cancer Foundation, 40-50 percent of most people that live to be 65 will have skin cancer at least once.
3. Don’t Drink Too Much- I know most of you will say, “Drinking isn’t bad for my skin”. Have you ever looked at yourself after a night of drinking too much? Not only is your make-up running down your face, but your face is also sagging and you have lost a large amount of your skin's natural hydration and Vitamin A, which is your skin’s first line of defense against aging. You do not look hot, no matter what you think at the time. Don’t believe me? Take a close up picture of yourself next time you drink too much.
For those people who are going to do what they want to do anyways (I was one of them for a long, long time), there are some ways to help save your skin:
1. Take your vitamins! Take vitamins every day! Read my post titled Take your Vitamins for some more information on which vitamins are good for you and your skin.
2. Use self-tanner- It is not the 80s when self-tanner turned you the color of an Oompa-Loompa (I know, it happened to me). There are now a lot of great self-tanners to try that will give you believable color and are easy to use. Xen-Tan and Fake Bake are great high-end brands to try, and I love the Neutrogena MicroMist line. It is so easy to spray your back and it is almost impossible to mess up.
3. Become a moisturizer junkie- Look for moisturizers with Peptides and Vitamin C to help plump up your skin and heal the sun damage that has already occurred. You must use moisturizer every day, morning and night.
4. Eat a diet of fruits and vegetables and protein- You are already loading your body with damaging free radicals, so do something healthy for it. Many of the vitamins that your skin needs to stay healthy are available naturally in fruits and vegetables.
5. Use sunscreen everyday- If you tan, at least use a sunscreen. The closer the SPF is to 30, the better. No more baby oil!
6. Use a hydrating mask after a night out- Lay in a tub, steam your pores and put on a hydrating mask loaded with Vitamin C, A, Peptides, Collagen, etc. You should also make sure to load up on the fruits and vegetables as well, rather than eating a big cheeseburger or loading up at Taco Bell. Your skin needs it.
7. Invest in a product with hydroquinone to lighten sun spots- Your dermatologist can prescribe you a high level of hydroquinone cream, or you can buy a product with a lower level of hydroquinone over the counter. Keep in mind that hydroquinone takes a couple of months to work and you have to use it religiously. The lower the level of hydroquinone, the longer it is going to take to see results. Ambi Skincare Fade Cream is loved by dermatologists and is under $5 dollars at your local drugstore. You can use it as a spot treatment to help reduce any sun spots you already have and it also has a SPF of 15. Hydroquinone should always be used with sunscreen. If you do not protect your skin with sunscreen, any lightening you do will be reversed as soon as you are in the sun. It took me over 6 months to lighten two sun spots on my face. Both spots came back after only 6 days at the beach in the Caribbean.
Follow these tips and you should help erase some of the damage you have already done to your skin. Cut back or erase some of the Beauty Sins from your life, and you will stop even more future damage. I have actually managed to turn back some of the (big) damage I did to my skin in my twenties from tanning, drinking and smoking (eek!) So, it is never too late. Well, maybe it is for Magda.
Follow these tips and you should help erase some of the damage you have already done to your skin. Cut back or erase some of the Beauty Sins from your life, and you will stop even more future damage. I have actually managed to turn back some of the (big) damage I did to my skin in my twenties from tanning, drinking and smoking (eek!) So, it is never too late. Well, maybe it is for Magda.
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