Sitting down after dinner one night this week, I saw three different skincare ads on TV within an hour, all promising instant youthfulness.
Then, scrolling through Facebook, I counted eight different posts that came up on my feed; from videos showing serums that can erase pigmentation, to pens that can inject hyaluronic acid by high pressure to plump out lines, to treatments that can vaporize the skin giving it an immediate tightening effect. Everything seemed to promise instant results.
This photo won me the Best Before & After Results, and I’m proud to say that changes to healthier skin for this client did not happen instantly. In fact, it took over a year! The point I’d like to make here is skin needs time to metabolise nutrients, to make healthy cells, to regenerate and repair. It can’t do this in just a few days. The life cycle of a keratinocyte (skin cell) is anything from 20 to 60 days depending on your age so, for someone to say you’ll have new skin in seven days, is simply not credible.
The other important point to make is changes can’t happen after one facial treatment or using products for just a few days. I compare it to a weight loss journey – a healthy weight can’t be achieved by having one gym session with a personal trainer and eating healthy every now and again.
The changes achieved in this example involved:
1. Discipline and commitment from the client, adopting a routine morning and night, every day.
2. regular two-monthly in-clinic visits for deep treatments and progress check-up.
3. Use of skincare products that adhere to the principles of corneotherapy, ie products that respect the stratum corneum (outer most layer of the skin). They don’t contain emulsi ers, preservatives, mineral oils, colours or fragrance. (If you would like to know how to identify these, I’m most happy to help).
In summary, healthy skin is possible with a great routine, using ingredients that respect your skin. with anything good and real, it needs time, discipline and commitment.
