Best Anti-Aging Skin Care Secret - Exfoliating For Beauty!

Our skin has an uncanny ability for recuperation. Consider this, the skin is exposed to abuse from the sun, air, pollution, air-conditioning and heat furnaces every day. Still it bounces back. The top layer of skin, called the epidermis, is periodically shed, leaving a softer, smoother layer exposed below. This is a natural, normal process that occurs every day and is called exfoliation. The exfoliating process is especially important for those interested in the very best anti-aging skin care. I believe all serious skin care is anti-aging skin care with the goal of keeping your skin healthy and youthful looking.

There are any number of anti-aging skin care products on the market today designed to give your skin the radiant clarity and glow of new skin by employing and speeding up this exfoliation process whenever you want. Including weekly exfoliation as part of your regular anti-aging skin care routine is important to remove dead skin cells and prevent skin from looking dull and aged.

Exfoliation Products Exfoliating, also called sloughing or epidermabrasion, can be accomplished in several different ways. Cosmetic companies offer a variety of exfoliation products which are generally categorized as abrasive or chemical.

Abrasive Exfoliates

Abrasive exfoliates remove dead cells with such ingredients as synthetic or food grains. One company relies on ground rice as one of its main sloughing ingredients, while another one has produced a product with the look and texture of oatmeal. Other abrasives are cornmeal and ground almonds which can use yogurt, oils or honey as soothers. Try any of these combinations yourself at home or use another one that appeals to you. You might want to try commercial products as well as homemade recipes.

There are also a host of brushes, mitts and washcloths used for this purpose. There are also body sloughing materials sold which definitely should not be used on the face.

Your skin will let you know if you are overdoing the exfoliating routine. If it becomes red or sensitive, cut back on the frequency. At all times, apply the abrasive material gently.

Chemical Exfoliates

Chemical exfoliates work by clearing away dead skin with salicylic acid, which you may know is a popular treatment for acne. There are an array of chemical exfoliates on the market from which you can make a choice as to which is best suited to your skin type and budget.

How to Incorporate Exfoliation Into Your Anti-Aging Skin Care Routine

1. Remove make-up with special creams designed for that purpose.

2. Cleansing - Use special facial cleansing bars appropriate for your skin type. Avoid soaps which have a tendency to dry out your skin.

3. Exfoliating - Exfoliate, using either a commercial product or homemade recipe.

4. Toning - Use a gentle toner after exfoliating to stimulate your skin and tighten the pores. Toners can make your skin appear smoother, and they do add brightness to your complexion.

5. Moisturize - Apply your favorite moisturizer.

In conclusion, people are living longer, healthier lives because of the many advances in the health field which make taking good care of the way your skin looks more important than ever before. Anti-aging skin care is a topic of interest to a lot of people today. Be assured that you have a wide choice in skin care products and that the quality is not necessarily proportional to price. Anti-aging skin care is within the reach of everyone.

Shirley Peel is a successful Webmaster and publisher of many articles about skin care and anti-aging skin care. Her years in the health care field have honed her interest in all aspects of good health including skin care. She offers more information about skin care, skin problems, remedies and home treatment at: http://www.skincare-systems.com and http://www.skincare-systems.com/antiaging-skin-care.html While there, be sure to sign up for our free 7-day ecourse on skin care.

By Shirley Peel
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Shirley_Peel

Improve your Hair and Skin. See results in days.

Why is coconut oil the best oil for your skin?

Coconut oil is excellent as a skin moisturiser. A study shows that extra virgin coconut oil is as powerful and safe as mineral oil when used as a moisturiser, with absence of adverse reactions.

When bathing or showering, soap washes the protective layer of oil and acid off our skin. Often afterwards the skin becomes tight and dry. Adding moisturizers helps the skin feel better, but it does not replace the acid or the protective medium chain fatty acid layers that was removed. Your skin is vulnerable to infection at this time. You would think that your body would be clean and germ-free after a bath. But germs are everywhere, floating in the air, on our clothes and everything we touch. Many germs survive washing by hiding in cracks and folds of the skin. Before long your skin is again teaming with microorganisms, both good and bad. Until sweat and oils return to reestablish the body's chemical barrier your skin is vulnerable to infection. If you have a cut or cracked skin, this can allow streptococcus, staphylococcus and other harmful germs entry into the body. By using a coconut oil cream, lotion or just pure coconut oil you can quickly help reestablish the skin's natural antimicrobial and acid barrier. Many people use coconut oil on their skin after every bath.


Cocout Oil is not like other oils used to soften rough, dry skin. It will help to reduce chronic skin inflammation within days and be soothing and healing to wounds, blood blisters, rashes, etc.


Most commercial creams and lotions are largely water. Their moisture is quickly absorbed into dry, wrinkled skin. As the water enters the skin, it expands the tissues, like filling a balloon with water, so that wrinkles fade away and the skin feels smoother. But this is only temporary. As soon as the water evaporates or is carried away by the blood stream, the dry, wrinkled skin returns. No matter how hard you try people will never be able to permanently cure dry, wrinkled skin with any commercial body lotion or body care merchandise. In addition to water, most lotions have an oil of some type. This oil is almost always a highly refined vegetable oil empty of of all natural protective antioxidants. One product in our food supply and in body care goods that leads to a great deal of free radicals is oxidized vegetable oils.


The ideal lotion is one that is made from an oil that not only softens the skin, but protects it against damage, promotes healing and gives it a more youthful, healthy appearance. Coconut oil fits that description.


Our skin is made up of connective tissues. These tissues give our skin strength and elasticity. When we are young and healthy the skin is smooth, elastic and supple. This is the effect of powerful connective fibers. As we age their fibers are continually subjected to free-radical attack which breaks them down. As a result, connective tissues become hardened and lose both elasticity and strength. The skin loses its ability to hold itself together and begins to sag and become wrinkled. Once young, soft and smooth the skin turns dry and leathery.


The coconut oil will aid in removing the outer layer of dead skin cells, making the skin smoother. The skin will become more evenly textured with a healthy "shine". While doing this the coconut oil will penetrate into the deeper layers of the skin and strengthen the underlying tissues.


Once a free-radical reaction is started it can cause a chain reaction which produces more free radicals, which ultimately damages thousands of molecules. The only way our body has to fight them is with antioxidants. When a free radical comes into contact with an antioxidant, the chain reaction is stopped. For this reason, it is good to have plenty of antioxidants in our cells and tissues to protect us. The number of antioxidants we have in our tissues is determined to a large extent by the nutrients in our diet. Having anti-oxidants in skin care products is important, too. Dr. Ray Peat, a biochemist who has written about the antioxidant properties of coconut oil, states "It is well established that dietary coconut oil reduces our need for vitamin E, but I think its antioxidant role is more general than that, and that it has both direct and indirect antioxidant activities." Virgin Coconut Oil is especially useful in fighting free-radicals, as it is unrefined and hasn't been extracted of any of its natural components through the refining process.


Conventional body care goods that are made with refined vegetable oils which have all the antioxidants extracted from them are highly prone to free-radical generation both in and outside the body. That is why eating processed vegetable oils can cause a deficiency in vitamin E and other antioxidants. The antioxidants are used up fighting off free radicals causing permanent damage to connective tissues. This is also the reason why you should be careful about the type of oils you use on your skin, and in your lotions, creams and lip balms. If you use a lotion, or cream with a refined oil in it you are in fact causing your skin to age faster. The lotion, though it may bring temporary improvement will actually accelerate the aging of the skin and even contribute to skin cancer through the free radicals that are readily formed from the refined vegetable oil..


Coconut Oil can help to keep the skin from developing liver spots, and other blemishes caused by aging and over exposure to sunlight.


Quality virgin coconut oil is the best natural ingredient for skin lotion available. It prevents destructive free-radical formation and offers protection against them. It helps to keep connective tissues powerful and supple so that the skin doesn't sag and wrinkle. In some cases it might even restore damaged or diseased skin. The oil is absorbed into the skin and into the cell structure of the connective tissues, limiting the damage excessive sun exposure can cause.


Coconut oil will absorb easily, keep the skin soft, and yet without feeling greasy.



Coconut oil for your scalp and scalp


What coconut oil can do for your skin it can do for your hair.


In India and Sri Lanka, coconut oil is commonly used for styling hair, and cooling or soothing the head and provide stress relief.


What coconut oil can do for your skin it can do for your hair.


Beauticians who are familiar with coconut swear by it. It softens the hair and conditions the scalp. Using the coconut oil as a pre-wash conditioner can rid a person of dandruff better than a medicated shampoo.


The protective environment of the skin and how coconut oil helps


Our skin is home to many tiny organisms, most of which are harmless; some are beneficial. At least one variety of bacterium is essential to the healthy environment on our skin. It feeds on the sebum, breaking down the tryglycerides into free fatty acids. The bacteria actually feed on the glycerol part of the triglyceride. This leaves fatty acids which are now "freed" from the glycerol unit that held them together. Medium chain fatty acids which are bound to the glycerol unit as they are in coconut oil have no antimicrobial properties. However, when they are broken apart into free fatty acids, they become powerful antimicrobials.


So these bacteria convert the medium chain triglycerides (in the sebum or on the skin) into free fatty acids that can kill disease-causing bacteria, viruses, and fungi. The combination of the slightly acid pH and medium chain fatty acids offers a protective chemical layer on the skin that prevents infection from disease-causing organisms. Due primarily to the action of bacteria, the oil on the surface of your skin and hair is composed of between 40 and 60 percent free fatty acids. The medium chain fatty acids in the sebum offer the protective layer on the skin that kills harmful germs. Coconut oil is nature's richest source of medium chain fatty acids.


When coconut oil is put on the skin it doesn't have any immediate antimicrobial action. However, when bacteria which are always present on the skin turn these triglycerides into free fatty acids, just as it does with sebum, the result is an increase in the number of antimicrobial fatty acids on the skin and protection from infection. The free fatty acids also help to contribute to the acid environment on the skin which repels disease causing germs.


Coconut Oil is an great ingredient to use in healing salves and ointments. People have used a coconut oil/crushed garlic mixture at night to eliminate plantar warts and athlete's foot with great results.


In the making of soaps, the soap does not have a tallow smell nor the smell of a vegetable oil. Instead, it has a nice fresh smell and yields a nice fluffy lather. Coconut oil is one of the most popular oils used in soap making.

by Roger Bert

The Miracles Of Tea Tree Oil For Skin And Hair Care

Tea tree, MELALEUCA ALTERNIFOLIA, native to Australia, is a tree or shrub with needle like leaves similar in appearance to cypress with heads of sessile pale flowers. The popular tea tree oil is derived from this tree. The aborigines of Australia have been known to have used the tea tree oil to treat a range of ailments from colds, sores to acne and even whooping cough.

Extensively used in aromatherapy, the leaves when crushed release essential oils of varying amounts and constituents. The oil is so potent that it can be diluted up to many times its volume and it still manages to retain its effectiveness all the same. Although the benefits of tea tree oil are numerous, for beauty treatments, it's been found effective in skin and hair care. The following sections describe the uses of Tea Tree Oil for skin care and hair care.

Tea tree oil for skin care

Tea tree oil has been used effectively to treat acne, abscess, athlete's foot, blisters, burns, cold sores, insect bites, oily skin, rashes, spots, warts and wounds. You can use tea tree oil to cure sunburns, diaper rash, toenail infections and problems of smelly feet.

Tea tree oil for hair care

Add a few drops of Tea tree oil to your regular shampoo to treat hair problems like persistent dandruff, itchy-scalp and even prevent head-lice. Massage it in, leave it on for 5-7 minutes and rinse off. Adding a few drops in pet shampoo/bath helps keep tics and rashes at bay.

Other benefits of tea tree oil Fed-up with allopathic medicines? Packets of antibiotics that have gone down your throat seem to be of no use? The only things you find they have lightened are your pockets? Well, don't panic, help is at hand, Tea Tree oil can be used to treat a variety of medical problems. A great remedy to soothe your sinuses; dab a drop of tea tree oil around your nose can help clear up blocked sinuses.

Add a few drops in a steam bath or vaporizer and inhale, a great relief for persistent colds and cough. Regular use of tea tree oil has been found to be effective in treating Asthma, bronchitis, catarrh, cough, sinusitis and even tuberculosis.

Tea tree oil is a great general disinfectant and can be effectively used to treat genito-urinary tract infections such as thrush, vaginitis, cystitis and pruitis. Tea tree oil has properties that act as a immune booster. It helps equip the body to fight off a host of infections. Using tea tree oil is particularly effective if the body is already in a weakened condition due to illness, stress or prolonged treatment-involving antibiotics that lead to a reduction of the body's natural resistance.

Using tea tree oil prior to a surgical operation or for those suffering from long-drawn debilitating illness has been found to be beneficial. The anti-fungal, anti-bacterial and anti-viral properties have seen tea tree oil being used extensively in soaps, toothpastes, deodorants, disinfectants, gargles, germicides, aftershaves and colognes. Tea tree oil is safe to use, as it is non-toxic and non-irritant.

Although tea tree oil has no known side effects, some individuals may be sensitive to it. This calls for consideration of the strength of tea tree oil and should never be used undiluted on the body and particularly on sensitive areas.

by Kevin Pederson

Skincare For Senstive Skin

If you have sensitive skin like me, than you know how tough it can be to find a good skincare line. I have tried brands like Avon and Mary Kay with no avail. Even the ones that claim to work for senstive skin have proven to be useless against my skin. If you are tired of trying new things that don't ever work, than I have a solution for you. Natural skin products.

Natural skin care products seem to be flooding the market today, so finding a good one may be tough. But the way I see it, if all these companies use all natural products than you should be pretty safe in the line you choose. But be sure that the products are indeed all natural.

More than likely you use a store brand soap. Did you know that by definition these soaps, including all the major soap brands, are actually detergent and not soap. Yikes! And then you wonder why your skin is so messed up! Oh and by the way, there is also animal fat in that soap as well.

Soaps, that are not all natural, contain so many chemicals that they rob our skin of natural oils that we are supposed to have to maintain healthy skin. For those with dry or sensitive skin this proves to be a real problem. I admit that my body is addicted to lotion because I use it on a daily basis. It now depends on the lotion for mositure.

This can be costly and not to mention annoying if I don't have lotion on hand. Our skin absorbs about 65% of what we apply to it. So in turn if we are applying animal fat, detergent and countless other chemicals that are to hard to pronounce, than we can assume that those chemicals are absorbed in our skin. This also includes the shampoors, conditioners, makeup, perfumes, lotions and other skin care products we use on a daily basis.

My point?! If we are going to use these products on a daily basis, why not use what we know to be safe. Granted, there isn't a product out there that can suits the entire world's needs, but natural skincare products are definetly worth giving a try.

* This is not medical advice and should not be used as such. These products use all natural products, but do not claim to not cause an allergic reaction.

by Cynthia Marcano