Retinol Ready

Who is ready for Summer? Or at least Spring? This cold, dreary weather needs to go. Don’t we live in the South? During the winter months lots of us struggle with dry skin. Furthermore, people back off on their retinol due to the dryness. You can read some of my previous posts about battling dry skin during the winter but today I wanted to give you some of my tips to make sure you are still getting your daily Retinol dose through these cold, dry months. We all know that if you do any skincare at all I want you on a sunscreen every morning and a retinol every night. These are your basic regimen workhorses for antiaging. So if you have set your retinol on the shelf grab it and add some of these tips into your regimen and be 29 forever with me……..

  1. Apply a moisturizer before your retinol. Retinol is a beast and can penetrate so don’t worry about losing effectiveness with this method. Applying a good barrier first can help the dryness and irritation often caused by Retinol.
  2. Mix your retinol with an equal part moisturizer in your hands before applying to your face. Any plain, white moisturizer is fine, cetaphil, cerave, equate, coconut oil, whatevs.
  3. Apply your retinol in least sensitive areas of the face first. For example, the T-zone area first and then what is left to the more sensitive skin around the mouth or eyes.
  4. Use a good retinol. Save your money on washes and moisturizers whose main ingredients are water and oil and put your money into a tolerable retinol. If you are sensitive or dry I recommend the SkinMedica Retinol because it has some anti-inflammatory properties.
  5. Start low and slow. Use your retinol just on Monday nights and if you aren’t too dry then increase to Monday and Thursday nights and if still not too dry and irritated then go to Monday, Wednesday and Thursday nights. Add one night per week until you can use it nightly. If you have been using retinol and just became dry then back off from every night to every other night until your dry skin is in check then increase back up to nightly.
  6. Add a specialty product to put extra moisture into your skin. I use ColoreScience Pep-up. It has peptides that fertilize your collagen so it helps with smoothing fine lines and tightening the skin. One of the ways it fertilizes the collagen is with the phytomoist feature which holds water in your skin. So it works really well for people who tend to be on the dry side.
  7. Prioritize Retinol. Basically if you are using acids that can also be drying stop them and use your retinol. It gets priority. For example, if you are too dry wash with a gentle cleanser instead of AHA/BHA cleanser because the alphyhydroxy and betahydroxy acids may be too drying with your retinol during these months.
  8. Avoid products that can cause inflammation. No scrubs, beads, exfoliators, scrubber brushes, brillo pads, etc…….

 

If you do all this and still feel irritated by your retinol you should make a free skincare consult with us at the clinic. You can e-mail Liz@johnsondermatology.com or Brooke@johnsondermatology.com to set that up. We would be happy to make a custom skincare plan with  you in the clinic.

Hope you all have the best Monday ever, best week ever, best February ever! Nina

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