Archive for November, 2009

People have this common belief that using a mishmash of skin products will automatically give them radiant-looking skin, and so when the skin remains as dull and problematic as they were before being treated with all sorts of creams and lotions, these same people end up disappointed. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with using skin products, but proper skin care goes beyond that. Whatever is put on the skin is as equally important as what is taken in. In other words, skin products can’t, even in the age of advanced science, beautify the skin all on their own; taking care of skin health primarily starts with eating the right foods for skin care.

However, this elementary principle is all too often ignored, and the result is people stashing skin care items with little thought about what comes in their refrigerators. A good diet benefits the skin in more ways than one; and there’s no substitute for it.

If you’re one of those who tend to overlook your diet, it’s time to rethink. Good thing is, there’s always a chance to make a good start. And you can do this by knowing what foods are exactly beneficial to the skin. Here’s a quick rundown:

Omega-3 rich fish
This includes salmon, mackerel, tuna, and other oily fish. Other than benefiting the heart, omega-3 fatty acid is good for the skin. Omega-3 strengthens cell membranes, and consequently makes the cells hydrated and replenished. This results in appropriate level of moisture. When there is enough moisture, the skin remains smooth and supple, has improved elasticity, and has healthy pores.

Carrots
Carrots are a potent source of beta-carotene and vitamin C. Once absorbed by the body, beta-carotene is converted into vitamin A that helps in making skin cells and keeping them replenished and healthy. If there is not enough vitamin A, the skin is dry and flaky. Vitamin C, on the other hand, has potent antioxidant properties and helps in collagen formation. Sufficient amount of vitamin C in the body keeps the skin young-looking and fresh.

Sweet potatoes
Also an excellent source of vitamin C and beta-carotene, sweet potatoes are rich in vitamin E, another good antioxidant and anti-aging. Vitamin E works to regenerate vitamin C, therefore allowing it to work in its maximum potential.

Green Tea
Famous for its many benefits, green tea has antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties and is rich in calcium, zinc, magnesium, riboflavin, and vitamins C, D, and K. Green tea is also believed to protect the skin from the harmful effects of the sun’s UV rays, and so helps prevent cancer. But not only is green tea good for the skin, it is also good for the entire body.

Whole Grains
Whole grains are excellent source of B group vitamins. These are essential to the skin because they aid in replacing dead skin cells and developing new ones. They also naturally protect the skin from infections.

Now that you know some of the foods for skin care, it is only necessary to incorporate them in your daily diet. Remember that deficiency in some of the vitamins and minerals can lead to premature skin aging, dryness, and other skin problems such as Eczema.

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Food and Skin Care

You are what you eat, as many would say, and surely, whatever you eat, shows in the appearance of your skin, thus, it is important to know the importance of correlating food and skin care.

Millions of people all over the world suffer from the most common food –related disorder known to modern man today, which is obesity and science has indeed proven time and again that the food we eat is shown on the appearance of our skin.

Take for example the visible signs of obesity aside from the obvious appearance of someone being overweight, but observe closely and see that the skin also shows signs of the disorder.

One would be the darkening of skin areas on skin folds all over the body, most especially the neck area, underarms, elbows, knees and nose.

For some, it also shows on both sides of the lips and eyelids, sometimes even around the eye sockets.

These skin darkening processes are the results of obesity in the body and no amount of skin care or cleansing can remove these, unless there is a change in lifestyle, like food intake and eating habits.

Dieting, however, remains one of the most daunting tasks ever and unless this is overcome by the need to ensure a healthy lifestyle, one can see and notice the effects – both for skin care and a healthy way of life.

How can this be achieved? You actually have the right answer to your problem and this can be best answered by you.

However, here are some tips that can help you keep on going.

First, try to establish a diet program partner for your regimen or a support group to keep you motivated.

Pursuing a diet regimen by your lonesome is generally a task that could only lead to your diet program going down the drain, since you lack the direct support of a peer to motivate or push you to succeed.

You can do this with a friend or a family member who shares the same desire to achieve an outcome for both your diet and skin care regimen, since it is best to have someone help you monitor your diet program development.

Feedback and motivational support can help you move on and keep you challenged to finish your diet regimen program.

Try to add  some fun into our diet and skin regimen program, this will help you have a more enjoyable program that you could keep on sustaining until you achieve your desired results, rather than a diet program that causes you to suffer or have misgivings about what you may have given up to pursue your diet regimen or skin care program.

Lastly, couple your diet program with a supplementary exercise pattern. Physical activity is still the best way to help you hasten your diet regimen, since you get to burn more calories, because as you lose weight, your skin does not immediately take on the shape of the pounds you lost and if your skin is not conditioned in the same way you lost weight, it will retain it’s shape and mill result to sagging.

Always get expert advise or opinion from your physician or nutrition expert, they can provide you with vital information on what diet program you could subscribe to that could suit you best, as well as a fitness and skin care expert to help you complement your skin structure therapy as well.

Always be careful when you want to go pursue a diet regimen, it pays to know what is best and save yourself the trouble of regretting something that you would not expect to happen to you.

This is how food and skin care are both important considerations to maintaining a healthy way of life and can surely give you the satisfaction of how you feel better and at the prime of your health.

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Face Washing as Basic Skin Care for Teens

If you are a parent with adolescents or teenagers in the house, you need to understand and also be aware of skin care for your kids and what better way than to impart to them the simplest method of face washing as basic skin care for your teens.

Surprised? Actually it is by understanding the fact that as children enter adolescence, they still have sensitive skin that requires delicate and constant care for them to have healthy skin.

Many parents usually worry over the prospect of their teenagers having problems with acne or oily skin, however, it is best to know how to deal with each possible skin problem teenagers are likely to encounter.

Probably one of the most common factor that leads to parents worrying over their children’s skin problems is knowing that as teenagers, they are already independent of washing and bathing themselves, wherein parents no longer have the idea of how their kids go about their skin care routines.

Are they simply using water to wash their faces? Or probably using your facial skin toners or cleansers or use bar soaps to wash their faces?

These things need to be carefully considered and corrected since this could lead to more harm than good if the incorrect method is not corrected right away.

Out of the three mentioned routines earlier, washing the face with water is the safest process of all, while the remaining two could prove harmful to your teenager.

Do remember that since adolescent skin is still sensitive, the appearance of acne does not conclusively indicate that your child’s face is really dirty, but is just a result of their skin’s sensitivity.

Also, adult facial cleansing formulas could also be too harsh for their sensitive skin and should also be avoided.

Using acne removal treatments could only lead to aggravating the problem or even do more damage to your child’s skin regeneration process.

Essentially, skin or face washing habits for adolescents should be limited to once a day since anything in excess of that can be damaging to their skin.

Parents, and teenagers as well, must be aware that adolescents should only be using gentle cleansers on their skin, for which the best choices are those made of natural or water based cleansers and cream-based cleansers that not only cleans but moisturizes skin as well.

Face cleansing should ideally be done once a day, as mentioned earlier, unless your teens are active in after –school sport or outdoor activities, where intense sweating or exposure to dust and grime are part of the activity.

 Also avoid letting your kids use body lotion on their faces, if they feel that their skin needs moisturizing, since the skin from the neck up is more sensitive and requires delicate attention, most especially since majority of body lotions available in the market contain certain ingredients that can cause reactions on facial skin.

It is a rare fact for teenagers to worry about moisturizing their skin, but if the skin starts to become extra dry, a gentle water-based moisturizer would do.

You can ask a dermatologist or a licensed skin care expert for products that can be helpful for skin teenager’s skin conditions.

In a nutshell, skin care for adolescents should just be more of simply clearing the dirt or grime from the topmost layer of the skin and to ensure good skin care habits, like face washing as basic skin care for teens, is by instilling in them the responsibility and awareness of what needs to be done and what should not.

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Effective Skin Care Through Foods

The skin, being the largest organ of the body, is believed to be one of the factors that determine a person’s beauty. Since it an also be a reflection of a person’s underlying health, it is a must that people take care of it by keeping it well-hydrated, away from harmful UV rays, and by supplying it with nutrients though a religious skin care regimen.

Maintaining Beautiful Skin By Eating Healthy

Aside from having and maintaining good skin care regimen and habits, one of the factors that greatly affect the health of the skin is food. Since the nutrients from a wide variety of foods are ready to be absorbed by the body, it is a must that people are very particular about the type of foods their bodies need.

For healthy skin, experts agree that people should load up on blueberries, cranberries, raspberries, strawberries, cherries, currants, purple grapes, pumpkin, carrots, butternut squash, and sweet potatoes because these are rich in antioxidants that protect cell damage.

Skin experts say that major antioxidants such as vitamin A, C, and E can indeed help decrease damage brought by the harmful rays of the sun. These vitamins can also help in the reduction of possible damages brought by certain factors in the environment. Studies shoe that Vitamin A is quiet essential for healthy blood and skin condition. The major sources of vitamin A are vegetables such as carrots, pumpkin, sweet potatoes, butternut squash, and green leafy veggies like spinach. Fruits such as cantaloupe, mangoes, and tomatoes are also major sources of vitamin A.

Vitamin C is also good for the skin. Aside from boosting your immune system against minor and major illnesses; Vitamin C is also a known potent topical antioxidant in its active form. Vitamin-C rich foods include fruits, fruit juices, and vegetables such as orange juice and grapefruit juice, slices of papayas, strawberries, and kiwis as well as red and green peppers, broccoli, and cauliflower. Vitamin E also plays a significant role because it serves as a skin conditioner. Major Vitamin-E food sources include vegetables like spinach and asparagus, vegetable oils, nuts, seeds, and olives.

Smart fats or unsaturated fats like omega-3 fatty acids are good for the skin and heart as well. Omega-3s that can be found from fatty fish can help protect your body against severe sun damage and various heart diseases. Aside from fatty fish, major sources of omega-3s are ground flaxseed, walnuts, and eggs. Other sources of monounsaturated or unsaturated fats are olive oil, canola oil, almond oil, hazelnut oil, avocados, olives, almonds, and hazelnuts.

Since stress also contributes to the person’s overall beauty and health, experts also recommend healthy foods such as beans, green beans, sugar snap peas, green peas, and chickpeas to stress reduction as well as lean proteins such as turkey and skinless chicken breast are best to boost the immune system. And for superior protection for skin care against the harmful rays of the sun, lots of tomatoes, watermelon, and pink grapefruit are recommended.

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Eating Healthy Foods Aids Skin Care

More and more these days are neglecting proper skin care due to busy schedules. In fact, good skin care habits are not the only ones affected by their overall health as well. Because of busy schedule, many people resort to alternatives means of skin care well in fact, all they could do to maintain healthy skin is to eat well.

Experts say that eating healthy foods is one of the major keys in combating unhealthy skin caused by toxicity that modern life brings. This is because it makes people aware that they should be more careful in watching their total health and well-being. It also reminds people that nothing beats the advantages of going back to basics.

These days, with the growing numbers of people who suffer from different skin problems, people should be more vigilant in keeping up with a healthy lifestyle by eating healthy foods. This is very important not only to ensure good skin but also to maintain overall health.

Good Food To Good Skin

Time and again, nutrition experts say that there are two major keys that lead to good skin—these include eating the right amount of food depending on the person’s need and lifestyle and eating a range of foods to ensure that the person gets balanced diet.

And since food and eating properly contribute so much to a healthy diet, people should focus more on considering the food their body needs especially on a diet. Experts remind that diet foods should contain the necessary vitamins and minerals that are quite essential for weight control and metabolism. These diet foods should include Vitamins B2, B3, B5, B6, Vitamin C, choline, inositol, chromium, manganese, and zinc. 

Studies show that the perfect foods that help people achieve healthy skin should include a wide range of fruits. Aside from being an all-natural product, fruits are low in calories, rich in dietary fiber that helps boosts satiety, and satisfies a person’s sweet tooth without worrying about weight gain. Containing all the nutrients and vitamins it has, fruits are an ideal diet food for those who are into losing weight or weight reduction and those who are striving to maintain their weight. Other nutritional benefits of fruit include the prevention of vitamin deficiency, a rich source of dietary fiber and rich in folate.

Just like fruits, vegetables are also considered perfect foods especially for those who are having problems in maintaining good skin care regimen. Aside from being low in calorie-content, high in dietary fiber, and full of dietary nutrients that help maintain efficient metabolism, veggies—in various preparations—also make good and appetizing snacks. Aside from being a rich source of important vitamins and minerals such as vitamin B-complex micronutrients, vitamins C, E and K that combat vitamin deficiency, vegetables are also excellent sources of the protective plant micronutrient called “phytochemicals.”

Having vegetables as diet food also lowers the risk of heart disease, cancers, and high blood pressure while protecting the body from having illnesses caused by muscle degeneration.

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Daily Skin Care To Avoid Signs Of Aging

Experts in the beauty industry say that there are actually two effective ways of skin care to the aging skin: first is the artificial means and the natural means. The former can be done through plastic surgeries and through the use of products that contain chemicals that are believed to minimize the signs of aging and the latter would include measures to living a healthy lifestyle.

More and more people prefer the artificial means because it is an easy remedy to aging. They encourage people to take natural means as possible because if these are done and followed properly, they can have a lasting effect on the person’s appearance and over all health and well being.

Experts say that natural skin regimen is the best way to achieve a long lasting, healthy skin. This might include having a balanced and healthy diet and developing a regular work out, exercise or physical activities to keep the blood circulate freely. This can also be possible by stopping smoking cigarettes; veering away from stressful events; finding ample time to sleep; being well hydrated through lots of fluids especially water and by keeping a positive outlook in life.

Why Skin Care Is Important

To avoid the early signs of aging, proper skin care should be an essential part of every person’s life. The first step in taking care of skin is to know what type of skin you possess. Dermatologists—professionals who are experts on skin and skin care and treatment—categorize skin types into four that include dry, oily, normal, and combination.

If there’s a tight or rough feel of the skin, you should pay more attention to the way you treat your skin because this is an indicator of dry skin—the most common contributor of ugly skin. This is characterized by the presence of flakes and scales as well as redness and itchiness of the skin. Experts say that is if you have dry skin, it is a must that you avoid washing it with hot water. It is also a must that you stay away from using harsh or strong soaps and alcohol-based skin products to avoid skin irritation.

Then, the next type is the oily skin that is characterized by shiny appearance and large pores on the skin’s surface that makes it prone to acne. People who have oily skin should shun away from too much scrubbing that can cause more pimple breakout. It is also advisable that they use non-comedogenic skin products to maintain a healthy skin.

On the other hand, normal skin is characterized by healthy glow. It doesn’t have redness or large pores. People who have normal skin type should use skin care products that help maintain the natural water balance of their skin.

Last effective skin care would be the combination skin that has dry and oily areas. Oily sections usually include the T-zone (the forehead, nose, and chin), while cheeks remain less oily. People with combination skin must use products that are specifically developed for this skin type in order to avoid over-drying that can cause redness, itchiness, or any irritation.

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