Facial routine blunders
Here are the top beauty-related mistakes you’re making, and how to fix them.
THE benefits of taking care of your skin extend beyond appearances and looking good on a particular day, it’s about the long-term effects.
A consistent skincare routine, along with constant hydration and eating well all contribute to maintaining healthy and glowing skin.
However, there are plenty of skincare boo-boos that go unnoticed, especially if you’ve only recently started on a routine.
Here are some common skincare mistakes you may not even know you’re making, and tips to help you get into a routine that will result in healthy, glowing skin.
Consistency is key
It’s easy to forget to stick to your routine when other things take priority but if you want to see results, you need to be consistent.
In an article by The New York Times’ T Magazine, dermatologist Dr Rachel Nazarian advises readers to aim at using a product over at least six weeks, once or twice daily, to notice a difference.
With any skincare product, apply in order of consistency, meaning from thinnest to thickest, said the writeup.
For your day routine, Cosmopolitan suggests applying your skincare in this order: cleanser, toner, serums, eye cream, spot treatments, moisturiser, face oil, sunscreen.
For night time, it’s the same order but replace face oil with retinol and sunscreen with face oil.
Ain’t nobody got time for that, right? Then stick to the bare minimum: cleanser, moisturiser, sunscreen, and change it up when necessary (serum or face oils for dry skin, acne toner or retinoid for breakouts).
Not cleaning your makeup brushes
Everything boils down to cleanliness, and it’s easy to forget that just like your dining utensils, makeup tools need cleaning too.
This is easy to overlook, especially if you notice that your makeup brushes need cleaning when you’re rushing to put on your makeup in the morning and you decide to leave it until later (and most of the time, never get around to it).
Well, you’d better get to it soon, as it doesn’t take long for oil and makeup to build up on your brushes, especially if you’re a heavy user. This can lead to fungus and yeast growth, and you don’t want to be smearing these on your skin.
Between uses, wipe the surface of your brushes with an alcohol-based cleanser, but make sure you also deep clean them once a week with baby cleanser and water or makeup brush cleaners.
Rubbing your skin
When we feel tired or stressed a lot of us tend to rub our eyes without thinking about it, and this is a big no-no as it puts stress on the skin.
The same applies to any part of your face, be it tugging at your eyes when applying makeup to rubbing in eye cream.
This makes your skin lose its elasticity over time, so make sure you find out the correct way to apply eye cream (lightly tapping with your ring finger all around the eye socket and lids).
Over-exfoliating
While exfoliating is a good practice as removes dead skin cell build-up and helps increase cell turnover in order to bring fresh cells to the surface, it’s not something you should do too often.
Daily exfoliation is a no-no as it may irritate your skin and damage the skin’s natural moisture barrier, so it’s best to carry out twice a week, and increase if need be.
It’s recommended that one exfoliates the entire face once a week, and for other days of the week to just focus on problems areas (rough or textured).
How do you know if you’re over-exfoliating? If your skin starts to feel dry and tight, is red or flaky or extra sensitive, reduce how often you exfoliate and look for gentler products.
Skimping on sunscreen
Every day, your skin is exposed to the sun, even when you’re at home sitting by a window. This is why SPF is essential, every day, on all areas of exposed skin, not just for when you go on a beach holiday! Photo-ageing or solar damage, which can eventually lead to skin cancer, refers to the damage caused by the sun. This happens when ultraviolet (UV) light hits skin unprotected by SPF, causing DNA changes at a cellular level. Not only do you need to apply sunscreen every day, it also needs to be reapplied every time you expose yourself to the sun.
The Skin Cancer Foundation recommends that sunscreen be applied 30 minutes before sun exposure to allow the formula to bind to the skin, and then be reapplied every two hours. Fortunately, there are tons of products in the market that are lightweight and go over makeup.
Good hygiene practices
Even if you’ve washed and dried your hands just before applying your moisturiser, foundation or eye cream, there could still be oil or bacteria on your fingers that you are transferring into your products. To avoid this, use a scoop, spatula or cotton swab each time, for each product. This is also often overlooked, but it’s important to clean your cell phone regularly. Every day, you’re touching lift buttons, doorknobs, shopping carts and so on, then transferring all those bacteria onto your phone, which you then hold up to your face. Continue to wash your hands often, but Good Housekeeping recommends deep cleaning your phone at least twice a week, by wiping it down with a disinfecting wipe.
Leaving dry skin untreated
If your skin is feeling tight and flaky, or if you notice scaly white patches and increased markings, this is a major indication that your skin is dehydrated.
What’s the difference between dry skin and dehydrated skin? Today.com notes that essentially, dry skin is a skin type, the same way people have oily or combination skin types, which stems from a lack of sebum (oil) in the dermis.
Dehydrated skin, on the other hand, means there’s a lack of water and moisture in the dermis.
To treat this, make sure you moisturise, but be selective about the products you choose.
Today.com recommends opting for something that has a higher oil concentration, which tends to be a bit thicker than your average lotion because they provide more moisture to the skin.
Additionally, use creams but if you have sensitive skin, go with an oil or ointment instead as creams have preservatives in them that are potential skin irritants.
You can also introduce a hyaluronic acid-based hydrator into your regimen to be applied before moisturise, in the morning and at night.
Sleeping with makeup on
This sounds like a no-brainer, but most of us have had those night where we’ve been up and about all day and by the time we come home, it’s tempting to think “just this once” before plopping into bed without removing our makeup.
Make no mistake, this will ruin your skin. Product settles into fine lines, and it prevents the nightly repair cycle that your skin goes through.
All this leads to blackheads, clogged pores and blemishes, so make sure you take the time (really, it only takes five minutes) and clean your face before your sleep!
Moisturiser mistakes
Only moisturising at night, and not using a serum before the moisturiser, are also skincare boo-boos that need to be rectified.
You might think applying moisturiser in the morning might make your skin look greasy, but in reality, applying a lightweight one a few minutes before your makeup can actually make it go on smoother.
It’s essential to include moisturiser into your daytime routine to keep your skin from drying out and producing more oil during the day to compensate.
Serum, which goes on before it, is designed to protect and hydrate your skin, and because it’s lighter and brings active ingredients to the skin swiftly, it goes on right after cleansing and toning.
To maximise its benefits, you need to seal the serum and that’s where moisturiser or cream comes in.
According to Eze-cosmetics.com, think of a serum as the secret weapon for treating skin issues like discolouration, dullness, fine lines, or acne, and a moisturiser as the key to hydrating your skin.
Not using a specific nighttime product
There’s a reason some products are designed to be used only at night. This is because the needs of our skin at night are very different, as this is when our skin repairs and regenerates itself.
In the day, applying moisturiser to create a base for our makeup and sunscreen is essential, and at night, you need a specific nighttime product to maximise the benefits of all those sleeping hours.
Look for intensive rejuvenating treatments with high levels of COQ10, as these will help balance and moisturise your skin so that you start the next day looking rested.