You’ll be amazed what a Dry January can do to your face
DOeS the word ‘detox’ fill you with doom? Or, like many in the medical establishment, do you think it’s a load of nonsense? the notion that you can rid your system of toxins, rendering your organs virtuously pure, is often deemed pseudo-scientific balderdash. A healthy body is constantly detoxifying, say medical experts. If it wasn’t, you’d be dead. no amount of snake oil can make it do more.
Fair enough. However, if we take exact science out of this, can’t we just use ‘detox’ as a term to mean: ‘We over-indulged. now, let’s be sensible for a while to reset our relationship with things we should be doing in moderation’?
I’m not talking about weeks of renunciation. We don’t need famine to make up for our feast.
the theory that it takes 21 days to get used to a new habit has been debated. And yet, three weeks, a month, six weeks — whatever works for you — is a useful block of time in which to retrain your body and brain to stop expecting mince pies for breakfast.
And, then, there’s mother’s ruin. We all know the not-so-great British Booze Face. Many of us see it in the mirror.
the complexion is dulled, grey, parched yet pimply. Skin may be shrunken about the eyes and cheekbones, but bloated as a whole.
PLentY of boozehounds develop a red and thread-veined nose. Jowls sag and undereyes blacken, while pores gape cavernously after sleeping in slap.
I have skin in the game here — literally. I gave up drinking seven years ago, after 30 years of carousing.
For the first week, I was ruddy-faced and spot-ridden, with my t-zone smothered in grease. After seven days, however, compliments about my skin started pouring in.
By day ten, I was happy without make-up. two weeks in, my cheekbones looked supermodelsharp. And the week after that, a man at a party mistook me for someone 19 years younger.
A month or so later, I glowed. My face had lost its booze bloat; even my nails were stronger. In my 30s, my sooty under-eye pits used to be the bane of my life. Sober, they vanished.
As skin expert Dr Michael Prager explains: ‘Alcohol is basically sugar, only with 50 per cent more calories. We see a sped-up version of the ageing effect of drinking in diabetes. Sugar causes glycosylation, ageing cells and tissues through higher levels of insulin, and leading to changes in the DnA and tissue oxidation.
‘this affects cells in a multitude of negative ways: causing freeradical damage, reducing cell proliferation and collagen production, and slowing everything. Alcohol is a diuretic, too: it dehydrates you, skin included. You also absorb nutrients less successfully and crave more salt.
‘In women it creates higher testosterone levels, leading to spots and the taking on of a masculine appearance, with a diminished waist, barrel-like middle, bloated moon face, skinny legs and hair loss.’
Los Angeles dermatologist Dr Harold Lancer — complexion guru to Scarlett Johansson, Victoria Beckham and Kim Kardashian — says that it can take our skin a month to get over a single hangover.
Other than hopping into a time machine and preventing a lifetime of sun exposure, nothing will ever impact how you look more than giving up alcohol — no cream, no facial, no superfood.
Dr Prager adds: ‘the best option for anti-ageing is to stop drinking altogether, but microbreaks come a close second.
‘Giving your skin time out allows it to recover by reversing damage, mainly in the production of skin collagen and hydration levels.
‘even the best Botox will never give you a glow as vibrant as a couple of months off the bottle.’
Free anti-ageing — this must be worth a thought.
Meanwhile, eat healthily: lots of vegetables; good fats (nuts, avocados, olives); salmon (Dr Lancer convinced Victoria Beckham to consume it daily for its omega-3 fatty acid hit); and blueberries.
the latter anti-inflammatory fruit — alongside salmon — is dermatologist brand Dr Perricone’s famous skin fix.
Use a retinoid, do some bodybrushing, take walks and have the odd steaming bath, too. Call it a detox, or call it being less of a lunatic — your call.