My basket of new skin and hair care products
So, a week ago I forsake all types of traditional facial products and decided to rub a bunch of weird shit all over my face. This post is a little gross so click below to read more!
I am a little on the crunchy side of things and since I became a vegetarian a year and a half ago, I have also been trying to use animal/cruelty free products. Well as I have learned, a lot of skin and body care items can be animal friendly but still terribly bad for you (harsh chemicals, fragrances, and all sorts of other carcinogenic additives). So with that, I am trying to use more natural skin and and body care products.
A little background about my skin care routine and my face. Skip this part if you don’t want to be grossed out. I have had acne since puberty. I have had a few clear days over the years, but they never last. My skin has always been quite the mix, my forehead and chin are dry and oily at the same time, my nose riddled with black heads, and my cheeks do what they please, when they please. I also have overly sensitive skin too, so anything abrasive makes my face red and mask like for hours. It’s horrible. I get cystic acne from time to time and have had a fascination with dermatology (probably because of my horrid skin) and would try to lance my own cysts or give myself deep facials to try and remove black heads any. way. possible. Gross, right? I have also tried every acne regiment short of accutane. Proactive worked on and off for me through high school. Clinique’s acne system partially worked through college but it was expensive. I have tried all of the pharmacy brands, Aveda’s acne products (which made my face red and inflamed by the way!), some of the “professional” brands at Ulta or Sephora, all of which turned out to be long term disappointments. I also have had very bad habits in the past such as wearing makeup while I do yoga (so stupid!) or going to sleep with makeup on. Sometimes with both of those things happening on the same night, without regard for how it would make my face look 3 days from them. I’m stubborn and lazy, what more can I say.
So fast forward to a week ago. I barely wear make up now and when I do, its washed of as soon as it has served its purpose. This in theory was helping but since I have not been wearing makeup as often, in my mind I have not had any reason to wash my face except when I’m in the shower. So my face was still pretty ugly. {Side note: I onow that no matter what I put on my face I have to watch what I eat. I have always known that diet affects skin, but never realized the extent to how true that is. When I eat a really healthy vegetarian diet (like I did in January of this year) my skin gets pretty clear. I still have some spot and its really flaky and oily, but no cystic acne and I feel pretty comfortable going natural.}
I can’t quite remember how I stumbled upon this natural acne cures post by Lauren, a girl working hard to heal her body naturally. I think it was pintrest, but regardless the oil cleansing kind of sounded like a crock of shit to me and of course google didn’t help as it is filled with success and horror stories alike, and not many credible ones at that. But at this point in my skin clearing journey I had given up. I had been using St. Ives for blemishes scrub to wash my face when I did end up getting around to it. I did a lot of research and thought, what the hell? (I’m not going to repeat it all here, if you want the info go to Lauren’s post) I decided I needed a bottle of Cold Press Extra Vigrin Olive Oil (evoo) for my skin type and to 2-4 weeks to see how it would work. If it was a failure I could still use the evoo for cooking, so no real financial lose.
We of course didn’t have any evoo at home so after sneaking a first cold press kroger “natural” brand bottle into our cart last Thursday I was ready. I re-read the instructions (1. Pour a pool of evoo or whatever oil you chose into your hand, about the size of a quarter 2. Warm the oil between your fingers 3. Massage oil into face for 1-2 minutes 4. Heat a wash cloth to as hot as you can stand, ring it out, then lay it on your face to “steam” the oil into your face, repeat 2-3 times 5. Wash out wash cloth with hot water again, the gently wipe (not scrub) the oil off your face 6. Rub excess oil into skin like lotion and BAM, oil cleanse complete) and got started. I actually didn’t mind it and my skin definitely felt different afterwards, but it definitely didn’t feel oily either.
I decided to take the natural cleansing thing farther than just oil cleansing (I mean why stop there!) and started doing honey cleansing in the morning. The honey makes my skin a little dry and when I sweat I smell like honey (bonus?). I continued the regiment this way (oil at night, honey in the morning) until Monday of this week. I got a bug up my ass and wanted to try some of the other stuff that Lauren mentioned in conjunction with the oil/honey cleansing. I know that by doing it this way I may never know which of these things is helping my skin the most, but I don’t care. I am not good at controlled experiments!
So, I dragged Steve to Whole Foods and found some jojoba oil (affectionately called Joe-Joe oil, because I’m a toddler), vitamin e oil, tea tree oil, and coconut oil. I again did a lot of research about the benefits and drawbacks of each of these oils before ever putting them on my face because like I said my skin is highly sensitive and one wrong ingredient and my face looks like a baboons ass for hours. So after my nightly oil cleanse, I mixed a concoction in my hand of 4 drops jojoba oil, 1 drop vitamin e oil, and 1 drop of tea tree oil (the Internet scared me to death with its horrid accounts of what could happen if you do not dilute tea tree oil enough and put it directly on your skin, so I was very careful to only use a little bit at first). I rubbed it into my face and neck as much as I could, washed my hands and rubbed the rest of it in and then washed my hands again. I constantly have my fingers in my eyes thanks to ridiculous seasonal allergies that Texas gave me as a welcoming gift 3 years ago and I was not getting that tea tree oil shit in my eyes (the Internet said it could make you blind or die, I’m very impressionable).
Also tea tree oil smells AWFUL the first time you open a bottle of the fully concentrated oil. Its like a hairs width away from smelling like patchouli, but I have to say, my face felt even better that night and the next morning. The tea tree oil has cooling affect on my skin (which means it makes it red for about 5 minutes) and the jojoba oil/vitamin e is a powerful moisturizer that supposedly doesn’t clog pours.
facial oil aka mask of red fury
After that night I have been doing the facial oil after both honey and oil cleansing and I have noticed a big difference in my skin. I have played with the ratio of oils in the facial oil and the recipe I have used for the past 2 days is 3 drops jojoba, 1 drop vitamin e, 3 drops tea tree oil, and that seems to be the right ticket.
On Tuesdy and Wednesday I used 1 drop jojoba and 1 drop tea tree mixed in my hand an applied with a q-tip as a spot cleanser after the facial oil and it seemed to make my face red all day long. Last night and today I went without the spot treatment and my face looks much better. On Wednesday morning I also tried the apple cider vinegar(acv)/witch hazel toner and it did not go over well. I was cheap and bought witch hazel with alcohol in it, so I’m thinking that could have something to do with it or the acv + the tea tree oil was just too much for my skin all at once like that. I will revisit it in the future though.
Right now my face looks pretty damn good for smearing oil and honey on it for the last week. It’s still a little oily to the touch but I don’t “feel” oily just sitting here like I used to when I was intermittently washing with the St. Ives. It’s not overly shiny either and I only have 3-4 red spots that are drying up and on their way out. I have taken a picture each morning and will post them next week after I’ve had the official 2 week turn around for new face products.
One last thing, which is probably my favorite part. I mentioned that I also bought coconut oil at Whole Foods on Monday. Its the cosmetic kind ($7.99 for a 7 oz jar) but it does says that it is food grade on the back. From my research you’re not supposed to use coconut oil on the face because it can clog pours, but it can be used alone or mixed with vitamin e as a body lotion. I followedthis recipe. I only whipped the coconut and vitamin e for 6 minutes and used cheap coconut oil and after being back in the jar for a day it’s hardened up again, but it is still easy enough to use as lotion. I just push my fingers into it to get a small chunk, warm it up between my fingers which makes it turn back into actual oil, and then a use it just like regular lotion twice a day. It’s amazing. My skin has never felt so wonderful. Right after I put the lotion on I feel like a baby seal, sleek and shiny. Then the oil sinks in and my skin is soft and supple. No matter what happens with the face portion of this experiment I think I will be using the coconut/vitamin e lotion for a long time.
sleek baby seal skin in a jar
Check back next Friday, where I will have my 2 week oil/honey cleansing update!
