Skin Care Basics

Skin care is important to your overall well-being. You should establish a daily routine for attending to the needs of your skin.

You need to determine your skin type (oily, dry, sensitive, normal) before you establish your routine. Select the products suitable for your skin type. You may have to experiment with a few products before making a final decision on what to use. Now that you have your products, establish your basic skin care daily routine as follows:

Cleanse your skin. Cleansers have three main ingredients: oil, water, and wetting agents. The oil and wetting agents extract the oil and dirt from your skin and water flushes it out. You will probably want to try a few cleansers until you find the one that suits you. You should always use soap-free cleansers. Use lukewarm water for cleansing. Hot water or cold water can cause damage to your skin. Over-cleansing of your skin can also damage it.

Exfoliate your skin. The skin naturally removes dead skin and replaces it with new skin cells. Exfoliation is a way to assist the skin in this process. Dead skin cells cannot respond to skin care products but the products do prevent the dead cells from reaching the new skin cells. Removing dead skin cells increases the effectiveness of the skin care products. Exfoliation should be done just after cleansing. Exfoliate 4 to 5 times per week if you have oil or normal skin and 1 to 2 times per week if you have dry or sensitive skin. In hot humid weather, you can add a couple more times per week.

Moisturize your skin. This is a very important step. Moisturizers seal moisture in your skin cells and also attract moisture from the air. The amount you need will become apparent within a week of your initial use. Do not use too much. It can clog the pores of your skin. Apply moisturizer while your skin is still damp.

Apply sunscreen to your skin. A lot of moisturizers or day-time creams come with UV protection. This doubles the benefit you receive. If your moisturizer does not have UV protection, use a sunscreen product. You can use sunscreen everyday whether it is cloudy or sunny.

You should experiment with skin care products to find the best one for you. You will also be able to determine how much of each you should apply to get the results you want. A word of caution: Consult your dermatologist before you start using any skin care products if you have skin problems.