Why You MUST Apply Sunscreen All Year Round
Oh sunscreen: you’ve got to love it for its valiant effort in the war against wrinkles. But, actually wearing it on a daily basis? Kind of annoying, right? Well, not any more. Say hello to one of the latest additions to the TruSkin family, SPF 30 Mineral Sunscreen with Vitamin C.
Facial serums are awesome for fighting off environmental nasties and targeting all manner of skin concerns. Toners are also fabulous for treating your skin and preparing it for moisturizer. But in terms of non-negotiable essentials, the big three are, without a doubt, cleanser, moisturizer and sunscreen. After all, without a daily ritual of keeping your skin clean, moisturized and protected, you may as well not bother with the rest.
Now, all this chat isn’t meant to make you throw away your much-loved skin allies. Far from it. Serums, eye creams, toners and oils are extremely powerful tools for flooding your skin with hydration, antioxidants, peptides and nutrients. What we’re trying to stress, however, is the importance of the skincare fundamentals.
And sunscreen is one of, if not THE most important of those fundamentals.
The Importance Of Daily Sunscreen
Speak to any beauty editor, dermatologist or skin expert and they will undoubtedly agree on one thing: daily, broad-spectrum sunscreen is crucial if you care about maintaining healthy skin. It’s the most important way to ward off the signs of premature aging (beware dark spots, lines and wrinkles), but not only that; according to the Skin Cancer Foundation, regular use of SPF 15 can reduce your risk of developing certain skin cancers by as much as 50 percent.
And it’s not just when you’re lounging on the beach or picnicking in the park that sunscreen is important. In fact, you should really be wearing it on exposed skin every day of the year. Dramatic? Not even. The sun is present even when it’s cold outside because sunshine is about light, not just heat. So, while you might not feel the sun beating down on your skin on cold, cloudy days, it’s still there doing its thing. If it wasn’t? Well, frankly, it would be nighttime. UVB rays (the ones that burn your skin) are strongest in the summer, for sure, but they can still burn your skin if you’re not careful. What’s more, those equally-as-treacherous UVA rays (that ones that are responsible for deeper skin aging) are constant all year – rain or shine, blue skies or clouds. In fact, according to the American Academy of Dermatology, up to 80 percent of the sun’s harmful UV rays can penetrate right through clouds.
Mic. Drop.
Your New BFF In The Fight Against Sun Damage
No matter how many times we talk about the damaging effects of the sun, it’s clear that applying sunscreen every day can seem like a real chore for many. We’ve heard all the excuses in the book, from ‘sunscreen makes my skin breakout,’ to ‘I don’t have time for yet another step in my morning routine.’ Well, we hear you. And this is why we decided to launch our very own SPF 30 Mineral Sunscreen to help deal with the damaging effects of the sun while being a product you might actually want to use.
Stacked with skin-protecting ingredients like our favorite free-radical-busting antioxidant, vitamin C, along with vegan marine collagen to enhance elasticity and moisturization, and aloe vera juice to soothe and shield the skin, SPF 30 Mineral Sunscreen can be used on top of moisturizer or instead of – your choice. If your skin is super-dry, you’ll love it as an addition to your Vitamin C Brightening Moisturizer, but many customers say they use it instead of moisturizer, applying it after their favorite hydrating serum to lock in moisture and protect their skin. So, that extra step you didn't want to deal with? Done.
The Secret Sauce
Recently awarded one of the Absolute Best New Sunscreens for 2022 by Stylecaster, the secret to SPF 30 Mineral Sunscreen’s success is its smart non-nano zinc oxide formulation. Bear with us for a minute while we explain the science.
As you probably know, there are two main kinds of sunscreens available: chemical and mineral. Chemical sunscreens use chemical ingredients (dur!) like octisalate and oxybenzone to absorb UV radiation and help protect your skin from the sun. The problem with these are that they can be irritating for acne-prone or sensitive skin. Plus, the FDA is still unsure as to their safety and effectiveness. That’s what we call a major red flag, right there.
Mineral sunscreens, on the other hand, contain, yes you guessed it, minerals like zinc oxide and titanium dioxide which instantly block the sun’s rays. These naturally protect your skin from both UVA and UVB radiation and are very well tolerated by all skin types. The only downside to mineral sunscreens? They’ve traditionally felt thick and sticky to apply and often leave a white residue on the skin. Many mineral sunscreens use nano-sized zinc oxide because its tiny size means it’s less whitening on the skin. The only problem there is, is that certain studies indicate that nano particles have the potential to negatively affect the environment, causing harm to marine life.
As you know, we’re not down with that. At all. Which is why we worked out a way to formulate non-nano zinc oxide into our SPF 30 Mineral Sunscreen. A non-whitening, lightweight cream that won’t leave your skin feeling heavy or weighed down. It's also cruelty-free, vegan friendly and reef-safe, which makes it the perfect addition to anyone’s morning routine.
Fast becoming a TruSkin fan favorite, now you have NO excuses not to protect your skin from sun damage every day of the year.
Literally none.
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![What Happens To Your Skin During Menopause?]()
Menopausal skin can be anything from slightly tricky to downright terrible. But wayward hormones needn’t get the better off you. You just need to know what to expect and get ahead of the game.
How times have changed. Rewind ten, maybe just five years ago and the ‘m’ word was never spoken about. This important life-changing period of time that happens to every single woman alive, literally brushed under the carpet as if it were some dirty secret. Total madness.
Thankfully, we live in different times and the menopause (there, we said it!) is now a topic we can openly talk about without feeling ashamed or, heaven’s forbid, old. Because it’s an important time and can bring a lot of unsettling uncertainties to any woman going through this perfectly natural stage of life. Hot flashes, weight gain, mood swings, zero energy, they can all go hand in hand with the menopause.
And then there’s your skin which also has its own challenges to contend with.
How The Menopause Affects Your Skin
The menopause can be split into three stages. Perimenopause begins first, usually in a woman’s 40s (although it can start as early as your 30s and as late as your 50s). This period of your life refers to the time in which your body starts to transition out of your reproductive years and into the menopause. Your body’s production of hormones (mainly estrogen and progesterone, but also testosterone to a certain degree) starts to decline, your periods become irregular and a few of the classic side effects may come to fruition. Fun times!
Then you obviously get the menopause which is when your body’s hormones cause you to completely stop menstruating (which can take many years) and all those fabulous (said with a side of irony) side-effects get stronger and more frequent. More fun times. Once menopause is over and you’ve stopped ovulating for a year you’re then said to be in the postmenopause and will be forever more.
As you progress through these different stages, your hormones are all over the place which is never great news for the health of your skin. You see, hormone fluctuations can affect your levels of sebum (cue dryness). Not only that but they upset your collagen production which is already declining as part of the natural aging process (cue wrinkles and sagging skin). Estrogen is also important for helping your skin to retain water so when these levels decrease your skin can’t hydrate itself as efficiently (cue dehydration).
Of course, changes in your skin depend on your skin type but, no matter what, you can inevitably look forward to some kind of ‘unpredictability’ during the menopausal years of your life.
5 Ways To Care For Menopausal Skin
If you’ve started to notice that your skin is misbehaving a little more than it used to, chances are you’re in the stage of your life in which your hormones have become, shall we say, less reliable. Read on for a few effective ways to help keep your skin in check as your hormones are very much not!
1. Be Kind
The most important thing to remember? Don’t panic. Freaking out and overcompensating for dry skin, dehydration, breakouts or wrinkles that were never before is a sure-fire way to irritate your skin. Instead, be gentle with your skin, cleansing, toning and treating it with kindness and respect. Most importantly, avoid ingredients like synthetic fragrances and harsh alcohols that will strip your skin and generate further problems you didn’t sign up for.
A great way to do this? Switch out your regular cleanser for Soothing Cleansing Milk which is perfect for menopausal skin, nurturing and calming your barrier function while bringing vital hydration and even a little exfoliation to the table.
2. Moisturize To The Max
Research shows that the most common skin complaint during the menopause is dry, irritated, and often itchy skin. This is all thanks to lowering levels of estrogen (an important skin hydrator) as well as reduced sebum. Without both of these important moisturizing tools, water is able to escape more easily from the surface of your skin which leads to dryness, dehydration and everything that comes with it.
To help get ahead of this, you’re going to want to introduce a hydrating serum as well as a really good moisturizer into your daily regime. Try the kick-ass combo of our Multi-Vitamin Facial Serum and Renewing Longevity Moisturizing Cream every morning, and Vitamin C Deep Hydration Night Cream before bed.
3. Use Smart Skincare Ingredients To Control Breakouts
Cell turnover becomes super sluggish during this time in your life which gives dead skin cells a free ticket to hang around at the surface of your skin and make your complexion look kind of dull. When it’s combined with wayward hormones it’s also asking for acne breakouts to do a real number on your skin. For most people these are mild and easily managed with healing, anti-inflammatory skincare ingredients like salicylic acid, niacinamide and tea tree oil – well, hello there Tea Tree Face Wash and Tea Tree Super Serum+.
If you feel like yours are more serious and out of control, however, seek help from a dermatologist.
4. Look After Your Collagen
It’s thought that skin loses a massive 30 percent of its natural collagen levels during the first five years of the menopause. Sound like a lot, right? Yeah, that’s because it is. And collagen is extremely important for the strength, firmness and elasticity of your skin so you’ve got to do everything you can to keep it healthy and plentiful.
How to do this? With a healthy diet, good sleep, marginal stress (preferably none at all, but it’s OK, we’re all human) and some smart skincare choices. Namely retinol at night (is there anything retinol isn’t good for?!), alongside our fabulous Collagen range which includes Smoothing Collagen Serum, Firming Collagen Day Lotion and our Collagen Boosting Skin Supplement which contains vegetarian collagen (none of that animal stuff for us, thanks) alongside skin-strengthening vitamins, biotin and acai.
5. Apply SPF Like Your Skin Depends On It
Because, heads up, it actually does. Dark spots are likely to get darker, bigger and more prevalent during your menopausal years as decades of sun exposure combine with wild hormones, causing your melanin to lose control of itself. Your fine lines and wrinkles are equally likely to suffer thanks to a lack of collagen helping to reinforce the strength and plumpness of your skin. Sigh.
Our advice? Don’t leave the house without applying SPF 30 Mineral Sunscreen with Vitamin C to your face and neck. It’s packed with sun-protective zinc oxide as well as aloe vera to hydrate and nourish your skin and a TruSkin favorite, brightening vitamin C. It’s basically a skincare must. Every. Day. Of. The Year.
What Happens To Your Skin During Menopause?
read more -
![What Happens To Your Skin During Menopause?]()
Menopausal skin can be anything from slightly tricky to downright terrible. But wayward hormones needn’t get the better off you. You just need to know what to expect and get ahead of the game.
How times have changed. Rewind ten, maybe just five years ago and the ‘m’ word was never spoken about. This important life-changing period of time that happens to every single woman alive, literally brushed under the carpet as if it were some dirty secret. Total madness.
Thankfully, we live in different times and the menopause (there, we said it!) is now a topic we can openly talk about without feeling ashamed or, heaven’s forbid, old. Because it’s an important time and can bring a lot of unsettling uncertainties to any woman going through this perfectly natural stage of life. Hot flashes, weight gain, mood swings, zero energy, they can all go hand in hand with the menopause.
And then there’s your skin which also has its own challenges to contend with.
How The Menopause Affects Your Skin
The menopause can be split into three stages. Perimenopause begins first, usually in a woman’s 40s (although it can start as early as your 30s and as late as your 50s). This period of your life refers to the time in which your body starts to transition out of your reproductive years and into the menopause. Your body’s production of hormones (mainly estrogen and progesterone, but also testosterone to a certain degree) starts to decline, your periods become irregular and a few of the classic side effects may come to fruition. Fun times!
Then you obviously get the menopause which is when your body’s hormones cause you to completely stop menstruating (which can take many years) and all those fabulous (said with a side of irony) side-effects get stronger and more frequent. More fun times. Once menopause is over and you’ve stopped ovulating for a year you’re then said to be in the postmenopause and will be forever more.
As you progress through these different stages, your hormones are all over the place which is never great news for the health of your skin. You see, hormone fluctuations can affect your levels of sebum (cue dryness). Not only that but they upset your collagen production which is already declining as part of the natural aging process (cue wrinkles and sagging skin). Estrogen is also important for helping your skin to retain water so when these levels decrease your skin can’t hydrate itself as efficiently (cue dehydration).
Of course, changes in your skin depend on your skin type but, no matter what, you can inevitably look forward to some kind of ‘unpredictability’ during the menopausal years of your life.
5 Ways To Care For Menopausal Skin
If you’ve started to notice that your skin is misbehaving a little more than it used to, chances are you’re in the stage of your life in which your hormones have become, shall we say, less reliable. Read on for a few effective ways to help keep your skin in check as your hormones are very much not!
1. Be Kind
The most important thing to remember? Don’t panic. Freaking out and overcompensating for dry skin, dehydration, breakouts or wrinkles that were never before is a sure-fire way to irritate your skin. Instead, be gentle with your skin, cleansing, toning and treating it with kindness and respect. Most importantly, avoid ingredients like synthetic fragrances and harsh alcohols that will strip your skin and generate further problems you didn’t sign up for.
A great way to do this? Switch out your regular cleanser for Soothing Cleansing Milk which is perfect for menopausal skin, nurturing and calming your barrier function while bringing vital hydration and even a little exfoliation to the table.
2. Moisturize To The Max
Research shows that the most common skin complaint during the menopause is dry, irritated, and often itchy skin. This is all thanks to lowering levels of estrogen (an important skin hydrator) as well as reduced sebum. Without both of these important moisturizing tools, water is able to escape more easily from the surface of your skin which leads to dryness, dehydration and everything that comes with it.
To help get ahead of this, you’re going to want to introduce a hydrating serum as well as a really good moisturizer into your daily regime. Try the kick-ass combo of our Multi-Vitamin Facial Serum and Renewing Longevity Moisturizing Cream every morning, and Vitamin C Deep Hydration Night Cream before bed.
3. Use Smart Skincare Ingredients To Control Breakouts
Cell turnover becomes super sluggish during this time in your life which gives dead skin cells a free ticket to hang around at the surface of your skin and make your complexion look kind of dull. When it’s combined with wayward hormones it’s also asking for acne breakouts to do a real number on your skin. For most people these are mild and easily managed with healing, anti-inflammatory skincare ingredients like salicylic acid, niacinamide and tea tree oil – well, hello there Tea Tree Face Wash and Tea Tree Super Serum+.
If you feel like yours are more serious and out of control, however, seek help from a dermatologist.
4. Look After Your Collagen
It’s thought that skin loses a massive 30 percent of its natural collagen levels during the first five years of the menopause. Sound like a lot, right? Yeah, that’s because it is. And collagen is extremely important for the strength, firmness and elasticity of your skin so you’ve got to do everything you can to keep it healthy and plentiful.
How to do this? With a healthy diet, good sleep, marginal stress (preferably none at all, but it’s OK, we’re all human) and some smart skincare choices. Namely retinol at night (is there anything retinol isn’t good for?!), alongside our fabulous Collagen range which includes Smoothing Collagen Serum, Firming Collagen Day Lotion and our Collagen Boosting Skin Supplement which contains vegetarian collagen (none of that animal stuff for us, thanks) alongside skin-strengthening vitamins, biotin and acai.
5. Apply SPF Like Your Skin Depends On It
Because, heads up, it actually does. Dark spots are likely to get darker, bigger and more prevalent during your menopausal years as decades of sun exposure combine with wild hormones, causing your melanin to lose control of itself. Your fine lines and wrinkles are equally likely to suffer thanks to a lack of collagen helping to reinforce the strength and plumpness of your skin. Sigh.
Our advice? Don’t leave the house without applying SPF 30 Mineral Sunscreen with Vitamin C to your face and neck. It’s packed with sun-protective zinc oxide as well as aloe vera to hydrate and nourish your skin and a TruSkin favorite, brightening vitamin C. It’s basically a skincare must. Every. Day. Of. The Year.
What Happens To Your Skin During Menopause?
read more -
![5 Ways To Deal With Smile Lines At Home]()
Not a fan of those vertical lines that extend from your nose down to the sides of your mouth? Then read on for five ways to help minimize their appearance.
Smile lines might sound rather lovely and, in all honesty, most of us have some kind of fold – however tiny or etched in – down the sides of our mouth. Do us a favor and dig out a picture of yourself smiling or laughing 20 or so years ago. Chances are, even then, they were apparent. But the thing is, smile lines, aka laughter lines, marionette lines or nasolabial folds come and go with your facial expression when you’re young and your skin is full of delicious collagen. Not so much as time ticks on. In fact, smile lines get progressively deeper as you age, often to the point where they’re always visible around the lips, even when you’re not smiling.
Many people can totally live with their smile lines. Some of you may even find that they’re an essential part of who you are. And we love that. However, that’s not the case for everyone. Smile lines, like crow’s feet and elevens (frown lines) can be a pesky annoyance for many of us. Sounds familiar? Then keep scrolling for some simple skincare tricks and lifestyle habits for helping to reduce the appearance of your smile lines. Just one thing, though. Don’t stop actually smiling in a bid to soften those lines. That’s just miserable.
Prioritize Regular Exfoliation
Exfoliation is one of the simplest ways to stimulate cellular turnover, remove dead skin cells and help improve the appearance of wrinkles by refining the tone and texture of your skin. Of course, in-office treatments like microdermabrasion offer the deepest type of exfoliation so they're always an option, but if you prefer to deal with your skin at home, our 6% AHA, BHA + PHA Liquid Exfoliant is a fabulous choice.
A leave-on liquid that’s best applied to freshly cleansed skin (but before serum), this lightweight treatment contains a super smart blend of exfoliating ingredients to do all the hard work without any kind of scrubbing action. The main ingredients in question are glycolic acid, salicylic acid and gluconolactone which are different types of exfoliating acids. Together, they work like clockwork to encourage collagen production, hydrate the skin and say a big, fat ‘ciao’ to dead skin cells.
It’s gentle enough to use daily but we always recommend starting slowly, then building up to frequent use as your skin acclimates.
Build Collagen With Retinol Or Bakuchiol
Collagen is extremely important for the health of your skin, giving it structure, support, strength and volume. You’re born with tons of fabulous collagen in your skin which is why baby’s skin is so soft and plump. However, as you age, your production of collagen gets slower and thus your levels get lower, making your skin become drier, thinner and less elastic. This happens from around your mid-to-late 20s onwards. Yes, that early!
Sadly, you can’t stop this inevitable natural aging process, but there are many ways to help keep your collagen from disappearing quicker than nature intended.
Two of the most important topical ingredients for collagen are retinol, or nature’s gentler alternative to retinol, bakuchiol. Both of these work at a cellular level to kickstart collagen and encourage a more efficient barrier function to help keep your skin hydrated and healthy. Our Retinol Facial Serum is an incredible nightly treatment for improving smile (and indeed all!) lines, or try our fabulous Longevity Regimen Bundle if retinol’s not your thing.
Stimulate Blood Flow With A Facial Workout
Daily massage around your mouth can be a super effective way to work out the muscles and help improve the skin’s texture in this area. Of course, it won’t miraculously make your smile lines disappear but if you practice it regularly you should see an improvement over time.
Here are three great exercises to try:
1. Create a fist with both hands and place them at the corners of your mouth. Apply gentle pressure, then smooth your fists up the cheekbones to your temples. Repeat 10 times.
2. Part your lips slightly and use the pads of your fingers to pull the corners of your mouth back towards your face while keeping your lips parallel. Hold for 10 seconds and repeat 10 times.
3. Hook the corners of your mouth with your index fingers and pull your fingers apart about a quarter of inch while tightening the corners of your mouth towards each other. Hold the resistance for 10 seconds and repeat 10 times.
Shield Your Skin From Sun Damage
If want to choose just one wrinkle-reducing trick for preserving your collagen and therefore improving wrinkles, lines, folds and creases on your skin, sun protection is unquestionably it. Granted, it won’t get rid of anything that’s already formed, but it will prevent further issues from rearing their heads and will help stop your smile lines from getting any worse.
We understand that applying sunscreen every morning can be a real pain in the butt, which is why we formulated our SPF 30 Mineral Sunscreen with Vitamin C to be a real joy to use. It’s non-sticky, totally lightweight, blends into your skin like a dream and doesn’t leave any annoying white marks. What’s more, it contains a cheeky boost of vitamin C to further protect your skin and add a little extra glow factor. Seems rude not to, right?
Practice Good Lifestyle Habits
Finally, the classic, skin-loving lifestyle habits must never be forgotten about if you want to hold on to young-looking skin for as long as possible. We’re talking, of course, about getting plenty of regular, quality sleep; staying hydrated with lots of sugar-free, caffeine-free drinks and water-rich foods (watermelon, anyone?); drinking booze in moderation; eating a fruit and veggie-forward diet; getting your fill of omega-3s and trying to keep your stress levels to a minimum.
Surely that’s not too much to ask, is it?
5 Ways To Deal With Smile Lines At Home
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