Avoiding Skin Care Problems – Are You Using the Wrong Skin Care Products?
Finding the right or best skin care products for your skin can often involve a lot of guessing. You buy a product not knowing if it is exactly right for your skin. While you definitely have to give skin care products enough time to work instead of giving up on them immediately there are more than a few signs that a skincare product just is not right for your skin. Be on the lookout for the reactions listed below, and then you can easily figure out if a product is right for your skin or not.
Itching and Redness
Skin care products should not cause severe, prolonged redness and itching on your skin. If these two reactions come together, it means you are experiencing an allergic reaction to an ingredient in the product. Some allergic reactions also cause skin swelling and even blisters. Many times people can experience allergic reactions to fragrance in skin care products.
This is actually fairly common. Other people are sensitive to certain preservatives in products. If you are afraid that an ingredient in a product might cause you an allergic reaction do a patch test in one small area of your body instead of spreading the product all over your face.
Skin Burning and Extreme Redness
When you apply an exfoliant and experience a little tingling or mild redness that’s fine. What’s not fine is feel continuous burning on your skin or extreme redness for a long time. If you feel or see one or both of these reactions that means that you are using a product that is much too strong for your skin type. Some people think that if they feel their skin burn or tingle extra hard when after they apply a product that the product is working and that’s good.
Yes, the product is working, but it is too strong for your skin. When you use a product that is too strong, your skin can become overly sensitive and prone to dryness. Once you have caused skin sensitivity, it can be hard to help your skin recover. Your best bet is to stop using a product immediately if your skin burns or turns extremely red.
Your Skin Is Flaky and Tight
If you have dry skin and start using products that promise to mattify and eliminate shine you are definitely using the wrong skin products. Instead of your skin being smooth and soft it can become dry and flaky. Or the reverse can be true too – if your skin is prone to oiliness and you use a rich, heavy moisturizer your skin will not look or feel its best.
One reason people experience dry, flaky and peeling skin is when they overuse facial acids or exfoliants like scrubs. When you combine too many active ingredients or use them too often, your skin will suffer instead of looking better. Once again you can cause your skin to become overly sensitive, and when this happens, it takes time for your skin to recover. So if your skin starts to feel dry and peel on a regular basis, it is time to go into recovery mode and start helping instead of hurting your skin. Take a long, hard look at the products you use and how often you use them. You do not necessarily have to give up your favorite cleanser that has facial acids in it; you just might want to use it less often. If you cannot figure out what is causing the problem, you can stop using all your products and start slowly adding them back in one by one. Or keep a journal handy write down how your skin felt after using certain products. Sometimes all you will need to do is cut back on how often you wash your face with a certain cleanser in order for your skin to feel good again.
There are some skin care products like Retin-A or skin care procedures like chemical peels that might cause your skin to feel tight or even flake for a little while. As long as you know beforehand that a product or procedure might cause certain reactions and that is normal than you will also know that it will go away over time. You are using the wrong product if the problem continues for a period of weeks or gets worse over time.
What Should I Do If My Skin Reacts to a Beauty Product? – How to Treat Sudden Rashes & Itchy Skin
A Multicultural Beauty reader developed an itchy rash on her chest. She thought it was a product that she used on her legs without incident. She wonders, is it possible that one area of skin can react to a product, while another area doesn’t? Is this really an allergic response?
“If someone truly has an allergic contact dermatitis, he or she would develop the same allergic response at all sites of application of the product,” says Dr. Michael Shapiro, Medical Director and Founder of Vanguard Dermatology. “However, different skin areas have different degrees of thickness, and this may alter the response seen. The thicker skin on the legs may show little or no signs of allergy while the thinner skin on the chest may show a brisk allergic reaction.
A good example of this is poison ivy. One of the reasons people continue to break out long after the exposure to the poison ivy plant occurred is because certain areas of skin that were exposed were thicker, and so the rash took longer to appear. Having said all of this, the rash the reader is experiencing may not be a true allergy. Perhaps the product clogged her pores on the chest, producing a heat rash such as miliaria, which was not seen when the same product was applied to the legs.”
What should you do if you have a reaction to a skin care product?
First, stop using the product. Then look at the ingredients list. “If the person is lucky, there are not a huge number of ingredients. In this case, in the future the person could be mindful to stay away from the product ingredients,” Dr. Shapiro advises. “In terms of skin care, they can apply soothing products to affected areas, such as calamine lotion, and Gold Bond and Sarna, which contain menthol and is very soothing. Over the counter, topical steroids such as Cortizone 10 or stronger prescription topical steroids can also be very helpful to decrease the inflammation.
Finally, taking an oatmeal bath is helpful for many itchy skin conditions. These pre-packaged baths are available in most pharmacies.”
Are there products that one should take when there is a skin reaction?
“Anti-histamines such as Benadryl, Allegra and Zyrtec are helpful. Anti-histamines can reduce the itch symptoms,” says Dr. Shapiro.
“For more severe itch, oral prescription agents such as hydroxyzine are prescribed. The problem with many of these is that they can be sedating, so individuals need to be careful to avoid driving or handling machinery after taking these medications.”
Is it also possible that the skin will react to a product one day and then will be fine on another day?
“If a person has an allergy to a product, they really should react to the product whenever it is applied to the skin. However, if the allergy is not severe, sometimes the reaction can be more subtle and easy to miss. In addition, the degree to which the reaction is visible depends on the condition of the skin at the time of application. Often, application of an allergen to dry skin may result in a more brisk response than application of the same product to skin that has been well hydrated.”
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