Dry Skin

I've complained about my dry skin here before.  I'd considered B12 and protein in a vegan diet, but the idea of lacking enough good fats hadn't crossed my mind.  Not until my skin was so dry that the lady who threads my eyebrows just had to comment.  I'd already noticed, to be honest, it was getting painful.

I use the oil cleansing method, but I found that even the tiniest amount of castor oil in the mix left my skin so painfully dry that I'd end up slathering myself in olive oil just to get some relief.  Getting more fats into my diet (so far, in the form of salad dressings, brazil nuts, and scallops from the chippy - that is, deep-fried, battered potato.  This is not a healthy option, but it is yummy) helped a bit, but I was basically using water and a flannel for cleansing, which worked pretty well.  However, the plain water also left my skin dry, which, I'm told is because it can disturb the natural PH balance of your skin.  Even the water that gets on my skin from brushing my teeth is painfully drying.  Using the oils to moisturise helped, but it wasn't perfect.  By the way, my current mix is something like 5% castor oil, 70% olive oil, and 25% sunflower oil.

Last week, I tried an avocado face mask - one, ripe, mashed avocado, two tablespoons of golden syrup, and a dash of lemon juice - which was moisturising, but irritated my skin slightly. I think I may be sensitive to avocados.

Finally, yesterday, I tried Crunchie Betty's Winter Scrub, as a mask.  That stuff seriously does exactly what it says on the blogpost.  My skin is so soft and perfect, even the next day.

My face.  Yes, it is a bad picture.

Sadly, she's not shipping overseas any more, but she does post the recipe.  I'll have to make up some of my own when this lot runs out.  Also, yes, the bag was gorgeous, it had little glittery blue things on it.  I'm planning to do the whole mask thing once a week, see how that goes.

I seriously cannot stop stroking my face.

Oh, I also got some of The Body Shop's Aloe Calming Facial Cleanser, as a gift.  It's a cream cleanser - just massage on, and rinse off.  I'll try that for daily cleansing, see how that goes.

As I mentioned, I work in fast food.  I had a month off, and had great skin, then I went back, and, boom, breakout.  I don't even eat the food - I'd be limited to fries, and lettuce-tomato-cucumber sandwiches.  Which are okay, but I can spend ten minutes in the morning and make a better lunch than that.  It's the grease in the air, I swear to god.

So, I've been using Boot's Essentials Cucumber Cleansing wipes, on my break and after my shift, just to wipe away the grease, and stop it from sitting on my skin.  I think it's helping a bit.  They're not drying, and they're also really handy to have around, for instance, when I've been drinking and need to take my make-up off.  Cheap, too - I got them three for £3.  With those, I find I barely need to use the oils to put moisture back onto my skin.

My hair has been a little dry too, but not really so much.  I haven't used shampoo or conditioner since July, which is handy, since most conditioners - except, notably, for Lush's Veganese Conditioner - contain lanolin, which is basically sheep's sebum.  I'm not water-only yet - instead, I use a mixture of one cup of water with one tablespoon of baking soda to cleanse, and four tablespoons of apple cider vinegar to one cup of water to condition.  I have them in water bottles, you know the kind with the pull-up tops?  It works really well.  I use that every three or four days, more or less depending on how my hair feels.  I used them yesterday, and today my hair feels so soft and perfect.  It used to get quite tangled when I used shampoo and conditioner.