On this, my dreadlocks' first year anniversary, I'm going to ignore them for a hot quick second so that I can provide a promised update on my skin saga. A couple days after the initial post, I treated myself to my first ever facial treatment, courtesy of Groupon, at Nuvision Med Spa near Grand Central Station.
The results were nothing less than traumatic. What began as a soothing, exhilarating experience, became painful and horrifying during the "extraction" process. Whatever the esthetician was doing was not only extremely uncomfortable, but also resulted in a breakout that was much worse than anything I have EVER had in my life. I left the spa looking and feeling like I'd lost a fight. And also, I was a hideous beast.
However, a week and change later, my skin is clearing up, and the positive effects of the facial are shining through. My skin is super soft from the microdermabrasion, and the breakout I had even before the facial is now a distant memory. The horrible self-inflicted scar above my lip is also a shade or so lighter, which is a huge encouragement to me. Furthermore, the esthetician gave me some really helpful tips.
First off, my M.A.C. foundation and brush need to be put on ice. It's not like I can't use them, but I wasn't washing my brushes regularly (read: at all), and my pores were clogged. It was never an issue before I started working because I never started wearing makeup on a daily basis before I began my job. According to the esthetician, M.A.C. foundation is notorious for its pore-clogging qualities--while she acknowledged that M.A.C. is great in terms of variety for black women, she insisted that I wash all of my brushes (with common bar soap) after every single use. I have decided to take the advice a step further, and am basically eschewing foundation at all save for necessary occasions (important client meetings, social outings)--not because I'm becoming an anti-makeup fundamentalist, but because it occurred to me that not only did I have flawless skin before I became foundation-dependent, but that all of the perfectly-skinned people I know are basically au naturale...my own mother included.
The second step I took, at the esthetician's behest, was to chill on applying the Dudu Osun (African Black Soap) to my face at this point in time--just because it might be too strong for me. Jury's out. I have, however, been using elsewhere on my body and I think I'm seeing positive results. For now, I'm sticking to Philosophy's Purity until it runs out, and then I will be giving Bliss's foaming face wash a go.
My current challenges are several fold. The lasting downside of the facial treatment was that the facial-inflicted breakout went away, but left dark spots behind. Scars are my big issue. My second big issue is skin irritation. My new OMG-my-job-is-stressful nervous habit seems to be picking at imaginary hairs on my face (I swear, I'm not going to become OCD)--and I have to put a stop to that for more than a couple of reasons. First off, it's weird. Secondly, my face constantly tingles after I've been on a picking spree, and finally, that has resulted in scarring, too. Not cute. My new mission is to keep my hands off my face and to resolve my feelings of excessive hairiness by keeping regular appointments with the spa across the street from my office. I'm also using the retinol treatments I mentioned in the first post--I'm not sure if they're working, but so far they've done no harm.
Other things I've done are: order the yellowdock and burdock root (I'm sipping my first cup of yellowdock root tea now--it tastes like burned rotten baby flesh, fyi), up my water intake, and to also go hard with the water/lemon/ginger drink habit. While I haven't discerned any benefits to my health, weight, or appearance, yet, water and ginger are always good (and lemon, too, if you don't have issues with acid), and it's just really refreshing and delicious. I start my morning with a cup of boiling water, ginger and lemon, and optionally, some yerba mate or goji berry tea. Really looking forward to the results! So far, just in the last week, I've received quite a few compliments on my skin--compliments I wasn't necessarily receiving avec the full face of makeup and before these little life changes, so I'm planning to move full speed ahead.
Will keep you posted!
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