One for people who charge too much, one for people who pay to much, and one for Taylor Swift (zing! team Feyhler forever!).
It boggles my mind how so many "Medical Spas" choose to charge up the ying-yang for the same products that are available to you via Amazon. In this case, I'm talking about Glycolic Peels. Glycolic peels are excellent for keeping your skin soft and exfoliated, and (at least for me) keeping pores small. In the Spa, one treatment can cost you upwards of $100. On Amazon, you can buy a bottle with enough for 12 peels for around $15-$40, depending on the vendor. I must say, at-home is not for everyone. Here are my recommendations for doing this at home vs. the spa:
At the Spa- If your IQ is sub 50, you have no feeling in your face, you have a 10 trillion dollar "Spa Fund", or your attention cannot focus even when there is acid on your face, go to a Spa-- they will apply the peel evenly, and most likely make sure you don't get burned from it. We don't want to look like whatever crawled away from Lil' Kim's last "update" now do we.
At Home- If you can read a label, you can tell if something hurts, and can tell time, I strongly suggest trying the at home version.
If you have never had a glycolic peel, or don't use products with glycolic acid, start with a Glycolic 20-25% formula. Here is the link on Amazon to the brand I usually use. Here are the steps I follow:
1. First of all, try not to use a chemical exfoliant, like retinol, 24 hours before using the peel.
2.Wash your face with a gentle cleanser like Cetaphil, and dry
3. Take a cotton pad* and pour the peel on top of the pad--it will more or less sit on top and slowly sink in like honey.
4. Carefully pat, don't drag, the peel onto your face, staying far away from eyes, lips, and (in the winter) the sides of your nose, which can be irritated. I also keep it away from my lady-stache so it won't interfere with my hair removal, but that tale of beauty is for another time. Wash your hand if you get some of the peel on it.
5. Leave on for around 2 minutes and wash off with water, which will naturally neutralize/remove the acid. If you feel a lot of burning at any time, go ahead and wash it off.
6. Pat your face dry, and follow with a really basic moisturizer, like the plain Cetaphil one with the pump.
7. Wait a week, and do another peel following the steps above. Each week, increase the time you leave the acid on your skin by one minute, until you get up to 8 minutes (aka 2 minutes at week one, 3 minutes at week two, etc). By that time, switch to a higher percentage peel and start at 2 again.
* they sell this weird fan/paint brush thing to put it on, but given my past art projects, I don't want my face to also look like a shitty Monet interpretation.
No comments:
Post a Comment