Two Steps to Smooth, Hydrated, Glowing Winter Skin.

Is your skin cracking like a dry riverbed? Resembling crocodile skin?

Rid your skin of roughness, flakiness, fine cracks, and any accompanying itchiness, naturally.

Dry skin can flare up in Winter and we might be cozying and covering up in our cashmere but that is no reason to abandon radiant skin health.

While what you put on your skin matters, other factors contribute to dry skin too and it may be useful to see where some of these may be causing or exacerbating your skin dryness.

Before we get to the two very easy and time saving steps, let’s look at some of the ways we avoid dry skin and how we can improve dry skin from the inside out.

What causes dry skin?

Weather

Cold, windy conditions with low humidity can be a trigger for robbing skin of its moisture. Indoor heaters can dry the air out which also affects our skin. Keep skin moisturised. Cover skin if going out into harsh winds.

Hot showers & baths

Hot water is great at dehydrating skin so long hot showers and baths, as lovely and relaxing as they are, are no friend to your skin. Aim for shorter time in the water and keep the water warm instead of hot.

Excessive bathing

Bathing can strip the natural oils from the skin so if you are showering more than once a day this can inhibit your skin’s own mechanisms for hydrating. If you have a profession that requires you to have your skin exposed a lot to water or hand washing (like nurses, food industry, hair stylists) you may need to protect your skin with skin barrier creams, just make sure they are petroleum free.

Chlorine

Depending on where you live, chemicals and chlorine in the water can become stronger in the hot water and will also impact skin health. Consider a shower filter if the water in your area is particularly strong. Likewise if you swim in chlorinated pools frequently, you may notice your skin getting dryer.

Harsh soaps

Many soaps, body cleansers and detergents strip moisture from your skin, especially those formulated for acne, breakouts and oily skin that aim to remove oil from the skin.  We don’t want this for our skin and scalp!

Eczema, dermatitis, psoriasis

If you experience symptoms of any of these, you more likely also experience dry skin, the things that exacerbate these skin conditions are similar and cross over with those of dry skin.

If you are looking for help for eczema, here are some ways to heal it naturally and holistically. 

Age

As we mature and ease into our elder years of wisdom, our skin thins and produces less oil. These oils are helpful to retain water in the skin, so we need to give our skin a little helping hand to stay hydrated.

Medical treatments

Some treatments or medications can cause dry skin or thickening of the skin and may need some extra love and attention during and after these times.

Some Easy Everyday Remedies to Heal Dry Skin

Cover your skin

When going out into cold and windy weather, cover your skin, wear gloves, hats and scarves.

Cleanse gently

Choose a soap free cleanser or shower foam and something that offer rehydrating properties. Check for moisture stripping ingredients and avoid things like sulphates, sodium laurel sulphate, denatured alcohols, and fragrance. Synthetic fragrances are the top cause of causing sensitive and allergic reactions on skin.

We love The Premedicated All Over Body Foam because it is more than a body wash, it is a medicated treatment solving dry and irritated skin problems that affect many of us.

We made this with powerful botanicals derived from coconut oil, amino acids, and ETTO’s high grade, terpinen-4-ol rich Tea Tree extract. This creamy wash improves your skin barrier, increases water retention in the skin, and soothes redness and irritation for clear, healthy, hydrated skin. Jojoba esters gently exfoliate and soften skin, resulting in a skin treatment for your body and invigorating, high functioning cleansing wash in one.

https://ettoaustralia.com/products/body-foam

Hydrate internally

Ensure you are well hydrated internally. Drink room temperature water and warm caffeine free beverages throughout the day. Eat foods that are high in water like fresh fruits and vegetables, think cucumbers, watermelon, citrus fruits, tomatoes and lettuce.

Foods for hydrated skin

Eat good fats every day and increase your consumption of foods naturally high in omega-3 fatty acids. These include salmon, chia seeds, walnuts, coconut oil and flaxseeds. Avocados are great too and full of vitamins E and C and monounsaturated fats. If you have really dry skin, you might like to talk to your naturopath about a sea buckthorn oil and or vitamin E supplement. Sea buckthorn is high in all the omegas 3, 6, 7 and 9 and vitamin E is essential for skin health and very useful for dry skin.

Also, olive oil is good for the lipid fat squalene which is naturally found on the skin surface, but less so if your skin is dry so a daily dose of olive oil can boost it up.

Orange foods like apricots (can be dried), pumpkins, carrots, capsicum & sweet potatoes are high in beta-carotene which the body converts into vitamin A, a powerful antioxidant essential for preventing skin dryness and boosting skin & eye health.

Moisturise and use a barrier cream

Protect your skin with a barrier cream to lock in moisture, protect your skin from external irritants, support the skins natural moisture barrier and prevent transperidermal water loss (water loss from the body through the skin). Look out for petrolatum, mineral oils, and petroleum jelly popular in barrier creams, moisturisers and lip balms as these don’t re-hydrate skin, are derived from crude oil and don’t contain any other nutrients. If you are interested read more about crude oil derivatives versus plant extracts in skincare here. 

For super hydration, we love The Skin Balm. The Skin Balm is a direct replacement for straight up petroleum jelly and other balms that use petrolatum. It includes a luxurious combination of skin barrier, hydrating and skin healing plant based oils and waxes, plus plant extracts like carrot oil and chamomile oil that aid in regenerating skin. This balm is truly restorative, hydrating and protecting for ultimate skin health.

The Skin Balm is made with the addition of ETTO's high-grade terpinen-4-ol rich pure Tea Tree oil, known for its anti-inflammatory, antiviral, antifungal, antiseptic and antibacterial properties making it ideal for healing minor wounds and skin irritations.  

Our Tried & True 2 Step Ritual for Hydrated, Glowing Skin

Step 1:

In a warm shower, cover your body with the creamy Premedicated All Over Body Foam and allow to soak in for a minute or 2 before rinsing off.

Step 2:

After your shower, while your skin is still damp, massage The Skin Balm onto neck, hands, arms, legs, feet, paying attention to particularly dry spots. The balm will melt at body temperature, absorbing beautifully into your skin. Applying it while your skin is damp will encourage this process. It is super compatible with even the most damaged and sensitive of skins. 

And that is it! Keeping your skin care simple is not only all that is necessary but it is particularly important for stressed skin to keep the stimulation load light and free of excess products. A couple of very nourishing, nutrient dense, clean products are all we need to keep the skin well fed, well hydrated, and well loved. 

Shop Simple & Effective Dry Skin Treatments

Premedicated All Over Body Foam, $35

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Buy 2 Get 3 and Save, 3 for $70

The Skin Balm, $40

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