Blame it on your skincare

Stress and skin

I’m sure we all do it. We tend to blame it on our skincare when we’re breaking out. We tend to forget there are various reasons to why we experience skin issues such as acne or eczema. Have you not been sleeping well? Have you been more stressed out than usual? Have you not been eating well? You get the picture.

So let's start with what does stress do to the skin!

Other than causing you to breakout, stress impairs wound healing. A study has shown that people under stress needed 20% more time for complete wound healing. What this means is that if you are currently breaking out, and stressing out, even more, this can delay or worsen your acne healing process. You can also experience other skin conditions like eczema, irritations or dry flaky skin.

If you want healthy skin, you want a skin barrier that's functioning at its best.

Stress on the other hand disrupts your skin barrier function leading to super dry skin through things like higher transepidermal water loss aka TEWL, which just means the loss of water from inside a body to the environment through your skin (more specifically epidermis) and lower ability to retain water.

Now, what can you do to help or avoid this altogether?

We all know that stress is inevitable, so the next time you're breaking out, slow down, take a breather and look at every aspect; Have you been bothered by something lately? Have you been more stressed out than usual at work? Has your diet changed? Have you switched up your skincare routine lately?

But we all know life happens, and you are bound to experience stress and the after-effects of it such as a breakout and you might be thinking what can I do about it RIGHT NOW? Here are 3 amazing, natural acne-fighting ingredients to look out for.

1. Green tea
2. Honey
3. Tea tree oil

These ingredients are anti-inflammatory and antibacterial which helps fight acne. Honey in particular, really soothes and moisturises your skin, which is perfect for calming down irritated or stressed skin. There are many other ingredients out there that work really well such as propolis, benzoyl peroxide, salicylic acid and retinoid.

Just remember, what works for someone may not work the same for you. Everyone is different. It takes some time and effort to figure out what works for your skin. You’ve got this!