How to Protect Your Skin Barrier: Essential Tips
When it comes to keeping your skin looking and feeling its best, a healthy skin barrier is essential. This refers to the outermost layer of your skin – a layer that performs several important roles that enable your skin cells to function to their full potential.
While maintaining a healthy skin barrier should, in theory, be relatively simple, this isn’t usually the case. Sadly, there’s so much out there that damages the skin barrier – you may even be causing harm to your barrier yourself without realizing it.
This is why it’s so important to have a solid understanding of how to keep your skin barrier feeling safe, protected, and fortified, which is exactly what Vivo Per Lei will be discussing today!
Use a Sulfate-Free Cleanser
Cleansing is something that you should, hopefully, be doing every day, twice a day. It’s a must when it comes to keeping your complexion healthy. However, using the wrong cleanser counteracts this, meaning that you could be unintentionally damaging your skin.
Some cleansers are notorious for how they strip away the skin barrier. Formulas containing sulfates are the biggest culprits, with these surfactants known for their overly drying effect.
If the cleanser that you’re currently using contains sulfates (there are different types, but they’ll all have the word ‘sulfate’ somewhere in their name), it’s time for a change. Treat yourself to one of Vivo Per Lei’s cleansers and you won’t have to worry about damaging your skin barrier as they’re all sulfate-free! The Hyaluronic Acid Daily Facial Wash is particularly beneficial if you have skin barrier concerns. Hyaluronic acid is known for being one of the best ingredients for keeping the skin barrier feeling boosted. That, combined with the amino acids and hemp seed oil in this cleanser, will keep your skin feeling wonderfully supported.
Be Gentle When Exfoliating
There’s no denying how satisfying it can feel to exfoliate with a face scrub. It’s a great form of instant gratification, with the skin usually looking so much clearer and brighter afterward while also feeling refreshed.
However, although exfoliation may be important, scrubs aren’t doing your skin barrier any favors. Many contain granules that are just slightly too abrasive. Sure, they exfoliate your skin, but they also cause micro-tears in the skin barrier. This compromises barrier function, which can take a while to heal.
Instead, to keep your skin barrier feeling safe, go for gentle chemical exfoliants, like lactic acid or mandelic acid. Save the scrubs for the skin on your body, which is much thicker and tougher!
Keep Your Skin Hydrated
Every single part of your skin needs water in order to function properly. This includes your skin barrier. Without enough moisture, it won’t be able to work in the way that it should and will also be more vulnerable to damage.
There are a few steps to take if you want to fully hydrate your skin. Firstly, make sure that you’re drinking plenty of water. Then, work on topical hydration in layers. Start by incorporating a hydrating toner into your skincare routine before adding in a hydrating serum, like the 24K Gold Encapsulated Serum from Vivo Per Lei. Ideally, the moisturizer you use should be hydrating too.
Go Slow With Actives
Although powerful active ingredients can sometimes have a transformational effect on the complexion, they can often leave the skin barrier compromised. It’s so easy to unintentionally use actives that are too harsh for your skin, resulting in barrier damage and inflammation.
If you’re trying to keep your skin barrier feeling preserved and protected, go slow with the actives and potent acids, or completely cut them out of your routine for a while.
Seek Out the Right Skincare Ingredients
Now that you know which ingredients you should avoid, let’s talk about a few ingredients that can do your skin barrier the world of good.
As we’ve already mentioned, hyaluronic acid is one. This is due to its humectant properties. Its moisture-binding effects keep the skin barrier hydrated, leaving it feeling capable of functioning optimally. Other humectants will have the same effect, so find a product that combines a few different humectants, just like the Vivo Per Lei Aloe Soothing Facial Serum.
Ceramides are also extremely beneficial. Ceramides are essentially the glue-like substance that holds your skin cells together. They form a big component of the skin barrier, making topical application useful.
Plant oils are also another must-have in your skincare routine. Find a product that offers a blend of different oils and you’ll be able to keep your skin barrier feeling boosted with antioxidants and fatty acids. A formula like the Magnetic Deep Hydration Mask from Vivo Per Lei, which contains coconut oil, marula oil, baobab seed oil, hemp seed oil, and sunflower seed oil, would be ideal!
Use a High-Quality Moisturizer
With so much environmental damage to deal with on a daily basis, it isn’t fair to leave your skin barrier to fend for itself! Do this and damage will be inevitable.
Instead, you should be giving your skin barrier some extra support with a high-quality moisturizer. A good face cream will form its own barrier over your natural one, taking the brunt of any environmental aggressors.
The Vivo Per Lei Hyaluronic Acid Moisturizing Day Cream would be a great choice for the daytime. It’s lightweight but contains several barrier-loving ingredients, including sodium hyaluronate, vitamin E, jojoba seed oil, and hemp seed oil. In the evenings, give the Snow Mushroom Night Cream a try. With a variety of unique plant extracts, it’ll leave your skin barrier feeling soothed yet rejuvenated.
Simplify Your Skincare Routine
With barrier protection your new goal, it can be tempting to go overboard and treat yourself to an array of products that each promise to protect your skin barrier in some way. However, this is the last thing that you should be doing.
Why? Because overloading your skin with lots of new products isn’t going to make your skin barrier happy. Instead, it would prefer the opposite – a simplified skincare routine so that it doesn’t have to constantly deal with new potential irritants. You need to give your skin barrier some time and space to regulate itself so that it can perform all of its tasks to perfection.
Apply SPF Year-Round
One of the biggest barrier-damaging environmental aggressors out there is the sun. Both UVA and UVB rays destroy various components of the skin barrier while also dehydrating the skin and causing inflammation.
This makes SPF absolutely essential. While many people are pretty diligent about sunscreen usage in the summer months, those efforts tend to fall flat in the winter. However, UV rays still wreak their damage on even those cold and dull winter days, making year-round SPF so important.
Stay in Control of Stress
It’s not just the environment that damages your skin barrier – your mental state can have the same effect. This may seem hard to believe but there are a number of studies that confirm this. Cortisol, which is the hormone that your body releases whenever you are stressed, weakens the skin barrier and causes it to feel inflamed.
It goes without saying that the best way to counter this is to de-stress. Sure, this is easier said than done but de-stressing on command is possible once you know how. The trick is to test out the various stress reduction techniques out there, from breathing exercises and meditation to journalling and physical activity, to find a few that work for you. This way, whenever you feel your stress levels beginning to rise, you can pick the method that’s most convenient for you at the time and quickly bring your stress levels back down.
Don’t Underestimate the Importance of Beauty Sleep
‘Beauty sleep’ earned its name for a reason! The time during which you are asleep is when your skin cells work extremely hard to repair daily damage, build new protein fibers, and so much more.
As a result, a lack of sleep can affect the skin in several ways. One of these, as confirmed by science, is decreased skin barrier function. When it comes down to it, your skin barrier needs you to be getting sufficient sleep each night in order for it to feel protected and healthy.
If your sleeping habits could do with some improvement, now is the time to work on them. Start by ensuring that your bedroom is a comfortable, sleep-inducing haven. Introduce soft and silky bedding, dim lighting, and soothing scents. Developing a regular sleep/wake routine is vital too. Try to stick to this seven days a week, even on weekends! You’ll soon get your body into the habit of sleeping and waking at those times – something that your skin barrier will very much appreciate!
Reassess Your Diet
Did you know that your diet can greatly affect your skin barrier? Certain foods can harm it while others can help it. Although dietary adjustments aren’t going to bring you any overnight changes, you’ll soon start to notice the improvements in your skin, and how strong your barrier feels, as the days go by.
So, what foods should you be eating? Foods that are rich in omega fatty acids are fantastic for the skin barrier. Try eating more oily fish, such as salmon and sardines, as well as almonds and walnuts. Eggs, dairy products, and brown rice are also great for the skin barrier as they’re a natural source of ceramides.
What shouldn’t you be eating? You probably already know the answer to that one! Sugar, salt, alcohol, highly processed foods, and fried foods will all contribute to a weakened skin barrier. Swap these for healthier alternatives and your skin will soon start to thrive!
Prioritizing Your Skin Barrier
When it comes to keeping your skin healthy and happy, your skin barrier is everything. If you’ve been neglecting this lately, put aside your other skin goals for a while and work on ensuring that your skin barrier feels as supported as possible. This, in turn, will help you with any other visible skin concerns that you’re dealing with, giving you a much healthier and more youthful complexion overall!
Click here to treat your skin barrier to more bestselling products from Vivo Per Lei.
