Oh! Salam Aidilfitri everyone!
* Disclaimer!*
I am not a dermatologist, aesthetician, specialist nor beauty guru. I am only someone who is into beauty stuff including skincare. All information that I share on my entry is all based on my readings, videos on youtube, and my experiences. At the end of this entry, I will include links to youtube videos where you can learn more about skincare.
Before I start further into how to take care of your skin, I want all of you readers to give attention to what I am going to tell because it is pretty important;
- Please! keep this in mind that not all products are suitable for everyone. If you saw a product review or a testimonial, DO NOT believe it immediately and purchase it.
- DO NOT buy any local product that is not approved by Kementerian Kesihatan Malaysia (KKM). I do not want to be biased, but I would personally avoid using local skincare products.
- DO NOT buy any skincare products without prior knowledge about the products. This is to help you to save money and avoid your skin become worst.
- Skincare needs to be done consistently in order to achieve your desired skin.
Now, let's get into things you should know before you start doing your skincare.
1. Know your skin type and skin concern.
Understanding your skin is quite important. This is because to have an effective skincare routine you need the products that will benefit your skins. Knowing your skin type will help you in deciding what products you should buy.
There are four types of skin, which are oily, dry, combination, and normal. There are a lot of videos on youtube that show you how to know your skin type, you can check them out, take your time to understand your skin type. My personal favorite video on how to know your skin type is by Hyram.
Next is regarding skin concern, examples of skin concern are sensitive skin, acne-prone skin, dehydrated skin, dull skin, etc. Skin concern can be known before you start doing skincare or it won't show until you actually did your skincare. For example, acne-prone skin can be seen prior to a skincare routine, it is obvious on your skin. Meanwhile, sensitive skin will happen after you apply your products. Some people may put sensitive skin in skin types but I personally believe it is skin concern. Because someone can have oily skin and sensitive skin at the same time.
My personal skin type is dry and I have sensitive skin. I need to be extra careful when choosing my skincare.
2. Cleansing!
(This is my current facial cleanser that I use)
This is the most basic thing to do, once you get into skincare. Please! buy a facial cleanser, do not use your body wash or any other soap. But you also need to know that, some facial cleanser does contain a harsh ingredient that can irritate your skin in a longer period. I will link a few youtube channels for you to understand how ingredients in facial cleanser work and what ingredient you should avoid.
The most appropriate time to wash your face is 45 seconds to 1 minute. If you wash too fast, it won't remove the dirt but you wash for too long it will strip off the hydration. When you wash your face DO NOT do it roughly! Be kind to your skin. After you cleanse your skin, you should continue other skincare steps. If you stop at face wash it might not be that helpful. This is because washing your face does strip off oil on your face if you have dry skin it will feel tight and might get flaky and for oily skin, the skin will produce more oil because of lack of moisture. Therefore, basic steps if you want to start skincare are a cleanser and moisturizer.
If you are someone who wears makeup or using sunscreen, I recommend you guys to use double cleansing approach. I will make another entry on double cleansing if you are interested!
3. Umm.. scrubbing?
I know a lot of people actually include scrubbing in their skincare routine or they just buy scrub because everyone is doing it. Well, the scrub is an exfoliation process, where you remove the dead skin that builds on your skin and cleanses your face deeper. Using physical scrub is not wrong but you need to know that there are few physical scrubs that can damage and irritate your skin. For example, St. Ives apricot scrubs are so harsh to the skin.
If you want to use the scrub you need to avoid scrubs that contain large exfoliants/beads. Go with smaller beads or beads that can dissolve like a sugar scrub. Remember to handle the scrubs gently. Do not rub on your face like you scrubbing away the dirt on your shirt.
So, I would recommend you guys to exfoliate your skin using a chemical exfoliator. Chemical exfoliator works more gently on your skin compared to physical scrub. There are a few types of chemical exfoliator that works differently on the different type of skin. To understand further about chemical exfoliators, I suggest you guys do some readings. I will make another entry on exfoliating because this topic is LONG!
These are three things you should know before getting into skincare. I know there are actually more things that we need to know. But for this entry, I think this is enough for you to work on your brain. You need to take your time and learn. Your skin can not improve overnight. I personally believe buying skincare is an investment, it can be a bad investment or it is profitable.
Here are youtube channels that you can learn from:
So, If you have any questions drop it on the comment section below and I will try my best to answer. See you in the next entry!