Essential Skin Care for Your Forties

Regardless of your age, there are three essential skincare products that everybody should use every day: a sunscreen, exfoliant, and antioxidant. But your skin also has additional and different needs which depend on your age. In this episode of the DermTV series on skincare by the decades, I’ll discuss issues specific in your 40’s, for healthier, more beautiful and younger looking skin. There’s a lot of information so I’m going to split 40s into two episodes.

So in your forties, the issues that are most important to you are first, and always first, ongoing prevention of additional premature photo-aging, lines and wrinkles.

Second, prevention of lines and wrinkles caused by unnecessary facial expressions.

Third, exfoliation… but in your 40’s it’s more to correct age and sun related texture problems and sun induced color problems.

And fourth, filler and laser correction and improvement of lines, wrinkles and other contours that come from loss of collagen and elastic tissue… whether from sun exposure, tobacco habits, or from repeated facial expressions that have literally broken your collagen and over stretched your elastic tissue prematurely.

In terms of ongoing prevention of additional premature photo-aging, lines and wrinkles, in the interest of brevity, check out the episodes on skincare in the 20’s and 30’s.

So onto the second issue, prevention of lines and wrinkles caused by unnecessary facial expressions…

Preventing these is all about botulium treatments with either Dysport or Botox. Many unattractive lines and wrinkles are caused by repeated facial expressions that are neither desirable nor productive, such as frowns and raised eyebrows.

While people such as psycho therapists and news casters use frowns and raised eyebrows to convey non-verbal communication… for most of us those expressions merely cause premature etching of those lines.

While Botox or Dysport can’t be used to prevent all facial lines like those caused by necessary expressions like smiles, the earlier you start Botox or Dysport treatments, the longer you’ll delay unnecessary etched facial lines.

So in part 2 of skincare for the forties, I’ll tell you what exfoliation, filler and lasers treatments can do for you.