Hello, I want to start off the blog by saying that if you answered yes to the blog question then your concerns are completely valid and you are not silly at all. When I first started learning about the skincare industry, I too was confused and then when I relay what I am learning back to my fragmented biology knowledge from year 9, I also get confused. But I am partially qualified and experienced enough to speak on these matters and hopefully reassure you that your woes and concerns are normal whilst providing you with some insight and ways of defining that can make your quest a whole lot easier. So now we shall delve into a brief investigation of homophones; or similarities, in skincare terminology and how you make the process of defining more enjoyable and recollective.
It all started when Plato wrote about a cave and we might have realised that what is regarded as beauty are simply manifestations of several forms of pseudo-beauties. Or it might have started when the skincare product that works so well for you doesn’t work for your friend, or for your family member or even for yourself as time passes – we grow up, our skin changes, our body changes, our needs changes, occurrences in life are never completely constant but surely our ways of working around these challenges can heed some kind of consistency…
Here are some of the areas that did confuse and still continue to confuse me, about skincare terminology in some of its most basic topics of understanding. I will detail why it can be a bit baffling at first and then explain how I work around this, and it may work for you also if you are experiencing any difficulties – I truly hope so:
-When it appears that there’s several variations of the same kind of thing i.e. AHAs and BHAs
This is probably one of the most mind-boggling areas of developed skincare and definitely one of the most important. Alpha-hydroxy and Beta-hydroxy acids have helped many people rectify long-term skin problems outside of needing to pay for expensive chemical peels that aren’t guaranteed to be the best and most effective option for their skin. Things tend to get complicated when you have a product containing both acids but are told not to layer them separately on top of one another to avoid irritation
My advice for managing confusion in this specific area would be to separate formulation concerns from application ones. Take the time to look through the lists of the best and worst AHAs and BHAs to not mix with one another so that you know straight away the worst possible combinations. Then work backwards, write down lists of all your skincare ingredients and research each individual one and what it can and can’t be defined as, whether the specific acid if utilised is best regarded as an AHA or a BHA and this will give you a good base knowledge before reshuffling your routine, adding in new products as time passes and/or doing thorough scans on the ingredient lists when in the supermarkets or ordering online
-When they start with the same letter i.e. phosphates and parabens
This may sound idle and ridiculous but honestly, it is much a bigger concern than you may think or want to admit. In the skincare realm, phosphates act to adjust the pH balance of a product and parabens whereas parabens act as preservatives. Phosphates are known for being antioxidising whereas Parabens are most typically regarded as irritating and in other areas of health and beauty too. This all gets worse when we consider Polymers, Papules or Pastules (both forms of acne, which I have written a blog about), etc. – But the point of today’s blog isn’t simply to lodge definitions at you or make you feel silly if you can’t remember all the different terms once you click off of the blog. The purpose is to remind you that something that may seem as trivial as skincare terms beginning with the same letter causing confusion for your understanding of the industry, is valid and common
So what do I prescribe for this? Well, I think getting to know each one is a good idea so that it becomes easier to differentiate and assess the benefits for yourself as all of the terms I have listed above and more under the letter ‘p’ currently have each contributed toward the developments in skincare understandings in a major way. But still, the list is by no means in extensive or complete – it is a guide for you to look at some major areas of skincare and health in general and delve deeper, ask those questions, listen to testimonies on having dealt with/dealing with them; even…But whatever you do, don’t let science homonym’s deter you from learning more because there is a lot out there to be discovered
-When you try to relay it to the world around you i.e. a humectant
This one may be an interesting concern for you if you like to really understand what it is each skincare product can do for you and how it is most beneficial to your skin. Take understanding moisturisers for example…Aside from knowing if there may be any AHAs or BHAs present in its formula, you may want to know what some of the more ‘basic’ ingredients do, such as: glycerin. Hyaluronic acid is a great example of a common, basic product in one’s skincare that has the same benefits as glycerin, which is base ingredient for a lot of products, particularly moisturisers if sticking with my own personal example. Both are humectants, however, which may cause confusion because one acts more solely to formulate a product than the other but both act as humectants, which draw water in from your skin and also from your environment
In these cases, my suggestion to all of you would be to look at the complete opposite term for such a term, in order to realise that it is okay for multiple ingredients in the skincare realm to serve the same benefit. In this case, the opposite would be called an ‘occlusive’ which does the opposite to a humectant in a sense by forming a protective barrier over the skin to stop water escaping it and comes in the form of many skincare ingredients, most influentially dimethicone. Although this term has a highly distinct ingredient by which we can assess its benefits and areas of confusion for the mass consumers of skincare products, it is definitely not a term isolated to the ingredient of dimethicone, especially as conversations between consumers and product formulators widens, broadens and deepens
-From K xx
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