My Evolution Of Natural Skin Care

When you hit puberty, all hell breaks loose. Your hormones act up and it’s projected onto your skin. It happens to all of us at some point. Our pH levels rebel causing oily and dry skin, and as soon as we break out, we run to the dermatologist.
They’re quick to prescribe all these topical creams and our skin just becomes a desert wasteland. Does any of this sound familiar?

This is the challenge of growing up: finding ways to balance healthy habits while trying not to compromise your bodily chemistry…because if you do mess with that chemistry, your body has no problem showing you the consequences.

I got frustrated with the trips to the dermatologist and the stupid creams that didn’t work. I got to the point where I Googled other options and I constantly came across natural remedies that worked. Well, in the beginning there was a learning curve, but these days I constantly get complimented on my skin and I’d like to think all those years of trying natural items instead of unnatural chemicals did some good.

Here’s a list of the things I learned after going natural.

The toothpaste remedy was one of those remedies everyone knew about, and always was the place where people started.
Pros: Toothpaste is good for clearing up pimples. It’s supposed to dehydrate them and absorb oil.
Cons: It irritates skin, especially those which are super sensitive. It dries it up to the point where it can make your face flakey. The majority of the ingredients are really not good for your skin and mess with your pH levels.
Honestly, knowing what I know now (what works and what doesn’t), I would never use toothpaste for my skin ever again. But like everyone else, it was my introduction into “natural” remedies.

This was something my friends discovered in college, and not for intestinal cleansing. We used it for facial cleansing. We had quite a number of girl nights in our dorm where we slathered this on our faces before bed. It was super awkward when the fire alarms went off because we had to exit with milk of magnesia smothered all over our faces. Random anecdote, moving on…
Pros: It’s good for controlling excess oil on your face, which during those teen years can definitely help.
Cons: I honestly don’t recall it doing too much to help my face during that time, but sometimes your hormones just defeat everything. Because it’s too basic, it increases acne and ruins the pH balance on your skin
I stopped using this not too long after we bought the bottle for all us roommates to share. It didn’t do much to better my skin, so I didn’t bother using it anymore.

Fast forward to my third year of college. I was super stressed in school and my face really showed it. I got to Googling and found lemon juice was another remedy which people found successful. I decided to experiment with it.
Pros: Like the toothpaste, it dries pimples and gets rid of blemishes. It fights oily skin and inflammation.
Cons: It stings and can cause some irritation because of it’s harsher acidity. Also using lemon juice before going in the sun can cause even more irritation and chemical burns as a worst case scenario. Lemon juice is a little too tough for the face and can possibly cause more harm than good.
I did use lemon juice for quite some time. I found that my face dried up too much and got irritated before I moved on.

After moving on from lemons, I went down a different path and found a whole lot of benefits from using honey on my face.
Pros: being a naturally antibacterial, your face can benefit from honey. It’s moisturizing and soothing, and easy to wash off. Since it’s a natural lightener, it gets rid of blemishes, dark spots, and even helps fade scars.
Cons: Honestly, from what personal experience, I find it gets real messy real quick. That’s the only con I know of.

Honey got a little frustrating as the smell slowly became too much for me to handle and I didn’t think it was mixing well with the oils on my face. I read a whole lot about apple cider vinegar and decided to give it a shot.
Pros: Apple cider vinegar balances the pH level of our skin, and acts as a toner as well. It gets rid of blemishes and dark spots while also battling pimples.
Cons: Straight up apple cider vinegar stings and burns. It should be diluted with water. It’s also easy to smell like salad. It’s a little drying and probably shouldn’t be used everyday because of that.
There’s a whole lot of benefits with apple cider vinegar. There’s so much to list, but the one negative I can see from my experience was the dry skin.
After a while I got a little fed up with the smell and the need to find a good moisturizer.

So here steps in coconut oil which became my daily moisturizer. I washed my face morning and night and used coconut oil after washing my face. It was my thing for a few years.
Pros: Besides being a good moisturizer, coconut oil has antibacterial properties. From personal experience, I found that this oil doesn’t make my face more oily. It balanced my oily skin. Aside from all those pros, coconut oil is also an amazing makeup remover.
Cons: My only issue is coconut oil during the summer. Over a certain temperature it melts completely and is frustrating to use when it’s at its full melted point. It’s a stupid complaint when you can easily put it in the fridge. So being that that’s the only con, I guess there’s no con?
I’m taking a break from coconut oil for a bit but I’ve been missing it lately.

I came across tea tree oil after reading a whole bunch of good things about it.
Pros: It dries out pimples pretty super well where you definitely can see a difference the next day. It helps with inflammation, and is known to be disinfecting. It also helps clear scars, blemishes, and brown spots.
Cons: It’s really strong and needs to be diluted. Tea tree oil can really dry out your skin if it’s not diluted. The smell is also really overwhelming.

Witch hazel is what I use still to this day. I use it first thing in the morning and right before bed. Ever since I started using witch hazel and stopped using pharmacy store bought face cleanser, I saw a huge improvement in my skin.
Pros: Witch hazel is an astringent where it removes excess oils and clean your face and clean off dirt. It’s a toner as well where it makes blemishes and dark spots go away. It helps with irritation, and basically helps with almost all skin problems. It does so much.
Cons: I don’t know any!

I came across pearl powder by accident when my brother purchased some from the internet but never ended up using it. So I looked up the benefits and decided to take it for a test run, and I am satisfied with the results.
Pros: Pearl powder was used in ancient Chinese times to help skin look youthful. It helps dry up pimples without drying your face. It eliminates blemishes, brown spots, and inflammation.
Cons: I also don’t know of any here.

These days I’m dedicated to witch hazel and pearl powder. I use witch hazel in the morning and at night. I exfoliate my face and body in the shower, so I don’t bother using face wash or exfoliating face wash in the morning or before bed. I find my skin has improved so much by cutting out the face wash filled with unnatural ingredients and those beads that supposedly “exfoliate your skin”. I’m just over the face wash. Witch hazel has done so much to help and my skin has been great.

I’m appreciative I took the steps to use natural instead of chemicals, and you can really see it in my skin. It’s never too late to change your routine. Skip the topical creams or other products that swear they use natural items. Go straight to the source. Trust me!

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