We’re in the midst of the summer months so we’re all spending a lot of our time outside, enjoying the sunshine. While most of us really do enjoy the sun, we have to remind ourselves and those around us, that the heat acts as a catalyst for dehydration and exhaustion. Therefore, it’s important to remember to stay hydrated and to know how dehydration affects our bodies, especially our skin.
Drinking an adequate amount of water is important for your overall health because water helps with circulation, digestion, absorption and excretion. It’s obvious that we need our organs to function properly so that our bodies can adequately carry our blood, digest our food, absorb the nutrients and get rid of what we don’t need. What may not be so obvious is that our skin is an organ too and there are many adverse effects when it’s not properly hydrated. Unfortunately, when we consume water, other organs get the water first. As a result, it’s important that we drink plenty so that our skin doesn’t dry out.
What happens when our skin is dehydrated?
When the cells of our skin don’t have enough water, they can’t function properly. As we mentioned before, adequate water helps us excrete things we don’t need like toxins. When toxins build up in our cells and there isn’t enough water to flush them out, we see things like acne, eczema and other skin irritations occur more often. The toxins need a way to escape and often do through the pores in our skin. Without enough water, our skin also becomes dry and therefore more prone to wrinkles. When we drink more water, our skin is more plump which alleviates bags under the eyes and circles around the eyes.
How to stay hydrated in general.
To make sure that you’re hydrated, the International Sports Sciences Association (ISSA) recommends that when you are not sweating, you drink at least half of your body weight in ounces of water, more if you are sweating. Also, if it’s more humid out our bodies have a harder time cooling off because the surface of your skin is so warm that the sweat has a hard time evaporating so it’s important to drink more. Be sure to drink water. When you drink beverages that have sugar, salt and caffeine in them, they contribute to dehydration rather than hydrating you.
How to keep your skin hydrated.
There are several ways that you can keep your skin hydrated and ways that we can help too. Of course, drinking enough water is one but you may also want to consider other options as well. For instance, topical solutions such as Image Skincare’s Hydrating Facial Cleanser will help your skin retain water on the surface. Also, Alazzo Med Spa offers services such as the O2 Lift in which we can use a serum to rehydrate your skin. We also offer MicroResurfacing which will remove the dry skin cells giving you a much more resilient and youthful appearance.
It’s important to keep your skin hydrated so that you don’t have premature aging or wrinkles. If you feel that your skin is not hydrated enough and would like to speak to us about our products and services that can help, feel free to give us a call at 301.810.5740.