Here is an article extracted from Beauty Buzz www.beautybuzz.com/SkinCare/index.asp?ArticleID=115
Reported by Regan Dunlap
You don’t need a medicine cabinet full of moisturizers: sample several and pick the one that feels best, smells best, and, most important, delivers the best results for you. A good moisturizer will meet the following criteria: it should suit you skin type, be easy to use and readily absorbable, and not feel too greasy on the skin. It should never burn or irritate.
The best moisturizers are usually the simplest. Look for a product that is clear or white, without added FD&C dyes. Avoid products containing TEA (triethanolamine), an ammonia derivative that is harsh on the skin. (If a product lists collagen, royal jelly, or aloe vera on it’s label but doesn’t require refrigeration, don’t waste your money on it, because the amount is minimum.)
If you have oily skin, avoid minerals oils, mineral waxes, and other pore-clogging ingredients. Mineral oils can clog pores because they trap perspiration, sit on top on the skin, and don’t get absorbed-the chemical composition of the molecule is just too big. Unfortunately, the vast majority of mass-market cosmetics manufacturers use petroleum and mineral oil in their moisturizers, because they are much cheaper than top- quality alternatives like beeswax, sweet almond oil, hyaluronic acid, collagen, vegetable squalene, or shea butter. (Mineral oil costs 50 cents per pound compared with glycerine at $2 a pound or collagen, which starts at $7 per pound.) They also have an eternal shelf life. Ingredients that are 100 percent derived from petroleum are mineral oil, carbomers, paraffin, microcrystalline wax, and petrolatum. (You can recognize petroleum-based ingredients on a label when you see the words “ethyl,” “butyl,” “methyl,” octyl,” “propyl,” “ene,” “eth,” and PVP. So if you have oily skin, you may want to spend a bit more to get the right moisturizer.
Look for an oil-free moisturizer where humectants take the place of oil. Often, silicone is added to give the ingredients a creamy, slippery feeling. (On the ingredients label, silicones end with “cone”: dimethicone, cyclomethicone, and so on.) Because silicones can be slightly drying, they’re good for oily skin.
The best time to apply moisturizer is right after you wash or shower, when skin is already damp and the moisturizer can seal in the moisture. Make sure you pat your face dry first (always pat, never rub), because if the skin is too wet, the cream will just slide right off your face. Most important, always apply moisturizer to a clean face with clean hands. For most people, one application in the morning and one at night should be good enough, but use common sense. If your skin feels taut or dry during the day, moisturize it.
Most people don’t need moisturizer on the nose. The nose has an extremely high concentration of oil glands that usually don’t need any extra encouragement.
Don’t forget about your neck. Stroke upward, so that you don’t pull the skin down. The neck is one of the least tended areas of the body. No matter how vigilant you are about moisturizing your face, if you forget about the neck, the contrast will be painfully obvious.
Say no to night cream. You don’t need a separate moisturizer for your neck, nor do you need a separate night cream. Admittedly, the thought of an overnight transformation can make night creams tempting. But most of us, most of the time, don’t need another beauty product to help us tell day from night. At the end of the day, our skin doesn’t really know the difference. There is no reason to use a heavier moisturizer at night. In fact, unless your skin is dry, you don’t need moisturizer at night at all. Give your skin a breather, and let your natural oils do their work overnight. If your day cream has sunscreen in it, use a separate night cream. At bedtime, the sunscreen is not only unnecessary, it’s apt to irritate the skin if used around the clock.
The Tape Test
At home, you can check the effectiveness of your moisturizer with a simple Scotch tape test. Two hours after you apply moisturizer, put a piece of tape on your lower cheek, near the jawbone, and it off. If the tape is coated with scaly shards of skin, it’s time to find a new product. Even without the tape test, your skin should tell you by the way it looks and feels whether your product is working or not.