Festivals are synonymous with delicious food. You must have indulged during your long weekend, maybe even overdid it all a bit, and now you are worried about how your skin feels and hair looks. Fortunately, a few small changes to your diet and beauty care routine can give your hair and skin a refreshing beauty boost. Pooja Bedi, Senior Brand & Category Manager, WOW Skin Science, explains how:
Clean Up Your Diet
There’s enough research out there to prove that your diet does affect the quality of your skin and hair; they also show that changing the way you eat can help clear up acne, keep your skin firm, and make hair healthy and shiny. Eating a diet meant to cleanse your body help in clearing toxins that are caused by your diet, environmental exposure, and certain lifestyle choices.
Opting for a detox diet is important if you want to rejuvenate your body from the inside. If you want to heal your skin and hair, you have to heal your gut. A detox diet is rich in antioxidants, which are highly beneficial for the skin as they protect the skin from environmental damage and premature aging. So, what does a detox diet do for you? It helps your body’s natural cleansing process by resting the organs, stimulates the liver to eliminate body toxins, promotes elimination through the intestine and kidney, improves and regulates blood circulation, and refuels your body with healthy nutrients.
To start detoxification, you have to give your diet a mini makeover like eliminating alcohol, sugar, artificial sweeteners, packed and canned foods, fast foods and stock up on healthy foods, and buy organic or farm fresh items. Add ingredients like flaxseeds, wheatgerm, broccoli, and garlic to start the detox process in your body. The other things that improve your skin’s condition include drinking plenty of fluids such as water, clear soups, vegetable juices, and water-rich fruits; eliminating stress through yoga and meditation, and getting enough sleep.
Detoxify Your Skin and Hair
Once you have things running smoothly on the inside, it’s time to focus on revitalizing your skin and hair from the outside. It is quite common to find one’s skin dry and dull after a period of fun and frolic during the holidays. This happens because, during vacations, one is so busy having fun that it is easy to forget about taking care of your skin and hair.
Start with some clarifying action for your skin and hair. You should start your skin’s spring cleaning by deep cleansing your skin. Make it a beauty ritual by itself and your skin will glow in no time. Be thorough about removing makeup, excess sebum, and a layer of dead skin cells. Double cleansing your face twice a-day is a good idea to keep your skin clear. Use a serum-infused sheet mask at least three to four times a week to restore hydration to dehydrated and dull skin. It also helps to repair damaged skin and soothe irritated skin.
Similarly, exfoliate your skin every alternate day with an AHA or BHA-based exfoliator, or a face scrub with micro granules to help in the skin renewal process. Apply a refreshing clay mask – as the mask sets it pulls out the impurities which get removed as you wipe away the mask. You can try gentle masks based on the traditional Ubtan recipe to restore glow to your dull skin. Do not forget to hydrate your skin with a hyaluronic acid-infused serum and moisturizer.
When it comes to your hair, every time you step out and again go into an air-conditioned environment, your hair and scalp take a beating. The result is dullness, dryness, frizz, or static. Besides that, you may also notice build-up on your scalp, be it from product, pollution, the chemicals in the water to just dust. So, what do you do? Go for a detoxifying, cleansing, and root-nourishing treatment. You can use a clarifying detox shampoo, and hair-restoring protein pack to moisturise your strands from the inside. Look for actives like apple cider vinegar as it can clear out build-up, and dry flakes from the scalp and hair and balance the pH of the scalp. It does help to restore a healthy shine. If your hair feels grimy, it is okay to shampoo your hair daily to remove pollution, and always use a conditioner to seal the cuticles and stop pollution or build from penetrating into the cuticle.
