How to Find Your Skin Type and Choose The Right Skin Care Regimen

By Soni Mishra

I am already getting a feeling that it’s going to be long post. As somebody rightly said, ‘Beauty is skin deep’. Beauty can not be measured in shades, but what our inner soul is composed of. But then, again, it is in our hands to keep our natural skin in its best form. Most of you may already be following a skin care routine, but as they say, there is always room for enhancement. Let us begin to understand the skin care basics.

How to Determine Your Skin Type and Choose The Right Regimen

Before starting any regime, it is most important to understand you skin type. Many beauty professionals provide free consultation over the skin type needs. Skin type can also change over the period of time and with climate. We are likely to have normal skin while young, but it tends to change with age. All you need is to observe few things to know your skin types like moisture content, oil content and sensitivity level.

A simple trick you can follow to know your skin type : Just blot your face with a clean tissue first thing when you get up in the morning.

How to Determine Your Skin Type and Choose The Right Regimen1

Basic Skin Types:

Normal Skin Type
Blessed folks have normal skin type as it has the right balance of moisture and oil. Normal skin is soft and smooth with even skin tone. Your skin is normal if there is no touch of sebum on the tissue. Following are some evident features of normal skin type:
• Flawless
• No dash of sensitivity
• Very small pores
• A glowing skin tone

Oily Skin Type
You have oily skin if you get stains of facial oil on the tissue especially from the cheeks, nose and forehead part. Oily skin yields additional oil due to overactive sebaceous glands. Oily skin is more disposed to following:
• Leaden or glossy, dense skin texture
• Enlarged pores
• Blackheads, pimples, or other blotches

Dry Skin Type
If your skin feels flaky and tight after being washed, you probably have dry skin. Dry skin is short of facial oil and shows following features:
• Dull, lumpy skin tone
• Pores are not easily visible
• Sore blotches
• A reduced amount of friskiness
• Evident lines

Combination Skin Type
If combination skin, you will notice sebum around the nose, chin and forehead area. Whereas, rest of parts may look absolutely normal or dry. Combination skin may produce:
• Excessively stretched pores
• Blackheads
• Glossy skin

Sensitive Skin Type
The doomed populaces like me are given sensitive skin type! Well, the sensitivity varies from person to person. I am allergic to sun!! My skin turns red if I stay in the sun for more than 5 minutes. Guess what, I am a Civil Engineer by profession and required to examine the sites outdoor.

So, after knowing your skin type, build in your routine as per your skin needs. You should keep in mind your skin type while choosing the right products.

• Opt for gentle soap free cleanser for oily skin as you may need to clean your face more often.
• Dry skin may entail added rich moisturiser for guarding the tight and rough touch.
• Exact skin care for sensitive skin is the trickiest one since many cleansers and moisturisers contain ingredients that may cause skin irritation. The finest skin care for combination skin rest on treating each area in a different way.

Let’s move to skin care basic products you require. Before you start with any product, please ensure that you patch test the same to see if it suits you. Also, give your skin sufficient time between familiarising new products to ascertain the exact effects of each products.

How to Determine Your Skin Type and Choose The Right Regimen2

Cleanser
Cleanser helps in getting rid of debris, oil and makeup off from face. Choose a cleanser that is suitable for your specific skin type. Dry skin junta should go for milky or cream cleansers whereas gel formulas work well with oily skin texture.

How to Determine Your Skin Type and Choose The Right Regimen7

Never sleep with you makeup! This will clog your pores causing breakouts and premature creases. Eye makeup removers should be used for taking out eye makeup. Many people follow the double cleanse routine. Firstly, an oil cleansing step breaks up and lifts off sunscreen and makeup, next a foaming cleanser is applied for cleaning away the remains. Oily skinned gals should finish with an alcohol-free toner next to cleansing to eliminate surplus oils.

Exfoliators
Our skin tends to become abnormally thick over long exposure to sun. Also, over a period of time, our pores get clogged due to built-up at skin surface. Facial scrubs or exfoliators help in revealing new skin by clearing away old and dead skin cells while unclogging pores. You may exfoliate once or twice a week if you have normal or dry skin and three to four times a week if you have oily or combination skin. Sensitive skin junta should avoid scrubs having rough grains and opt for natural fruit enzyme based exfoliants.

How to Determine Your Skin Type and Choose The Right Regimen3

Toners
Toners are followed up after exfoliating or cleansing to smoothen, soften, and calm skin, while taking out the last bits of makeup. They also add vital skin-repairing ingredients to hydrate and replenish the skin’s surface immediately after cleansing by balancing the ph. Many toners are formulated to lessen soreness and dry blotches.

Moisturisers
Available in cream, lotion, gel, or liquid texture, moisturizers help in refining skin’s well-functioning and retain it feeling smooth, soft and younger. During the daytime, light moisturisers can be used coupled with sunscreen. For the nighttime, a rich moisturiser containing collagen, elastin, and essential lipids needs to be applied which helps in refreshing and repairing the skin while sleeping.

How to Determine Your Skin Type and Choose The Right Regimen6

Eye Creams
The skin under the eye is very delicate and henceforth, requires special treatment. Eye creams are formulated particularly for eye area concerns as they add moisture and prevent occurrence of fine lines and wrinkles. Oily skin should be treated with gel formula based eye cream preferably having caffeine. Gals with dry skin type should switch to balmy consistencies. If dealing with dark circle, any cream with Vitamin K may be helpful. Eye creams should be applied patting very gently with the ring finger around outer edge of the eye.

Advanced Skin Care Products
Many skin care extras and treatments are offered providing supplementary benefits to the skin, these may be incorporated into routine as per your needs.

Acne Treatment
After exfoliating with an AHA or BHA exfoliant, an acne treatment product with benzoyl peroxide eradicates acne-causing bacteria and aids in diminishing soreness. Many products are available which help in getting fewer breakouts and a lessening of big, red, inflamed blotches.

Skin Lightening Treatment
Skin lighteners are formulated to progressively decrease or eliminate brown spots and streaks. These products claim to reduce the overproduction of melanin pigment which leads to brown spots and discolorations.

Anti-Aging/Anti Wrinkle Treatment
Many serums or creams having antioxidants and other anti-aging ingredients are available which claim to protect the skin from environmental damage, including sun damage and pollution. I have not used them yet, but will explore them once I reach my 30s.

How to Determine Your Skin Type and Choose The Right Regimen4

Targeted Treatments
Many products are available that offer a variety of benefits like providing extra hydration to skin, absorbing surplus oil, soothing skin, or treating any special requirement or random skin anxiety. These products are elective extras you may use, reliant on your individual skincare worries. These come in various forms like face packs, facial masks, facial oils, blackhead removers, oil-blotting papers, lip treatments etc.

This simple, systematic routine covers the basic types of products everybody must use and the order in which to use them on a daily basis. These steps are applicable irrespective of your skin type.

Choosing The Products and Building Up Routine As Per Type of Skin:

Best Regimen for Normal Skin:
• With normal skin, you can build routine including daily cleansing and moisturizing using gentle, basic products.
• Hunt for products with antioxidants, which battle free-radical harm and keep at bay the signs of aging.
• Choose moisturizers with sunscreen for the daytime and one devoid of SPF at night.
• If thinking of building an advanced skin care, you might add retinoid or Vitamin C to few times a week to boost collagen production. Do consult a specialist for knowing the requirements.

Best Regimen for Sensitive Skin:
• Be very cautious in choosing the products as any new product, particularly one that holds scent or preservatives aggravate a reaction―typically in the form of redness or stinging.
• Go for gentle products on a daily basis and avoid anything with an added scent.
• In addition, do not hold back on sun defence: Go for products containing gentle UVA-blocking ingredients, like zinc oxide and Mexoryl.
• Keep products having anti-inflammatory ingredients, like green tea and licorice-root extract at aid for calming itchiness and redness.

How to Determine Your Skin Type and Choose The Right Regimen5

Best Regimen for Oily Skin:
• Major focus here is to unclog the pores by removing all dead skin cells on a daily basis with products containing salicylic acid or alpha hydroxy acids.
• It is equally essential to keep your skin well moisturised since oil producing sebaceous glands turn active during dehydration.
• Make use of oil-free lotions and sunscreens, which do not aggravate acne.

Best Regimen for Dry Skin:
• In order to keep the skin hydrated and healthy, it is recommended to use cleansers and creams with emollient ingredients, like hyaluronic acid and ceramides.
• Foaming face washes strip away the vital oils from the skin, therefore, should be avoided.
• In addition, anything containing harsh retinoids and alpha hydroxy acids should be skipped.
• Application of face oil under the moisturizer helps in keeping the skin smooth and reduces the flaky or peeling feeling.

Best Regimen for Mature Skin:
• Many hormonal changes occur with the ageing process leading to reduced speed in both oil and skin-cell renewal process giving dull appearance to the skin. hence, fine lines, brown spots, rough patches start showing up.
• Products having antioxidants and retinoids may be used for getting young radiance back. The antioxidants help in fighting the free radical damage which boost in ageing process while retinoids enhance collagen production to keep it firm.
• It is advisable to consult dermatologists for using a weekly at home peel which aids in removing dead skin.

People with combination type skin need to build regime treating each area differently. I know it is tough to get one in all products.

Hope you all find the above post useful. I have gathered above information from my personal exploration on skin care in search of best regimen for myself. It is strongly advisable to consult a specialist first to find out the best needs of your skin.

Image Source: 1, 2, 3

How To Use Night Creams
How to Take Care of your Skin in late Twenties
CTM Routine for Oily Skin
Best Ways to Exfoliate Acne-Prone Skin
How to Stop and Reverse Sun Damage
22 Best Skin Care and Makeup Solutions for Oily Skin
10 Budget Skin Care Products Review for Combination Skin
Skin Care Routine Normal to Dry Skin
My Skin Care and Hair Care Routine
How to Layer Your Beauty Products

IMBB RECOMMENDS

6 thoughts on “How to Find Your Skin Type and Choose The Right Skin Care Regimen

Leave a Reply to Shikha Sharma Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *