WRINKLES

Anti-Wrinkle Cream and Aging Skin

Aging Beautifully

Wrinkles: many of us dread the arrival of those lines, crinkles, and creases, but we know they’ll etch their way into our faces sooner or later. You can’t avoid aging, obviously, but it turns out that you don’t have to end up with a prune-like complexion. If you follow some commonsense skincare advice, you can prevent some wrinkling and continue to put your best face forward.

This site site has been developed to help you learn how to put that best face forward. There are lots of anti-aging promises out there, we would like to help you sort through them all with real-life solutions and anti-aging treatments you can use that really work.

First, it’s important to understand how skin ages and why we end up with wrinkles. One cause of skin aging occurs as the skin begins to wear out. By the time a person reaches 70 or 80, the skin and bones (including the skull) begin to thin and the layer of fat underneath the skin shrinks.

Another factor that comes into play over the years, causing skin to sag, is gravity. The corners of the mouth turn down, and the upper lip may disappear altogether. Eyelids droop, the tip of the nose dips, and jowls forms. Even your ears will begin to hang a little lower.

Sleep lines can add to your facial etchings, too, as can the facial expressions you’ve worn through the years. The muscles that make you laugh, cry, wink, and pucker your lips pull on the skin, which can leave permanent creases over time.

Still, these mostly unavoidable physiological changes actually play a very small role in the development of wrinkles. Unprotected exposure to the sun’s ultraviolet rays is by far the biggest culprit. That so-called healthy glow you get from a tan is anything but healthy for your skin.

So while you can’t prevent certain body changes, you can protect your skin from the greatest culprit in wrinkle formation and help lessen the impact of some of the contributing factors. For instance:

Wear sunscreen everyday
Wear sunglasses or a Hat to protect your face and eyes
Sleep on your back
Don’t smoke
Moisturize

What Is Aging?

According to medical experts, aging is a constant, predictable process that involves growth and development of living organisms. Aging can’t be avoided, but how fast we age varies from one person to another. How we age depends upon our genes, environmental influences, and life style.

Were it not for disease, we might not notice age creeping up on us other than the changes we see in the body (like wrinkles, loss of muscle tone, hair loss or graying). Aging skin is the primary sign we see as we grow older. Many of us want to reverse the wrinkles and age spots we see and we turn to skincare as the first line of defense.

Anti-Aging Skincare vs Surgery

With aging, the outer skin layer (epidermis) thins even though the number of cell layers remains unchanged. The number of pigment-containing cells (melanocytes) decreases, but the remaining melanocytes increase in size. Aging skin thus appears thinner, more translucent. Age spots or liver spots may appear in sun-exposed areas. Changes in the connective tissue reduce the skin’s strength and elasticity. This is known as elastosis and is especially pronounced in sun-exposed areas.

Wrinkles and Aging Skin Biology

Plenty of anti-aging cream manufacturers tout their products as face-lifts in bottle form. If that were true, it would be nothing short of a miracle. After all, creams are much cheaper and less invasive than surgical face-lifts, and you can use them from the comfort of your own home. All things being equal, who wouldn’t choose the less expensive, less risky option?

Of course no cream will give you the same result as a face-lift. However, there are possible downsides to cosmetic surgery, too: You’ve probably seen pictures of a botched or artificial-looking face-lift, in which the patient actually ends up looking worse than she did before the surgery. That’s where the advantage to using anti-aging creams and treatments comes in. Because creams can’t work as dramatically or invasively as a face-lift, they also don’t have nearly as much potential to cause painful and lasting side effects. And the positive results that you do get, while being less dramatic, will often look much more natural from an anti-aging cream.

Another advantage to creams is that they can provide additional, perhaps unexpected, benefits to your skin. Surgery can tighten the skin by pulling it, but it can’t improve the overall texture of your skin. Anti-aging skin creams may continually exfoliate and moisturize while reducing the appearance of pores and wrinkles — things a surgical face-lift can’t do .

When evaluating anti-aging products, looking for those that contain antioxidants and natural extracts such as rosemary or chamomile can be a good place to start. No anti-aging skincare treatment will give you the same, dramatic results as surgery. But in some ways, that’s not a bad thing. A cream won’t remove all the wrinkles, droops and sags that surgery can, but you may improve your skin just the same, and you won’t run the risk of looking artificial. The choice of which path is better, of course, is up to you.

Wrinkles: What Aspects of Aging Can Be Prevented?

Growing older cannot be prevented. We begin aging at the time of conception and continue aging one day at a time. However, some of the effects of aging can be slowed and even prevented. Prevention in later years requires participating in health education and health promotion activities designed to reduce the risk of disease. Prevention also involves engaging in interventions that improve outcomes in the event an illness does occur and includes efforts that reduce the risk of progressive disability and decline of function. In later life the goals of prevention also include maintaining function, vitality and quality of life

Life style strongly determines how well we age. One long-term study shows that engaging in seven health practices improves the quality of life, prevents decline in function and contributes to longevity.

Seven Anti-Aging Practices for a Long Healthy Life and Reduced Wrinkles

Smoking Causes Wrinkles

* Seven to eight hours of sleep at night

* Weight control

* Exercise

* Limited alcohol consumption

* Not smoking

* Eating breakfast

* Seldom snacking

Exercise has been shown to be an important means of preventing cardiovascular disease, falls, and depression. Walking is recommended to all persons who are physically able. It is readily available and costs are limited beyond a good pair of walking shoes.

Dietary excesses should be controlled. The recommended diet includes calorie intake that is balanced against the amount of energy expended. Saturated fats should be limited to less than 10 percent of the total calories. Using the recommended daily allowances, one should make sure to have an adequate intake of fiber, minerals, vitamins and fluids (approximately 8 glasses or 64 ounces).

Maintaining positive relationships throughout our lifetime contributes significantly to our sense of well being. Research shows that the quality of our social supports has direct positive effects on our health and can buffer or reduce some of the health-related effects of aging.