Welcome to the Rabbit Hole
When I was 11 years old, my mother started taking me to an austere cosmetics counter in the local department store to buy their gentlest, three step system: face wash, toner, and moisturizer.
For years, I used this three step system because my skin, I was told, was problematic. It was over sensitive, prone to drying and explosive reactions. I would often have dry patches in my t-zone and flakey skin with little red bumps around my nose.
Clearly, the product I was using was too good for my weak skin.
Eventually, I moved to more and more expensive product lines – the last being an Eastern European line that featured botanicals and high prices.
And then my post-pregnancy skin went into a crisis previously unseen.
Enter the Rabbit Hole.
(It’s a warren, really.)
After even the most expensive “hydrating” moisturizer failed to help, I turned to the internet and read NIH published research papers about skin. I looked for everything I could understand about the structure and function and regenerative cycle. After understanding that skin has a PH balance, a microbiome, a dead surface, a rich underworld, and a huge role in our life decisions, I started to realize that the skin care industry is full of it.
I began experimenting from my perspective as a chef, working with different ratios of essential fatty acids profiles. Then I began to read maker blogs, take online classes, and buy “formula” DIY beauty books. None of which seemed to be rooted in reality.
As my face began to heal, I continued to read the science and learn how intricate, vast, and complicated skin is. I continued to follow influencers who insisted that all skin could be perfect.
In the years since, I found some good solutions for people whose skin never seems to settle down. I've come to understand that because hormones fluctuate, skincare needs to fluctuate. What one does in their follicular cycle strongly affects what the skin does in the menstrual cycle. Most importantly, I learned that if I wanted to take care of my skin, I should listen to it.
Every ingredient I experiment with gets a wrestling. I’m a skeptic who reads vendor descriptions with a sneer. I don’t believe marketing copy. (I don’t believe the ding dang dalai lama.) But I believe in science, empirical knowledge, and curiosity.
Rabbit hole reads can be a lot. They take me years to create. Literally. So if you follow them, thank you.
