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#skinthusiast: the podcast
My Winter Arc | Transforming My Skin, Hair and Self Before January
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Amy
My hair care routine is actually much longer than my skincare routine and that's kind of on purpose because of the type of hair I have. I need more products. I do use heat on my hair. I have colored my hair in the past. So there are things I like to do to really optimize my hair health. If you're somebody who's using leave in products or you're using dry shampoos, then having a good scalp detox routine, something like maybe a very, very fine gentle scalp scrub or a clarifying shampoo to help remove the buildup that makes a huge difference on just the state of your hair. Welcome to Hasht Skin. Thus the podcast a place for listeners to hear from the experts and so can tangible tips to get that glow from the inside out. I'm Amy, a skincare educator, practicing dermatology PA and beauty creator who bridges the gap between the consumer and the industry. Listening to the industry's top experts on everything from the best way to spot treat a pimple to the Holy Grail hair products you didn't know you needed to the drugstore finds that are better than luxury price tags. We cover it all Here, dermatologists, beauty and wellness experts, brand founders and thought leaders share their tips and tricks for all things beauty, skincare and wellness. Think of hashtag skenthusiasts like the coffee chat with the beauty gurus whose brains you've always wanted to pick. You won't get this kind of insight anywhere else. Hello and welcome to another episode of skenthusiasthepodcast. Today we are talking all about the winter arc. If you have been on TikTok, you have undoubtedly seen this concept. Generally it is used in the fitness space, but the concept of the winter arc in general is that you kind of take in inventory of your life now and start making the changes now in the fall, rather than waiting until January 1st to do all of these lifestyle changes and have all these resolutions. Instead, we start now so that by January 1st we're already reaping the benefits. So I want to talk about from like a more holistic perspective, how you can really take inventory of your life this fall, whether it be your skin, your hair, your wellness, your fitness, your diet, and start to make little changes now that can make a huge difference. So by the time the beginning of 2020 comes around, you're already feeling good, you're feeling motivated, you're feeling energized, and we're already feeling like we're living our best lives, feeling like our best selves. So this Might be things like building strength and endurance in your fitness routine. It might be things like developing mental resilience, setting your goals early, creating healthy habits, and of course, just taking stock of where your skin is at, where your hair is at. Because this of course is a podcast for the skin enthusiasts to see what we can changes we can make to really set ourselves up for success in 2025. And the first step is taking inventory because you can't change what you're unaware of. So we really have to look at these different aspects of our lives and see how are we feeling? How are these aspects of our lives making us feel what is actually happening in our day to day lives that we can change? What are some things we can implement to help ourselves to feel better? So let's first start by taking inventory of our skin and our skincare routine. So how is your skin feeling this fall? Is it feeling hydrated? Is it feeling moisturized, or. Or does it feel tight and dry and dull? Are you feeling like you're like some of the life has been sucked out of your skin? As we move into the fall winter months, is there maybe some hyperpigmentation left over from summer that you want to address? This is super common in the fall months because for most of us we're getting more sun than we would like or we're getting exposed to more heat than we would like. And it really, our skin pays the price, especially for we're prone to hyperpigmentation. Does your skin feel overall radiant and clear? Does it reflect how you're feeling on the inside? Or do you look in the mirror and you think, my skin isn't a good reflection of how I'm feeling? It's not a good reflection of me as a person. So how do we address this in the skin space? This is a really good time during this winter arc where I think a skin reset is in order. So I think just taking inventory of what we're using morning and night, are we using the same products on, you know, most days of the week, or are we jumping around a lot? Are we trying new things? Are we getting any breakouts or irritation from products that we're trying? Is our routine maybe getting a little bit too long? Have we added too many steps in without pulling back other areas? So this is a really good time to get back to the basics, get back to that like really essential three to five step routine that we know works and give our skin kind of a reset and a break from the rest of it. So if we are feeling any irritation Any little breakouts, any hyperpigmentation, we can kind of pull back, give our skin that reset. And I recommend doing that by again, the basics, something like a gentle cleanser morning and night, a vitamin C in the morning, if you tolerate it. Make sure you're using a good moisturizer for this time of year, a sunscreen, preferably tinted if you have hyperpigmentation at night, making sure you're double cleansing, getting off all that sunscreen, getting off all that makeup that is like such a good skin reset. Just doing that for a couple weeks and trying to implement that into your regular routine. Using a retinoid, if you tolerate retinoids, if you have hyperpigmentation, incorporating some sort of a hyperpigmentation serum and of course, moisturizing something that's going to be moisturizing enough for this time of year. A lot of times people don't transition their summer products into the fall and winter months. And for a lot of people, that may not be necessary, but for some of us, myself and included it is, we need some of those heavier, more moisturizing products. I actually recently started doing some graphics on my social media to cover some sample regimens. Something like I would give my patients in clinic for different skin types. So if you go to my highlights on Instagram, there's a highlight that says three step skincare. And it is three to five step skincare routines really simplified, but, but products that are clinically proven to work and work on our concerns based on very specific skin types. So I'm going to continue to incorporate more and more skin types there. So feel free to DM me if you want to add a skin type to the list. So that's how I would kind of approach our skin during this winter arc. And then when it comes to hair care, we can kind of ask ourselves the same question. Is my hair reflecting the vibrancy that I'm feeling inside or is it feeling dry and damaged? Is it feeling lackluster? Is there maybe more damage than usual? Have I been doing more from the sun and the water from the summer months? Did it, did it cause some leftover damage that maybe I wasn't recognizing? Is my hair in need of some tlc? And we can kind of do that same reset when it comes to our hair, pull back on our products, reset our routine. Funnily enough, my hair care routine is actually much longer than my skincare routine, and that's kind of on purpose. I, because of the, the, the type of hair I have, I need more products. I do Use heat on my hair. I have colored my hair in the past, so there are things I like to do to really optimize my hair health. So do you have a good scalp detox routine? If you're somebody who's living using leave in products or you're using dry shampoos or maybe you're an infrequent shampooer like I am. I only shampoo about every five days. Then having a good SC Scalp detox routine, something like maybe a very, very fine, gentle scalp scrub or a clarifying shampoo to help remove the buildup that makes a huge difference on just the state of your hair. Do you need damage control products? Do you need bond builders? Do you need peptide treatments? The people who are going to benefit from these the most are people who use heat, people who use color or bleaching services, people who perm. Obviously like any sort of relaxing stuff like that, any sort of chemical treatment to the hair. But even things as simple as like brushing our hair can cause damage and environmental aggressors that we're exposed to from being outside pollution, things like that. So the great majority of us can benefit from some sort of a repair product and then really just kind of babying our hair during this time so that in the next three months we really see a difference. By January, like we're really feeling like our hair is shinier, healthier, more vibrant. What can we do? So really careful brushing, like baby your hair. When you're brushing, don't rip a hair brush through it. Sleeping on silk. So whether that be silk pillowcase, it could be cotton too, or a silk bonnet. Using silk hair ties. Stop pulling your hair back. In tight hairstyles, the tight really slicked back bun, the really tight slicked back ponytail, those are causing not only breakage to your hair, but it can also cause thinning at the root, which over time can actually become permanent. So really supporting our hair during this time. If you want to go as far as using like a nutraceutical, the one I take is called Nutrafol. It has kind of targets the many different reasons that we have thinning hair, like hormones, nutritional deficiencies, stress, things like that. And kind of covers the bases when you need a little bit of extra. It's something I've taken consistently for the last five years when I would. After I had my daughter, I switched to the postpartum version. And then once I was done breastfeeding, I switched back to the women's formulation. So there's a lot of good ingredients in there to Help support our hair, to help nourish it. What else do I do? Switching to continuous air hair tools like the Dyson was the biggest game changer for me and like up leveling my hair care routine. Absolutely. But just incorporating like any one or two of these things is going to, you're going to see a difference in a few months. So that's what's amazing. By starting now, we're already going to be reaping the benefits by January 1, by the time the holidays come around. And it's just going to be motivation to like continue to make these healthier changes for not only our bodies, but our hair and our skin. So let's talk a little bit about our bodies, about wellness. And some of the inventory questions I ask myself are, do I feel at home in my body again? Is my outward appearance reflecting the way I feel on the inside? Am I waking up in the morning feeling refreshed and rested? Does the food I'm eating make me feel satisfied and nourished? Or am I feeling worse after the meals I'm eating? Am I falling asleep easily? Am I staying asleep throughout the night? Have my sleep and wake times been consistent? Am I supporting my spiritual health through meditation or simply with nourishing thoughts? This is a huge one that I have to be on myself about all the time because if I'm not careful, my thoughts kind of get into this like, like very normal for our society, kind of like a pessimistic spiral. And it can be something as simple as, like when you're stuck in traffic, you're just like thinking about annoyed thoughts, like just those annoying, like how you're annoyed at things. But when you really reframe your thoughts to be more positive and try to feed your mind only positive thoughts, it's absolutely amazing what can happen. And it can take time to get yourself into that routine. So by starting now again in the fall, we're giving ourselves time. So we're not starting fresh with this like entire mindset refresh on January 1st. So just making those small changes now can really help. So my favorite ways to do this is rereading some of my favorite books. So the Secret is a really good like introduction. It can feel a little bit cheesy, but when I if I had to pick one book that changed my life, it's the Secret Journaling. If you want to do like the five minute Journal, that's a really good way to incorporate some of these healthy habits. There's also a book called the Magic, which is, is from the same author as the Secret and it's a step by step guide that I always do on January 1st, but that's a really, really good thing to implement right now at the end of the year. Like I that actually lights me up just thinking about it. I think I'm going to start it tomorrow, but starting a book like that now in fall is just gonna give you so much drive for when 2025 comes around and you're gonna feel so motivated because you've already done the legwork. Basically, it's daily prompts showing you different ways that you can incorporate gratitude in truly change your mindset. So let me know if you want to do a little. We could do like a follow along on stories on that one. This episode is brought to you by well Me. Skinthusiast.com is your one stop shop for all things skin, hair and beauty. I have countless blog posts to educate you on all the skin concerns and most common skin questions I receive. We also have a complete skincare basics guide on our shop page as well as the Cutest in my Skin era crew neck. If you want to support the show, please head over to skyenthusiast.com forward/shop and don't forget to rate and review the show wherever you listen to podcasts. When it comes to our food, our diet, I think a really good way to kind of reset and also take inventory is a food journal or someone like me. I use the levels, which is a continuous glucose monitor and then I can track my food in there and kind of correlate how I'm feeling with my normal diet. So usually I'll do like the first two weeks I eat how I normally have. I don't change any anything just to see like how is this affecting me. And oftentimes I'll realize like oh yeah, that bagel really wasn't serving me or all those carbs I had at lunch really did make me feel like I needed chocolate or a coffee by 3pm so just understanding how these foods were making me feel throughout the day, that can be such a good reset. And again, you don't need any fancy technology to do this. You can literally write it down on a piece of paper. Like write down what you have for breakfast and make a note in a couple hours how you're feeling. Write down what you have for lunch, make a note in a couple hours how you're feeling. How are you feeling throughout the afternoon? To you go home, how are you feeling after dinner? Are you feeling well, ready for bed? Or are you feeling wired and tired. All those things so important. And I think taking inventory of how we're sleeping, how we're falling asleep, are we staying asleep? I do a lot of that tracking with my aura ring. But you don't need an aura ring to know if you're sleeping or not. Like, you can track your bedtimes, you can track your wake times, you can track how you're feeling in the morning. Most of us know when we're waking up and tossing and turning at night. So what are you eating throughout the day? Are you eating a lot more sugar than you have been? Like, these are things that slowly start to creep in when we're not. Not really having full control over a lifestyle. And it's happened to me many times. It still happens to me. I have to do this reset often. So as did my caffeine intake creep up? Am I creeping up to two cups of coffee a day? Okay, let me peel back. I need to get back into my half caf or even my decaf routine to kind of flush out some of that caffeine. Often. That's a huge culprit for why I'm not sleeping right or sleeping well. So just understanding how these things are affecting you. I think a food journal is a really, really, really good way to do this. It's not something you want to obs about. It's something you just want to do for a couple of weeks. Again, take inventory of what's currently going on in your routine, because you can't change it if you're unaware of it. So just understanding exactly what's happening and why is going to make such a big impact. And it's also going to give you the motivation you need to make the changes. Then when it comes to my fitness, like, for me, I'm asking myself, how are my activity goals? Because I wear an aura ring, I can see, like, am I meeting those goals that I've set for myself? It could. You know, any tracker that you're using, the Apple Watch, they all track this. You know, it tracks how often you stand. It tracks your calorie goals, but it also checks, like, your steps, just basic activity. Like, are you living a sedentary lifestyle? It's so important that we're living an active lifestyle, which the majority of people in the world anymore don't do. I'm reading a really fantastic book by Dr. Casey means called Good Energy. And it's very much about this how, just like we've become such sedentary people, we've ignored our diet, we're eating largely Processed foods and it's frankly slowly killing us. So I always try to increase activity where I can, whether it mean just like when I'm running around the house doing chores, like doing my laundry, cleaning up, like just. We all have those days where we've been really productive and really active. And you just, when you, when your butt hits that couch at 8 or 9pm you feel so much better. Like you feel like you actually did something rather than when we're sitting all day long. And that can be hard for, for people who have like a desk job. And we're going to talk about that in a minute. But when we're sitting all day long and we're not moving, we feel more tired. Like we're spending less energy, but we're more tired when the day comes to an end. So what are some things that can incorporate into your life? Is it maybe a walk after dinner? If you're a stay at home mom, maybe you throw the kids in the stroller and you walk around your neighborhood once or twice a day. That's been a game changer for me. I put Josie in the stroller. We had like a time where she just like wasn't tolerating it right. She became a toddler and she's like, I don't want to sit in my stroller anymore. And I was always someone who was very strict on like meal times and snack times with her. But you know what, sometimes you have to improvise. And now what do we do? We give her a snack. I give her a snack on the stroller. It keeps her occupied. We throw walnuts on the street, squirrels, like anything I can do to keep her occupied during that time. It's good for her because she's getting fresh air, she's getting sunlight. At the end of our walk, we both get out together. She runs around, she rides her bike. And I'm getting, you know, three to five miles in, which is just so good for my mental health. I'm seeing the sun. I'm just like. That has been a truly a mood booster and it's able. Like I usually will close my activity ring on my aura ring just from my walks throughout the day. So if it's not from the first one, a lot of times we'll take an after dinner walk, which I've talked about in my episode when I talked about my cgm. Because after dinner walks have been really helpful for me in controlling blood sugars. So we'll often walk after dinner again, get a little bit of that, that last little bits of sunlight before the sun goes down helps regulate your circadian rhythm. So where can you walk throughout your day if you're not able to get outside? And I think be creative about this. My sister in law is a pa. She works full time, but she used to work at this clinic that had like a little pond outside and she would literally on her lunch break, like just get a few laps around the pond again, get that sunshine shine, get those steps in so you can be creative. When I used to work in the ICU at night, sometimes I would do the stairs like in, in the hospital, up and down just to get those steps in. So whatever you can do to kind of get your heart rate up a little bit, get moving. Maybe that means getting a standing desk and getting a walking pad or maybe no walking pad. Maybe you're just standing instead of sitting. You're taking a few more trips to the water cooler to fill your water. Whatever we can do to increase that I think is so good not only for our physical health of course, but our mental health. I feel so much better when I'm actively moving throughout the day. So. So get creative about ways that you can implement this now again in fall so that by the time New Year's comes around, if you want to start increasing your fitness goals, you can because you're coming from such a good foundational space where at least you're getting like some, some healthy daily activity in now. Maybe you already have like a really good workout routine. Are you making it to your favorite workout classes right now or do you feel like you're in a slump? Maybe you can actually reset, take a break, either find a new class or maybe you find a routine that you like doing from home. Home from time to time. I really love group fit classes, but from time to time, and I'm currently in a season in my life like that right now it's just easier for me to incorporate at home workouts from like programs or videos because I'm more likely to do them. I can do them in short bursts when the baby is sleeping or when I, even when she's awake, she just comes in and hangs out with me. And I'm so much more likely to do it because it doesn't mean me driving to a class. And then are you incorporating weight training into your routine? I think this is such a like a low hanging fruit, especially for women because we know that by increasing our muscle muscle mass we're increasing longevity. We're also increasing the metabolic benefits. So like it's not a one to One of a of a strength training session versus a cardio session. The strength training session is going to actually give you more long term benefits. So that's what I mean when I say low hanging fruit. It's more bang for your buck if you can incorporate some weight training into your routine versus like continuing to kill yourself with cardio. Although I do love low intensity cardio, I walk all the time. These are just some of the inventory questions that I personally ask myself this time of year so that I can kind of formulate, formulate a plan and how I'll approach this is I do make a vision board in January of every year and that's where I like go through Pinterest. I find the images that are really exciting to me and I think about what those images mean to me when I see them and I formulate my vision board based on what I want my year to look like instead. What I'll do during this time is really make a list of the categories I spoke about in this podcast, do an inventory of how I'm currently feeling, food journal if I need to take track, take inventory of what's going on currently in my life and then formulate just two to three bullet point plan for each of them. So for skin it might be reset to my three step routine. It might be add in hyperpigmentation serum twice a day. It might be, you know, be consistent with my red light and microcurrent for the next three months. My hair care routine might be increase the amount of days I'm using my bond builder because my hair is, you know, feeling a little dry and damaged from the summer. Reduce air drying and only use my continuous air tools for blow drying, which helps. My hair is a lot healthier when I blow dry versus air drying. So go through those, each of those pillars and put two to three bullet points. Don't, don't overwhelm yourself because then you're never going to do any of it. And again we can reset again in January and really up level these goals. This is a time for you to just kind of give yourself some grace. Start now so that when January comes around, you're not overwhelmed and you're not more likely to just throw your hands up after three days because it's too many changes to be made at once. This is an opportunity for you to start now and make some small changes that are going to give you a big payoff, a big difference so that you're already seeing changes by January 1st and you're even more motivated to make further changes and to, like, really hit your New Year's Eve plans and goals hard. So I hope this was a helpful episode for you. This is how I am taking the whole winter arc and my own routine, like what I take it to mean. And I think it's just a really helpful ease into the change. And I think a lot of us feel that this time of year, like, it's, it's fall, it's cozier, we feel change in the air. I think this is a really good way to take inventory and make those small changes. So I hope you found this helpful. And I will talk to you next week. Sky enthusiasts.