Had my first " your skin looks amazing" comment-- THANK YOU Caroline Hirons!

[bigbuttons]

A colleague said this at work today, I was so chuffed.
I'm 47 and was looking not so good. This last month I have invested in serums, acids and what not have gone back to Caroline Hirons properly this time. I have been religiously cleaning and tending to my face AM and PM. I use a 30% glycol peel every couple of weeks and use tretinoin every 3 days.
I must say even I have noticed a difference, it has knocked years off me.
All blemishes gone, skin is ultra smooth, wrinkles reduced.
There is hope for us more (ahem) mature ladies!

I went into boots today and started looking at the ingredients lists for serums.
Nearly all had mineral oil listed.
Is this a bad thing.
It put me off buying the product.

I ended up buying Botanics at half price.

frownsanddimples that's great. have you ever checked out EDS forum? It is the most incredible site for DIY.

CH thinks mineral oil is a bad thing. Many others don't, Dr Sam Bunting cheerfully recommends products with it in.

I'm not convinced personally it's nasty - I think it's like parabens which have entered the public consciousness as being evil with v little evidence. I watched a great clip of Marko Zelens talking about parabens once saying he'd looked at the evidence, didn't think there was any issue with them but he wanted to sell a high end product and all his customers were convinced they were bad so he made his product paraben free to meet demand. Of course you then see 'paraben free' and it makes it look even more likely that parabens are bad as why else would you want to be free of them? It's a vicious circle.

I think there will be a big trend away from mineral oil but whether that's based on truth or myth we probably will never know.

Am v excited as my Hylamide has arrived! Watery texture in a dropper bottle - unlike the tacky Hydraluron I've slowly grown to dislike. Seriously considering throwing the rest of the Hydraluron in the bin as the only thing it seems to have done is dried my skin out.

thanks kundry

kundry I've JUST ordered a bottle! Was trying to decide between the eye one and face one. Thanks for putting me on to that. Went for the eye one. Found a 20% coupon so got it for £24 plus postage. Well chuffed! By all accounts it's good stuff!
My Bravura package has arrived today. I'm like a child in a sweetie shop!

I lie, I went for the face one!

My take on mineral oil is that it's cheap and most people can tolerate it. I wasn't going to be spending £50+ on Clarins Double Serum that contained cheap mineral oil as an ingredient that's for sure!

Twitchcoco that's prob similar to mine. Would pay a small amount for mineral oil based moisturiser (except I wouldn't because I avoid oil) but £50+ for something claiming to be great but prob just an average moisturiser - no way, I'm with you!

bigbuttons fingers crossed we aren't back in a week moaning about it

Thanks bigbuttons

Which retin a do you use frownsanddimples?

Nabootique.....what makes me think it might be the eve lom is that since the company was bought out the formula has been meddled with and now contains mineral oil so it might be this that's angering my skin?
Other than eve lom I occasionally use Jo Malone vitamin e gel/Liz Earle rescue mask/eve lom rescue mask, number 7 p&p serum and the mousturiser, except at night when I use the trilogy rose hip oil. Still the redness remains....I think I'm going to buy the cetaphil and give it a whirl, this has been going on for a few months now I'm sick of throwing money at the problem! At least the patches aren't sore today, sometimes they feel like they're stinging and get tiny blisters on there too.

Those lumps are probably spots of acne under the skin that never quite come up and never quite go away.

What strength tretinoin (or retin a) have you bought? It's unlikely to do much except irritate in the first few days.

I would leave off the tretinoin and start with the Liquid Gold. Once you know you are happy with the Liquid Gold, then you can add the tretinoin but slooowly - for example I am just restarting 0.025% and alternate days was initially too fast. Came up in massive redness and peeling. Applied loads of Cerave, slowed down and now going much better despite me having used it before so should have known what I was doing

bigbuttons yep love that site. I also made my own diy lactic acid lotion from a recipe from eds. I tried body peels and found it a faff. The lotion got rid of my keratosis pilaris on my arms and years of perma tan to reveal my birth colour. Love it.

Mrsdesperado Do you mean the seller or the strength? Its this one from this person www.ebay.co.uk/itm/231538874400?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1555.l2649
I'm on 0.025%. Have been for a year. I can't recommend retin a enough. Its transformed my skin completely. Faded old acne marks, sun spots from pregnancy and no lines/wrinkles so far. 32 this year so they may yet form but so far so good.

frowns can you tell me the recipe or post a link please?!

Fab, thanks frowns. How often do you use it?

I'm really tempted to buy this, and the liquid gold or pixi glow stuff, but I'm so scared of making pigmentation problems worse. Can anyone reassure me? Tia!

I'm looking to get the retin a that FrownsandDimples linked to, but what strength should I start with?

Just got the clearasil super fruits pads from the pound shop!

Love love Caroline hirons - my sister introduced me to her blog recently and have read it all . Currently rotating my way around

Clinique take the day off
Soap and glory hot cloth
Body shop camomile cleansing oil
Emma hardy cleansing balm
Pixi glow tonic
First aid radiance pads
Clearasil pads
Liquid gold
Vitamin e serum in oil

And a few others .
I'm a total product junkie .

Have been following her routine for a couple of weeks and there is definite improvement!

If you are going to go for real retin a then 0.025% or lower if you see it, to start with.

I think I didn't even use 0.025% every day until I'd got halfway through the tube - and you only need a tiny amount to apply.

It is great, even back on after only 2 weeks and the initial cock up I can see my skin looks way better.

I would suggest you start with a 0.025. The idea is that once you can tolerate using this everyday you then move up to the 0.5. Some people might never be able to tolerate anything above 0.025.

I have the 0.1. It is a tad too strong so I am buffering it with some emu oil. When I was using it at full strength I did so 2-3 times a week. I must say that my skin would do a complete peel. Whole sheets of skin.it was quite something. The new skin underneath was bloody amazing though, like a baby's bottom!
Trouble was it was a bit of an anti social process- going around with half your face peeling off. So now I am hoping that buffering will help to get the effects but not quite do aggressively!!

Ok just bought the retin from the link posted just above.

Now where does this fit in with the skin care routine? Every day? After the serum? Or do I use it after cleansing and nothing else? Thanks.

Oh and would I still use liquid gold or not bother with that?

Lol buttons! Yes I imagine it is quite antisocial having a permanently peeling face! that tickled me