| Author | Message | ||
     Eiji New member Username: Eiji Post Number: 1 Registered: 10-2008 |
Hello everyone  I am a 24 years old male and had a wrinkle free forehead at the beginning of this year. Unfortunately, due to a rough year I have developed 3 forehead wrinkles that go across the whole forehead  They are not very deep and the wrinkles at the top of the forehead and just above the brow are faint but the wrinkle in the middle has darkened and is very visible like this picture for example and catches my nail when I scrape it across it: http://www.kyredhead.com/images/DashOutTheDoor.jpg I also have small wrinkles like this: http://i36.tinypic.com/343i2wj.jpg I have decided not to raise my eye brows to contract the frontalis muscles as they seem to make the wrinkles worse and the main reason for me wanting to do the scalp exercise is to tighten the forehead skin and eliminate the wrinkles. Is the working of the frontalis muscles important to get rid of the forehead wrinkles in tandem with working the occipitalis muscles or is just working the occipitalis muscles fine? I think I have good control over my occipitalis muscles after practice. I wear glasses and they move towards my face and my ears move inwards about 2 centimeters when doing this exercise. My forehead also looks like its moving up about 0.7cm (7mm) judging by the movement of the wrinkles and eye brows. The wrinkles on my forehead also stretch and look about 60% better when doing the scalp excercise. Am I doing the exercise correctly? Anyway to improve on it? Would this exercise get rid of the wrinkles completely with time? If I use my hand to pull the forehead from the hairline, I notice 85% of the wrinkles disappear completely so it looks like my wrinkles are not due to frowning but my scalp being slumped forward? Would using a product called Rescue Oil on my forehead which contains Vitamin E, Peach Kernel Oil, Sweet Almond Oil and Evening Primrose Oil also be beneficial alongside the scalp exercise? What about using a natural microdermabrasion product like Epidermx II for the fine lines on my forehead? Sorry for the long post, hope I didn't bore you :-) Many thanks! | ||
| C M New member Username: Ceeme Post Number: 97 Registered: 06-2007 |
Hi Eiji: Hopefully Tom can answer you on the microdermabrasion and the oil. I will share with you my own experience. For one, I believe it is OK to just do the occipitalis part of the exercises minus the frontalis part. I did that for years before I ever realized the frontalis was also involved. And even when I did, it took me a while to understand how to alternate between the two...so I continued with just occipitalis and I didn't suffer any loss or deterioration from that. My forehead has remained smooth. I do now involve the frontalis but as I love to do the exercise so much that I catch myself doing it in public, I tend to leave out the frontalis often so I can be more subtle. As far as the fine lines, I share this with you not as a fact but as my own hypothesis. For years, I would use lotions that many claimed were best for skin. Sometimes it would be the tried and true ones my Mom used like Oil of Olay and sometimes the new rage on the market like Aveeno Clear Complexion or Neutrogena Visibly Even. Indeed my skin would look wonderful when I used these, but every now and then, during the day, I'd catch my image in a mirror and my skin would look very dull. And while my face was firm from years of face exercise, I couldn't help but notice lines like the ones you have. On another program, I "met" someone who suggested water-based lotions were not good for skin. How ludicrous that sounded. I mean, aren't we told we need to hydrate the skin, so how could that be true. He would say something like splashing the face with water was good, but it's leaving it on the skin as you do with lotions that's bad. He was all for oil washing...although at the time, it seemed like a crazy idea to me. Later on, I came across a forum that talked about theOil Cleansing Method. The reviews sounded promising and adding that to what the guy on the face program had said, I decided to give it a shot. By the second day, when I caught my reflection in the mirror, I had to do a double take as my face looked like I was wearing foundation. It literally glowed. What was also very weird was the fine lines were not evident anymore. And my previously dry/combination skin was now even and no longer dry. In fact, at times it seemed oily...which was fine by me; most times though it passed for normal. I stopped using lotions altogether and made the OCM my only source of "lube for my face". I decided to increase my water intake and thus hydrate my skin from the inside. It's been about 3 years now and my skin is doing fine without lotions. (BTW, I am not suggesting you do this. Just sharing what worked for me.) The other thing I have made a habit is applying sunblock every single day. Because I didn't want a "lotion", I sought a product that wasn't really a "moisturizer" in the way we know them (meaning a product meant to be absorbed by the skin and with water as one of the first ingredients). Instead, I sought a product that would just sit on my skin and provide coverage from UV rays. Xterra is the sunblock I chose and continue to use. I also take a source of EFA daily. It used to be Flaxseed but now it is chia (Anutra) which I write about in the diet section of this forum. (I did alternate with cod liver oil for the vitamin D it gives but it ran out so I need to get some more. I do take Calcium with Vitamin D (good for skin protection) but I understand the cod liver D is best. Back to the topic of lotions. On the skin section of the forum, I share an article about coconut oil and why it's better than lotions. Perhaps you could take a look at that and see? And now to Tom's exercise for the scalp. Indeed you do sound like you are doing it correctly and I believe if you continue to do it, you will reap great results. Don't expect it to happen right away. But instead, just get into the habit of doing the exercise whenever you can. One day you'll be surprised to see that your perseverance did indeed pay off. Incidentally, I used to take Biosil for my nails (to strengthen them) and was considering getting it again as it's also good for hair and bones and my nails could use a little help every now and then. And while looking it up to make sure I have the right product in mind, I saw that it reduces fine lines and wrinkles. So perhaps you could try it? While I haven't used alpha hydroxy acids in ages (they do the same thing as microdermabrasion but instead of being manual exfoliation of dead cells, they do it chemically; and fruit acids are mild. In other words, they hasten the shedding of dead cells to reveal fresher newer cells--an action that would have happened on it own anyway but just at a slower pace. This also helps remove fine lines. I preferred AHAs to manual exfoliation because I always feared that with manual one might tear too deep into the skin. My introduction to chemical exfoliation was a product called Fruition Extra by Estee Lauder. While it proved too expensive for me to keep up with it, I can still remember how my face glowed when I used it. I used very little...applying dots on various parts of my face and smoothing a thin layer to cover just before my lotion. Later I only did it at night, for two reasons: 1) no sun to worry about (you MUST use sunscreen/sunblock when exfoliating); 2) I was trying to be economical so I wouldn't run out of that magic potion. LOL And oh how my skin glowed (Did I already say that?). Now I know there are cheaper alternatives out there, and some more "natural" than others (I've got a plan to try out House of Deming products sometime in the future as they sound so good and I've heard good reviews about them.) Otherwise maybe I will treat myself one day to a facial. (That's another thing you could try. Glycolic acids they might use at a facial, since you don't need the more concentrated peels as you don't have deep set wrinkles, can help smooth out the fine lines, but again, I worry about overdoing it because I know excessive exfoliation can cause the skin to age even faster. So you'd have to promise yourself to do it just once every blue moon...even once a month facial may not be bad. But I'm no expert on the subject. Dr Pickart ( skinbio.com) has done extensive studies on aging of skin and sells products many rave about. So between reading his site and talking to Tom, you should know what's best for you. Anyway, you could also adopt the healthy diet recommended by Tom on this site, remembering that any junk you consume takes the place of something that would have been more beneficial to your health (or appearance) and therefore decided to cut back on useless food that has little nutritional value, focusing more on food high in antioxidants, for example. Dr Oz has appeared on Oprah several times recommending foods that reverse the aging process (Here's a recap of one such show and I remember Dr Perricone also coming on Oprah's show and showing the effect of his diet on two women's faces--although they may have also used his very expensive products--and they looked like they had had a facelift! You can never have too much of wholesome nourishing foods so just make eating right your lifestyle. Anyway, I've rambled a little too much so I'll be quiet now. Please forgive any typos. I'm too tired to proofread. (Wouldn't you be? LOL) I hope you find something useful in all the wordiness. | ||
| Ellie New member Username: Ellie Post Number: 7 Registered: 10-2008 |
CM, thanks again for another useful post. How often do you do oil cleanse? It's mentioned in the article not to do it too often to avoid dry skin. I'd like to try this method. Ellie | ||
| C M New member Username: Ceeme Post Number: 98 Registered: 06-2007 |
I do oil cleansing usually every evening after work but some days I use just plain lukewarm water* (*More on this later) in the evening. In the morning, I simply splash my face with lukewarm water and pat it dry with a paper towel (I like paper towels as I deem them cleaner than a towel that has been used before and left to air dry). On Saturdays, I don't leave the house so I don't use sunscreen or sunblock so I may cleanse my face using just plain lukewarm water and a face cloth. (BTW, I bought several face cloths from KMart so I can afford to use each one just once, then rinse it casually and hang it to dry before putting it in a bag waiting for laundry day. I wash all the cloths on the weekend with a bit of bleach in the sanitary cycle of my washer. I don't wash them with anything else. Afterward, I keep them in a bag away from dust and air until needed, when I repeat the cycle.) Although when I first learned of this method, the suggestion was to use a mixture of Extra Virgin Olive Oil (EVOO) and Castor Oil (CO), with CO being the cleanser and EVOO being the moisturizer, I found CO made my skin feel dry and didn't care too much for its thickness. The suggestion was to vary the ratio of the oils till you get a good mix that is both cleansing and moisturizing for your type of skin. Those with dry skin might need more EVOO and those with oily skin more CO. I just use EVOO alone and haven't had problems with it. I mention washing my face w/ just plain water, and I do alternate this with the oil cleansing pretty often...not just between evenings and morning but there may be days when I use nothing but plain water with a face cloth. I got this idea after I noticed a peer of mine with skin that looked like baby's. I asked her what she uses on her face and she said nothing; just water. Disbelieving I prodded her for more info and she explained that she has oily skin and found products made for oily skin made her skin appear more oily later in the day. So she started washing her face with a cloth and letting the shower head spray water on her face as she scrubbed it. And then she didn't apply lotion and her skin seemed to balance itself out. (Makes me think that sometimes in an attempt to fix something we don't like, we sometimes mess up the normal balance and just make things worse, so that we start to be fully dependent on the so-called solutions. When in reality, had we just been a wee bit patient and just let our bodies be, they'd remember how to manage w/o the assistance from cosmetics. Nervously, I tried this "no product" regimen for a week, and for the first time in my life, my skin was "oily". I tested it using the paper strips you can get in stores that sell products according to skin type and my type came up as "oily". It's as if my not using moisturizers or moisturizing cleansers freed my skin to be normal again and remember how to produce sebum again. So I do plain water cleansing every now and then. Do a search for "oil cleansing method" and read other places about it. Different people find different oils work best for them, so you may get ideas of what to use if one oil doesn't seem quite right. I do want to try the Rice Bran Oil but hate that I seem to only be able to find it online, so I haven't yet jumped on that bandwagon. Why Rice Bran Oil? See my post on the skincare section. BTW, my brother suffers from acne and oily skin and he has been cleansing his face with oil and loves how much better his face looks. He uses EVOO and tells me that on days he gets too lazy to cleanse his face the OCM way, he regrets it the next day because it shows in how bad his face looks. As someone who is very suspicious of cosmetics that seem to trap people (For instance people will start to use eye creams when they never missed them before and then find they cannot stop using them because their eyes look worse when they stop)...the fact that my brother cannot do without EVOO cleansing does make me wonder if the process has just made a junkie out of him the way I suspect cosmetics do, or whether the reversion he sees is just a return to his face as it would have been if he hadn't started OCM. Hence the reason I do take breaks from OCM lest I become addicted to it and unable to do without it. I would like to just use plain water like my friend but I do like how my skin looks and feels with OCM (and on days when I have used it in the morning, coworkers have complimented me on my skin; they usually don't when I just do plain water splashes). Another reason I can't exclusively use just plain water is because I worry that plain water may not really clean my face since I use sunblock. My friend doesn't use anything on her face at all so she can get away with cleansing with just plain water. | ||
| Ellie New member Username: Ellie Post Number: 9 Registered: 10-2008 |
CM, Wow, as always, thanks for your irrefragable answer. After reading you posts I do not have to look for any additional information! I feel a little guilty asking you questions as you take time to explain everything in detail. I do not want to abuse the welcome. Thank you. | ||
| Thomas Hagerty Board Administrator Username: Admin Post Number: 105 Registered: 05-2006 |
I had to go to the dictionary for that one. A neat word. |
