Hot or warm bath. What’s best for your beautiful Black skin? We all know there’s nothing quite like a long, hot bath or shower. Is there anything better for relaxing and cleansing your body at the end of an exhausting, stressful day? Well, actually there is.
Take out one word – Hot – and the long-term benefits of a bath or shower skin increases dramatically.
Bathing in warm rather than hot water is the key and here is the main reason. If you think of the natural oils your body produces as being the major natural barrier against the elements, your right.
Your natural abundance of oils can ward off sun damage and pollution, as well as prevent premature aging of your skin. This is why so many people of color in their later years look so much younger than people of other ethnicities at the same time of life.
Yet all this natural advantage can be literally soaked away in a bath or shower if you have the hot water tap turned up too high!
I’ve been studying skin in general – and African American skin in particular -for many years. And I have found that so many of you, who normally have oily skin, suddenly develop the problems of dry skin, eczema and uneven skin tone.
Partially, it’s because many of you wash your bodies in hot water and use harsh chemicals to scrub your skin clean. (The other part is what you eat. That’s another article.) Your scrubbing can cause skin breaks and irritations.
We can be so much more gentle on ourselves. We just need to take the time to think about it, and become aware of what we’re doing to our largest organ, our precious skin.
Starting with your daily bath or shower, and turning the hot water down will help prevent washing all that healing oil down the drain. Warm water baths and showers will keep your natural oils where they’re intended, on your body.
Most people say “nothing” or “my clothes”, when I ask this question. Now think about that some more. There you are, having depleted your natural oils and you haven’t replaced them. You’ve scrubbed them and anything else away. What do you think happens?
A good moisturizing body oil will benefit your skin greatly. It can help you replenish some of the oils you’ve lost. It’s always a good idea to apply body oils while your skin is moist. It absorbs better and penetrates deeper.
If you’re younger, your body will most likely produce natural oils more quickly. This can often over-compensate for the loss of oil causing build up. This repeated build up causes breakouts of spots due to clogging up of the pores.
If you are more mature then the problem is more likely to be that your body can’t produce more oil as fast, so it just stays dry. This is when flaky, rough uneven patches show up and wrinkles and lines make their appearance.
All this can be easily avoided by bathing in warm and not hot water. Like all things, the simple solutions often work best and this gem of knowledge definitely falls into that category.
You wouldn’t expose your baby’s skin to hot water, so why do it to yourself?
It’s good to relax and enjoy your bath or shower, but don’t forget the needs of your beautiful black skin. A warm bath and a good body oil will work every time.
Dedicated to Your Beauty,
Juliette Samuel,
Esthetician/Author/Publisher,