Guinea Pig #34: Glycolic Acid Facial Peel
The Problem:
I was walking down the street recently with a fellow mummy friend; we were both feeling less than yummy that day. “My skin,” my friend told me, “feels like an old piece of flannel.” “Precisely!” I exclaimed. I’d been searching for the right way to describe my dull, uneven, bumpy skin for ages. Well, not quite ages: about a year, to be precise. My skin condition changed for the worse around the time I came down from the high/low of two pregnancies in less than two years, the births of two beautiful, healthy babies, and a whole heck of a lot of breastfeeding. I’d been unsettled by the redness, breakouts, and newly discovered fine lines. Where had I gone wrong? I’d glowed during pregnancy, and for a long time afterwards, too, the product, I believed, of my love of motherhood. Ha!
My skin, apparently, does not love motherhood. Lack of sleep, exposure to the elements during long afternoons picnicking and playing at the park (rain, wind, or shine) and hormonal changes had likely contributed to turning my formerly youthful skin into a dried and aging husk of what it once was. And at 31, I refused to give up on my quest to be mistaken for the children’s hot young nanny whilst pushing my alarmingly huge double stroller (that seemed like a good idea at the time) down the streets of my family friendly Toronto ‘hood. I would be a yummy mummy if it killed me, I decided.
Hypothesis:
After my walk with my friend, I came home, plugged the kids into Treehouse—don’t judge me, television can be a mother’s best friend—and called Dr. Sheldon Pollack (http://www.derma-surgery.ca/meetdr.asp), cosmetic dermatologist, to ask for some advice on rejuvenating my tired-looking skin. He recommended the Neo-strata Glycolic Acid Peel ($150) as a quick way to get the results I was looking for. “These are simple, effective treatments that improve and maintain skin texture and appearance, over decades, with extremely minimal risk,” he told me. “What I love about these is that they seem to deliver more results than I would have expected for such a simple procedure.”
Variables:
The treatment has been called the “lunch time” peel, because it only takes twenty minutes, and there’s apparently no downtime, save some minimal redness and sunburn-like peeling, and a potentially adverse reaction in people with ultra-sensitive skin. (Dr. Pollack does a spot test to make sure.) However, I was still apprehensive—remember that Sex and the City episode where Samantha gets the peel and ends up showing up at Carrie’s book launch wearing a beekeeper’s hat to hide the angry redness and horrific peeling? Remember the way the girl’s screamed in terror when she lifted her veil? I did not want that to be me. But Dr. Pollack assure me he’d be gentle, so I decided to place my trust in the professional. He’s one of the best in his field, after all. He recommended I use a night cream with glycolic acid for two weeks preceding my appointment, to prepare my skin for the treatment. It stung a little, but also started to even out my skin tone already, which was worth the minimal discomfort.
Procedure:
On the day of my appointment, Dr. Pollack evaluated the condition of my skin—he refrained from saying it looked tired and flannel-esque— and prepared my skin by cleansing it gently. Next, he applied the glycolic acid solution with a brush. There are different levels in the Neo-strata system, and Dr. Pollack used the weakest one on me, explaining that we could work up to a stronger solution in future treatments.
The solution caused my skin to tingle, and the tingling eventually increased to a slight burning sensation, but when Dr. Pollack asked me to evaluate the pain I was feeling on a scale of 1-10, I really couldn’t go any higher than a two. About twenty minutes later, just when I was beginning to think I might have to move my pain number up to a 3, and possibly beg for mercy, he removed the solution and placed cool, soothing cloths on my skin.
Analysis:
I was a little red afterwards, so Dr. Pollack applied some Dermatop solution, which calmed things down right away. Ten minutes later, I was out the door and walking down the street without feeling the need to cover myself under some sort of helmet. I looked normal. Better than normal. When I got home, my husband looked up from the newspaper and said, “Wow, your skin looks amazing.” He’s not really the type to notice the subtle nuances of a woman’s skin condition, so I took it as a huge compliment. “Patients are always receiving unsolicited compliments on their skin and love the feel and look that the peels provide,” Dr. Pollack says. And truly, my skin did look great. It was completely smooth and soft. And the next day, it was glowing, too. A tiny bit of peeling followed over the week, and I was careful, as always, to wear lots of sunscreen, but any peeling wasn’t noticeable and was easily amended with moisturizer. I felt youthful and vibrant, and it just kept getting better as the days passed.
Conclusion:
Dr. Pollack recommends a peel treatment every six weeks or so and says improvements will steadily increase over time. “There is no limit to the number of treatments that you can have,” he says. “I have women in their 20's through 70's all coming for these with no interest in stopping. Compared to a spa facial, which costs about the same, these peels deliver much, much more, including evening out the skin tone, decreasing blemishes in acne-prone skin, a smoother look and feel of skin, and the promotion of collagen formation in the skin. Also, I have seen remarkable improvement of acne scarring, but this is after 12-18 months of peels.”
I booked my next appointment, and don’t plan to look back on my days of less than perfect skin.
Data:
Toronto Cosmetic Skin Surgery Centre - 416-961-7731, http://www.derma-surgery.ca/
200 St. Clair Avenue West, Suite 218
Toronto, Ontario
Telephone: 416-961-7731
Glycolic acid peels cost $150 + GST.
Written By: Marissa Stapley Ponikowski
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Guinea Pig Experiment #27: Argan Oil Scalp and Face Treatment
Guinea Pig Experiment #22: Reiki
Guinea Pig Experiment #23: Therapeutic Waters