Many menopausal women describe a change in their skin from oily or combination skin to dry. This is because when estrogen decreases the skin produces less sebum (i.e. lipids) and has less ability to retain water. Care must therefore be adjusted accordingly.
1. Firstly, The cleaning must be done with suitable gentle products. Common alkaline soaps combined with hot water significantly dry the skin, even at young ages. So we must use cleansers that are not drying, without perfumes and agents that in other decades when we may have acne or oiliness are useful such as salicylic acid, lactic acid or fruit acids. A wrong cleanser can remove fat molecules or sebum from the skin that we need, otherwise the skin becomes drier and may show irritation and redness.
2. Secondly, has role one good moisturizer. But what does this mean? What is a good moisturizer? The outer part of the skin, the one we touch, has rows of cells closely stacked on top of each other and between them are lipids. Such, for example, are the tiles. When we touch our skin and it feels dry we are practically grabbing the edges of the keratinocytes that are about to fall off and that have peeled off, or folded because they are not held in place by the lipids – the skin barrier is not working properly. Then the skin's water content is not ideal, i.e. between 20-35%. The role of a good product in menopause is twofold:
- 1. To give enough lipids to the skin and to restore the ratio of Omega 3-6-9 fatty acids.
- a. The goal is to replace their loss and their ratio, so that the skin barrier works properly.
- 2. Moisturizers are a must also contain hygroscopic agents, i.e. substances that can hold a lot of water, such as hyaluronic acid and glycerin.
In addition, some menopausal women they complain that their skin suddenly became sensitive. In other words, things that did not bother them in the past, suddenly the skin does not tolerate them, they have the feeling that they it stings, pulls or displays redness and pimples. For example, they are bothered by woolen clothing or products that were previously tolerated without problems. This is because when we don't have estrogen we synthesize less lipids and in that the skin becomes thinner. We have a lower rate of proliferation of the outer cells (keratinocytes) but also less collagen in deeper layers of the skin. So we need gentle cleansing and the right moisturizers without fragrances or irritants.
