I belong to a book club that has 16 women ranging in age from late 50’s to late 60’s. None of us has any deep wrinkles and could pass for 10-15 years younger. I just think this is the new normal for women who take care of themselves.
I’m not being contrarian but I don’t know what 50’s-60’s looks like these days. It certainly does not look like it did for my grandma or my mom were that age.
I’d like to think that I look good for my age. I take care of myself, I work on my diet and I work out. I try to dress nice but I never was the prettiest girl in the room. So how old do I look? No idea.
I met one of my mid 30’s neighbors mom recently. She looked great. I asked my neighbor how old her mom was and she’s about 5 years older than I. I think I dress pretty nice but her mom was so pretty and dressed really young. Then I found out that she goes to the plastic surgeon and has “help”. That’s great and I don’t do that. But it doesn’t help to determine how old someone is.
What I’m trying to say is that I think all of us think we look younger than we are. And that’s great. But I am what I am. A woman in her (ugh!) mid 50’s. Just trying to keep it up.
I definitely don’t think I look younger than I am…sigh. I think so much of good skin is genetics and heredity. No creams are going to make up for thin, non-elastic skin. I wish 
My regimen is a gentle wash in the shower with a basic soap product and Aveeno daily - sometimes twice daily. I don’t have ANY wrinkles - right? I mean, I don’t do I!!! Not mentally anyway.
Seriously though, I do have pretty decent skin. I don’t think of myself as having wrinkles but if I look in the mirror, yep I have some smile wrinkles around my eyes. Big deal. I’m 55. I’ve been mistaken recently by a couple people for being 10 years younger. I’ll take that! I do spend a good bit of time in the sun and yep, I love my beach time wearing a low to mid- range sunscreen. I have Mediterranean heritage so I think I’ve been blessed with some decent skin. Not perfect, but I’m not really examining it much!!
I think heredity has a lot to do with it-that and marketing convincing us that we “need” some kind of product or service. I am the oldest of 4 sisters at 56. We all recently met up in Vegas and found ourselves at a kiosk for skin care. The lady had a great wrinkle-filling cream that worked wonders on my youngest sister who’s had a rough life and health issues, and used to be a smoker. She had a regimen that worked well for the other two, one who has my dad’s pale skin that wrinkles easily and the other who lives in a very sunny climate and has some sun damage. Then she looked at me. “You’re the youngest, right? I have some moisturizer you could use, but really, keep doing whatever it is you do.”
What I do is wash my face in the shower with basic hypoallergenic soap and use a bit of face lotion-whatever was on sale. And I have no wrinkles. Neither did my mom. It’s all luck and maybe some environment thrown in. I’m also the only one of the 4 of us not dealing with long-term health issues, and I’m also the heaviest. That shut them all up.
Regarding retin A, I’ve been using it for a couple of months. But all of the sudden my eyelids have started being very puffy, and are scaly now. I did NOT put it on my eyes, but I think it must have spread to my eyelids, and it looks bad. (Others may not notice, but I do). So be careful with retin A.
I will sometimes have a facial when I am away on vacation if the hotel has a nice spa. It is very relaxing and I feel like I get a good deep cleaning. I don’t like though when they pressure you to buy expensive products. Lately I wash my face in the shower with Trader Joe’s body wash or Dove but when wash my face before going to sleep I first use Kiehl’s gentle eye make-up remover and Aveeno foaming face wash. I use moisturizer and a day wrinkle cream at the moment Neutrogena and Loreal but I have just switched to Kiehl’s face cream as well, all with SPF or sometimes Philosophy. I try to mix it up, I will use either Bare Minerals eye cream or Burt’s Bees. Sometimes I’ve used Burts Bees Radiance Night cream also and a beautiful product from Korres, Wild Rose. I also have a wonderful lip gloss from them also. For make-up I use a Nars Primer and a Clinique foundation but just bought Bare Minerals to try. Smashbox also has a great primer. I use Benefit concealer and their Freshup under eye brightener or Bare Minerals. It sounds like a lot of stuff but all light, hypoallergenic and I do look much younger than my age.
Face shape also seems to have something to do with how young you look.
I have a round face, am short, and have a younger vibe, that I finally am making peace with.
I have friends that are 10-15 yrs older than me, but I also have friends that are 10-15 yrs younger.
I fit in better with the younger friends, just because I like to be more active, although I do know people that are a bit older, who would put me to shame!
( my younger friends, go out more often than me, which means drinking alcohol invariably, which I don’t really do, so we look the same age. I also have more time to exercise, which makes you look younger. They have middle or high school age kids at home, so they even get less sleep than I do!)
I don’t want to make my skin thinner, so I won’t be using retin A, but I do use scrubs or masks or peels.
You can even make them yourself out of fruits & honey.
http://www.webmd.com/beauty/face/papaya-double-mask-treatment
Then you can marinate your dinner in it!
Retin A user here. In grad school, I was using it for acne while my roommate’s mom was using it for wrinkles. Now, I I am more like my roommate’s mom. I get it without a prescription from a Mexican pharmacy. I don’t recommend doing that unless you have experience with Retin A and know what to order. Some people are very sensitive but I am not. Also, after my last order I had someone email me wanting my credit card info again but I ignored that email and still got my tubes.
I used to think that toner was a gimmick but once I started using it I can’t believe I hadn’t used it before.
Retin A does not thin the skin.
“It thins the
dead layer (the stratum corneum) which has a tendency to thicken and become slightly irregular (something we don’t want) with age and sun damage. For this reason, you must use a sunscreen every morning if you are using a retinoid cream.
In the layers of the skin that really matter, the epidermis and dermis, it does the opposite, it slightly thickens the skin (in a good way) creating more healthy cells, reducing unhealthy ones with damaged DNA from UV, and improving the microvascular (tiny blood vessels) circulation and building collagen.
The only time you want a thicker dead layer (the stratum corneum) is when you are going to be outdoors a lot. Then that thicker outer layer does help to protect you (a little) from UV. So stop your Renova, Retin A, tretinoin, retinol, etc. about 1 week before any prolonged sun exposures like vacations, etc.
You still need that sunscreen though.”
I use a nightly moisturizing cream with retinol – which is a milder and less costly alternative to Retin A. The specific brand I am using is “Neutrogena Ageless Intensives Deep Wrinkle Moisture (Night)” - I am in my early 60’s and have been using this for about a year, and it really has made a difference. I don’t wear makeup on my face, and I just wash during the day using a moisturizing facial product - no particular favorite.
VeryHappy, after facials, I feel my moisturizer works more effectively. Even my makeup goes on more smoothly. I’m not sure I really “need” it, but its something I treat myself. My esthetician also includes a massage and I leave the spa feeling great!
I am outdoors a lot year round. Maybe what I didn’t like about retin A was that it seemed to make my skin taut
I have gotten facials ( and foot/hand massages at the same time), and they are relaxing, but she used a .Clairsonic, just like I have at home!
I look much younger than I am. People are always surprised when I tell them my age. I had to have my ears repierced recently (torn earlobe) and the plastic surgeon looked at my age on the chart and told me I looked really good for my age and that whatever I was doing, I should keep on doing it. Personally, I think I’m just lucky to have great genetics My parents both looked younger than they were, even when they were in their late 70s.
That being said, I spend way too much money on creams, facials, Trenotin, chemical peels, laser treatments,etc. I’m not really sure that they make me look younger–some of the stuff seems to pack a bigger punch than others. I think my skin looked far better after a chemical peel than it looked as a result of using various anti-aging products. I use all sorts of products and change them up a lot. Lately, I started using products (facial person recommended) from this website–Beauty Counter–but I’ve also used Orlane, and Sissley, and Clairns. You name it, I’ve probably used it at some point.
@deb922 I think you may be on to something. Perhaps we all really do look our age now. Perhaps things have changed so much, that we really can’t compare ourselves to our mothers or grandmothers. So many of us say, “we don’t look our age…we look 5-10 years younger”. Maybe we really don’t. We are just envisioning those years from when we were 20. Maybe with time and knowledge (exercise, suncreen, no smoking, diet, things that work on our face)…we really are the new 50-60. So, when we compare ourselves to each other…we all look similar. This is what this age is now.
Interesting discussion. I had heard that the amount of retinol that could be put in an over-the-counter product was really too low a concentrate to really do anything so I haven’t bothered. Seems that some are finding that’s not the case. Would be interested in hearing from others who are using non-prescription or if anyone’s tried both. How long does it take before you start to sense a difference? It’s easy to get discouraged and stop using a product when it seems like it’s not doing anything. Also, my neck is getting wrinkly…is retinol appropriate for one’s neck?
Is there an age at which you would not be addressed as “miss” any more? 60, 70?
@collage1 I tried using ROC for about a year and it didn’t do anything for me at all. But apparantely it’s worked for others. After using Retin A for 2.5 years now and seeing what it can do, I really don’t think it will do anything for the cracks on the neck…if that is what you are talking about. It’s really for wrinkles and from what I’ve read it does work on the neck for those… I’ve used on my chest and it’s improved that considerably. But it itched like the dickens for awhile, so I only use it once a week.
Just a note. Retinol and Retin A (retinoic acid) are not the same thing. Retin A is the active ingredient that does the magic of smoothing out skin. Retinol can be converted into Retin A in the body via normal biochemical pathways. Retinol is very, very unstable and decomposes rapidly upon exposure to oxygen and light, so storage of retinol-containing cremes matters.
Most important part of the facial regimen: massage. Some stuff I read suggests that any good moisturizer will do as long as you spend the time massaging your face skin with your fingertips when applying it.
I have no idea whether the retinol in the product is what is helping or not. In addition to the neutrogena product, also alternately use a moisturizer I got from the dollar store (for $1) which contains retinol - I had just picked it up for travel but I ended up liking it and the tube lasted a long time. But I do know that when I started using the neutrogena, I saw noticeable results within a few days and I with regular nightly moisturizing there have been gradual and continuous results over the course of a year. I can’t compare it to anything else because I wasn’t using anything before, and that may be a factor in why I saw good results – going from nothing to something is a different than the process of switching from product A to product B.
Here is what I will say: I don’t have a lot of money to pay for cosmetics & beauty products, and I think there is a lot of hype that goes into the marketing. The question isn’t so much whether the retinol product – or any other OTC product – will work, but rather whether you can get the same results with the $15 product as compared with the $50 product. The neutrogena product I use costs about $18, and I like it – but I don’t see $17 worth of difference between that and the dollar store product. Obviously I need a moisturizer, and I want to avoid products that contain oil. Other than that, am going to stick with an economical product.
If you aren’t sure – then I’d suggest starting with a less expensive OTC product and see how it works for you. If not, you can always move to the prescription product. But of course, the prescription product can be costly not only because of the cost of the medicine, but generally you need to pay for doctor visits in order to get the prescription. I’ve got a high deductible health insurance plan, so that’s just one more reason form me to avoid doctor visits unless clearly necessary.
Also there is an obvious difference between needing a product to deal with a skin issue such as acne – and the simple changes that come with aging. I don’t expect a product that will make me look like I am 30. I get it. I’m old. I just want something that makes me look a little less old.