With my clients, I always suggest natural ways to assist their beauty regime at home. Here is one you want to remember…Vitamin C DAILY!
But it can not be just ANY Vitamin C.
L-Ascorbic Acid is the only form of Vitamin C that can be utilized directly by the skin. It is highly absorbable when applied topically and can offer concentrations of 200 times or more within skin tissues than Vitamin C that is taken internally. L-Ascorbic Acid is one of the few compounds that have shown to be of both short and long-term benefits to the skin in more than one thousand clinical studies.
KEY BENEFITS
- Fights free radicals
- Stimulates collagen production
- Increases skin repair rate
- Fights hyperpigmentation
- Supports sun damage repair
- Improves circulation
Perhaps the most significant cause of aging is the presence of free radicals within all tissues, including the skin. Free radicals cause significant damage to every cell, leading to the development of lines, wrinkles, pigmentation problems, loss of firmness and textural damage.
Many factors lead to the presence of free radicals within the skin: general body metabolism, UV radiation, stress, pollution and the environment. A free radical is any atom or molecule that has a single unpaired electron in an outer shell. While few free radicals such as melanin are not chemically reactive – Vitamin C is a potent antioxidant; it binds to free radicals so that they are unable to damage skin cells. This is why we should all be eating a diet rich in foods with anti-oxidants.
Vitamin C helps improve the skin’s repair rate from physical damage, which includes visible and invisible damage caused by the environment, aggressive scrubbing, harsh chemicals, physical trauma, laser treatments, injection treatments and surgery. Topical Vitamin C in high concentrations offers superb adjunct therapy potential for many procedures.
Vitamin C is a potent corrector of hyper-pigmentation, as it interferes with overproduction of melanin (skin pigment) brought on by inflammation in the skin. The inflammation can come from acne, sun, hormones, medicine and burns. Ascorbic acid significantly inhibits tyrosine (the amino acid released that activates the melanocyte cells) activity. Melanocytes are cells programmed to produce melanin that are deposited over the damaged area for protection. This is our bodies’ own defense mechanism at work. Through this interaction, not only does Vitamin C reduce the appearance of pigmentation disorders, but it also decreases inflammation leading to overall skin radiance and brightness.
Vitamin C increases the skin’s ability to fight UV-induced damage through multiple mechanisms, the leading of which is the high antioxidant potential of L-Ascorbic Acid. Oxidative stress is increased significantly through UV radiation. Unlike sunscreens, this approach is one of supporting the skin’s own ability to repair sun damage, rather than one of preventing sun damage.
Animals maintain complex systems utilizing multiple types of antioxidants, such as Glutathione, Vitamin E, Vitamin C, as well as enzymes such as Catalase, Superoxide Dismutase and various Peroxidases. I hope that these past two articles have helped you understand the importance of Vitamin C in your Anti-Aging Skin Care Protocol. We cannot ignore the importance of antioxidants in our diet and as a part of our skin care.