Caring For Your Skin During Menopause

As your journey into peri-menopause and menopause begins, you will notice many changes throughout your body, the most prominent being the changes in your overall skin health. As estrogen levels decrease, your skin becomes gradually thinner and noticeably duller. Menopause causes a significant difference in your body’s hormone levels, specifically a decline in estrogen. The changes in progesterone and estrogen causes various symptoms associated with menopause that you will experience.

For some, this change creeps up on us slowly; for others, it happens so quickly that it knocks us off our feet. Aside from thinning of your skin, other common symptom of menopause includes vaginal dryness, disruptive night sweats and hot flashes, mood swings and forgetfulness. We may experience heart palpitations, joint and muscle stiffness, headaches and weight gain. Our overall sense of well-being is off balance, and we can feel confused, frustrated, angry and depressed. For some, the changes in their skin health can be alarming, from vaginal skin dryness to a lack of lustre on our faces to the appearance of crepey sink on our arms and legs. How can this happen overnight, and what is causing these concerning (or alarming for some) changes to occur? Studies show that women’s skin loses about 30% of its collagen during the first five years of menopause and about 2% every year after that for the next 20 years. During menopause, our skin also loses its ability to retain water, leaving it dry, dull and not as vibrant as it once appeared.

As our collagen decreases, our skin loses its firmness and begins to sag, jowls appear, and permanent lines run from the nose to the corners of the mouth. Wrinkles, when we smile or frown, have become more and more visible all the time. Half of this is due to skin firmness and hydration and can be cared for with good skincare products, but we also need to be realistic in that some of this cannot be repaired through products alone as the problem runs much deeper. Knowing that our facial muscles may be affected by laxity, we need to be realistic in treating our skin and manage what can be managed.

It’s never too late to begin a good skin care regimen, and knowing the unique needs of your menopausal skin is very important along with which ingredients are best for your aging skin. What worked for you in your 20s and 30s will not in your 40s and 50s.

Treating your skin with love and TLC and embracing the changes you are going through is essential. Love this new stage in your life and give your body and skin the gentle attention it deserves.