Is Pressing Pause on the Ageing Process Possible?
In The Winter’s Tale, one of Shakespeare’s last plays, Queen Hermione transforms herself into a statue for sixteen years — after her jealous, possessive husband becomes convinced she has been unfaithful. At the end of the play, the penitent King Leontes comes to see the statue of his queen, which reanimates, becoming the living Hermione. Leontes is overjoyed, and they embrace — but not before the King has remarked that the Hermione he remembered, from sixteen years before, was ‘not so much wrinkled, nothing/ So aged as this seems’.
If even magical statues in a Shakespearean play cannot press pause on the ageing process, we might wonder what hope there is for the rest of us — but then, Elizabethan ladies relied on lead paint and vinegar to hide their wrinkles, while we have all the technology of modern aesthetic procedures. So is ageing inevitable, or is there something we can do about it?
Changing Your Skin Through Your Lifestyle Choices
The skin is commonly considered to be the clearest indicator of a person’s health, and for good reason — it’s our most visible organ. If you live a healthy lifestyle, it will be reflected in your skin, and quitting smoking, reducing or eliminating alcohol intake, drinking plenty of water and getting enough exercise are commonly prescribed methods of improving your skin.
Research is also being conducted into how nutrient-rich diets can affect ageing, with a proper diet shown to be necessary for strengthening and protecting the skin — antioxidants, nutrients and enzymes such as Coenzyme Q10 all help to keep your skin strong and young. However, if you truly wish to delay time’s onward march (and the pesky footprints it leaves all over your skin), you may need to be even more proactive with your skincare.
Pressing Pause Through Skincare Procedures
Having an appropriate skincare regime for your age is extremely important for preventing premature ageing. Sun damage is believed to cause up to 80% of preventable damage to the skin, and its effects are cumulative, so using a strong SPF and reapplying it frequently is of fundamental importance — but if your skin already shows signs of sun damage, there are options for you to choose from.
Lasers, such as the VBeam, can be used to combat signs of sun damage, redness, age spots and pigmentation, by delivering a targeted burst of light into the affected area, which is safely absorbed into the skin. Dermarolling (also known as ‘microneedling’) can also help to correct fine lines and signs of sun damage, by stimulating the skin’s amazing ability to repair and regenerate itself.
Once you’ve repaired some of the underlying damage caused by your lifestyle choices, Botox can be used to smooth out the lines you have, and help to prevent new lines from forming. We’ve all seen the smooth, flawless appearance of Botox treated skin (few celebrities’ faces are free of Botox), but not everyone realises that Botox has a preventative effect, as well as a curative one.
Botox works by blocking signals from your nerves to the facial muscles under the skin, so they don’t contract and cause lines — and when Botox is active in your face, it also prevents new wrinkles from being created. In this way, it can help to press ‘pause’ on the ageing process while it is present in your skin. When administered by a skilled aesthetic professional, Botoxed skin looks naturally smooth and blemish-free, without movement being restricted — so make sure you check out the credentials of your Botox practitioner, to ensure optimal results.
So, while a proactive approach is necessary to prevent ageing from taking its toll on our skin, its process can be halted, and even reversed. You don’t need to resort to invasive procedures to have celebrity-smooth skin — you simply need to live well, take care of yourself, and pay attention to your skin and its requirements.
