What does textured skin mean
Skin texture is the look and feel of your skin’s surface. A healthy skin texture is smooth, soft, hydrated with firm collagen (no pores) and has good skin elasticity. An uneven Skin Texture, on the other hand, will feel rough, dry and dull. The main reason for a textured skin is improper care of the skin.
While a glow is more of an aesthetic feature which is something nice to look at, a textured skin tells more about the actual health of your skin. Smooth skin is a sign of healthy skin. Textured skin is a sign that your skin is struggling a little bit - probably due to dehydration or sun damage
What causes textured skin
- Dead skin cells buildup
- Dead skin cells + Excess sebum clogging pores = blackheads/whiteheads
- No exfoliation
- Rosacea or Keratosis Pilaris (dry skin condition)
- Acne
- Sun damage
- Aging
- Using bad skin care products
Our skin sheds dead skin and creates new skin cells daily. Uneven Skin texture is the result of excess dead skin cells that build up on the epidermis (top layer of the skin). It is usually caused by lack of cleansing and exfoliation of the skin. Textured skin is also common in dry skin type and needs more care than normal skin to avoid textured dull skin.
Uneven Skin texture makes the skin look dull as it does not reflect the light.
How to fix textured skin
Wondering if you can get back that smooth skin and get rid of uneven bumps and coarse textured skin? The solution is to have a daily morning and evening routine that involves cleansing to clean the dirt and dead cells on the top layer of the skin, exfoliating to clean deeper into the pores, moisturizing to keep the skin hydrated (you may need to moisturize several times in the day if you have dry skin) and Sunscreen (only in the morning routine). Daily cleansing, weekly exfoliating, daily moisturizing and sunscreen is going to help improve your uneven skin texture.
Apart from the daily AM PM skin care routine, you may also opt to get a chemical peel from a dermatologist or use a chemical exfoliant with AHAs/ BHAs.
Recommended Product for Exfoliation: Use The Ordinary AHA 10% BHA 2% Peeling Solution ($9 | 30ml) once a week and make your textured skin go away.
Another ingredient to add to your skincare routine to get rid of textured skin is to use a Vitamin A derivative i.e. Retinoid or a cosmeceutical Retinaldehyde product or a cosmeceutical Retinol product. Retinol helps in exfoliating the skin, helps control oiliness, acne breakouts and over time use helps in boosting the collagen production in the deeper layers of the skin that leads to improving your skin firmness and smooth out the skin.
The last emphasis you need to make is having a good 8 hour sleep for proper recovery of skin barrier function.
What to do if you still have textured skin
Your cleanser might be the culprit? One of the biggest culprits of textured skin is dry & dehydrated skin. And your skin might be getting over dry because of your cleanser. A lot of cleansers are very harsh - specially foaming cleansers that are made for oily skin. They tend to get rid of everything that your skin actually needs. So they not only get rid of your surface oils but your deeper natural ones as well. An easy way to fix this is to get yourself a gel cleanser.
Gel cleansers give a good cleanse. They remove excess sebum that you don’t need, and they tend to keep what you do need.
Resurfacing Your Skin
Apart from following a daily skin routine from now on, you may also wish to consider micro-needling or derma-rolling. It is basically a procedure where you poke tiny microscopic holes into your skin creating a micro-injury. This promotes the skin to stimulate collagen production, which will re-plump your skin and improve the texture of your skin. It is also recommended to follow up with a serum as well to maximize the absorption of the serum.
Summary
Textured skin can become uneven or very textured due to many reasons: mainly lack of exfoliation and cleansing of dead skin cells build up on the skin, acne, sun damage or skin conditions like Rosacea and Keratosis Pilaris. The texture can be improved overtime by following a daily skin care routine that involves cleansing, weekly exfoliation using AHA/BHA and moisturizing and always using sunscreen during the day. Apart from this, the use of topical Vitamin A derivative (Retinol) is extremely effective to improve the skin texture over time. The last emphasis you need to make is having a good 8 hour sleep for proper recovery of skin barrier function.
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