How much is too little?

One of our good friends came over to stay for a week recently. She has stayed with us before but I never really paid that much attention to how long she took to get ready each day. By ‘get ready’ I mean from the moment she walks into the bathroom in the morning until she comes out of her room ready for the day. This time I did notice though and it became a running joke that she would need at least 3 hours notice before she had to go anywhere. Then one of the mornings I actually asked her to break it down step by step and let me know what she does that could possible take her that long (1-2 hours) to get ready because I could not for the life of me work it out BUT that’s also because I have become a master of the ‘mum shower’ so it literally takes me 15 minutes from getting into the shower to getting out of the house. I initially thought that I had the better setup but I’ve been thinking about it and now I’m not so sure.

This will be easier if I break down both our routines for a day/night out.

Mine:

1. Shower (5-10 min)
2. Change
3. Moisturise face and visible skin
4. Apply roll on
5. Apply make up
6. Grab my bag, phone, keys and go

Hers:

1. Shower (20-25 min)
2. Serum over entire face and neck
3. Eye cream around eyes and mouth (wait for it to dry)
4. Moisturise whole face and neck. Sometimes applied twice if her skin is dry/has that stretchy feeling
5. Sunblock, face and neck (day)/ tissue oil (night)
6. Reapply sunblock, moisturiser as needed throughout the day/night
7. Applies make up
8. Apply aloe vera gel for the dark patches/abrasions on her legs (active poodle, gardening, etc.) (day)/ tissue oil or cocoa butter on patches/abrasions (night)
9. Lotion (summer)/body cream (winter/travelling)
10. Cocoa butter or tissue oil (night)
11. Reapply on areas that need it (eg, lower back, tummy as they tend to feel extra dry) as needed
12. Petroleum jelly for the heels and elbows, applied heavier at night
13. Followed by sunblock (day)
14. Change
15. Deodorant and perfume
16. Grabs her bag, phone, keys and go

This blew me away! My emotions ran from shocked to horrified to curious to contemplative. Initially I thought she was crazy to spend that much time getting ready. How much of moisturiser does one person need?? Then I attributed her self care routine to her not having any kids and hence having the time to do all this. Yet, MY routine has pretty much always been the same with or without kids so that can’t be it. After some thinking (for some reason this became quite a point for me to ponder) I realised that it is because she places a much higher value on personal care than I do. I am almost certain that she would find a way to fit in her skin care routine even if she had three kids and its because she really cares about her physical self. Which in turn made me think, does this mean that I DON’T care enough about my physical self? Unsurprisingly, the answer is Yes.

I am 34 years old and I only recently (last month) started using eye cream daily. I’m about ten years behind apparently and according to my sister you can’t use extra cream to make up for lost time. Phooey. My skin is incredibly dry and I suffer with eczema yet I still only moisturise the skin that can be seen (I know mum, you’ve been telling me to moisturise for years. I’m a slow learner 😉). Remember the Dawn advert from back in the day where the lady wrote DRY on her skin? That’s ME! My problem is not a lack of time, it’s that I am just too damn lazy and my skin is already paying the price.

I probably wouldn’t have given this topic much thought had my friend not visited and while I won’t be adopting her amazingly moisturising routine, I am making more of an effort to be consistent with my skin care. I use an Oil of Olay serum, Oh So Heavenly eye cream, Eucerin day cream and night cream daily and a Himalaya face mask once a week. For my body I use Epimax but will probably switch over to Palmers soon with winter coming along.

I will never be the girl that needs hours to get ready but I hope that I will be the woman who has great skin at 50…if it’s not too late.

This post has been published with the permission of my friend Natasha, mentioned above, even though she had no clue what I was going to write when I asked her to email me her skin care routine. That is true friendship trust right there! I should also mention that she goes out of her way to source products that are cruelty free and not tested on animals.