You wash carefully, put on plenty of moisturizer, and still it feels tight, looks flaky, and refuses to be soft. So what is the deal? Is there some hidden factor you are missing?
It is very likely that you are. Many people take their usual shower, perform their usual facial routine, use their specific products, and never consider the single, largest thing they are constantly putting on their skin.
Your water. A lot of people do not even know what type of water they have. Still others were not even aware they have a water type. However, most people do have a water type that they might want to know about. In your case of continuously dry skin, you definitely will want to find out.
There are in fact two different types of water; hard and soft. If you find that your skin continues to be dry even after all the work you put into it, the problem may lie in the fact that you have hard water and it is helping to keep your skin dry.
Water that is considered to be hard means the water contains a large amount of calcium, magnesium, and iron deposits. If you notice your shower or tub slowly but constantly building up deposits, such as rust, soap scum, and lime, you probably have hard water.
Not only will you be cleaning your tub more often and possibly dealing with clogs in your pipes, but you will also be left with skin less inclined to be soft. Hard water makes it more difficult for substances to dissolve in it efficiently, such as soap. When you lather (which you may also realize is difficult to do) and then rinse off, you may not be removing all the soap from your skin.
This is through no fault of your own, but rather the inability of your water to wash all the soap from your skin. Soap that remains on the skin aids in drying it out, leaving you with flaky, itchy skin. Remaining soap can also aid in the clogging of pores, giving you dry skin and a few extra skin irritations.
Because both hard water deposits and cleansing products are left on the skin, it can also cause your skin to become more irritated and susceptible to damage, especially when it comes to facial skin and the fragile blood vessels beneath. Hard water can even cause your skin to become thinner and aggravate skin conditions, such as rosacea.
Washing in hard water means even with good products meant to help your dry skin, you still have to fight to get your skin in the condition you want it to be. If you have well water, then you can easily obtain a water softener to help avoid hard water.
Soft water means there are fewer deposits in the water, giving your soap better lathering power and making it much easier to wash off, freeing your skin of excess soap after you towel off and giving you a better chance at softer, more moisturized skin.
However, many people get their water through public means. If you do, then if your water is not already soft, then you may have a bigger problem in trying to get soft water.
Yes, you cannot do too much to remedy the water coming out of your faucets unless you want to opt for having a major installation of a water softening unit. If you are unable to do this, you will have to learn to live with your hard water by using less soap and taking shorter showers, giving your hard water less access to your skin.
You could buy water to use for your face in order to help keep your skin from dealing with hard water, and continue using your current skin products.
Even if you are unable to do anything about hard water, at least now you can have peace of mind by knowing your water was the final puzzle piece in the dryness of your skin.
