Listen homie, we know you don’t know a lot about skincare, and that’s okay. It’s why we’re here. Most of us don’t think twice about our skin until we’re well into our twenties or thirties. Then we begin to notice changes in our skin.
Fine lines, wrinkles, acne, changes in texture; are all skin conditions that a good skin-care routine can help eliminate. Before you run to the store and grab whatever you find on the shelf, browse the Disco Journal and learn about the products you need, the ingredients that make them good, and how to build a skincare routine that works for you.
One of our favorite ingredients here at Disco is vitamin E. It’s natural, provides skin hydration and protection, and is effective for all skin types. Here’s why you should use it.
What Is Vitamin E?
Vitamin E is a group of fat soluble vitamins (vitamins that can dissolve in fats and oils) that your body needs but can’t make on its own. That makes it an essential vitamin. The vitamin E your body gets has to come from your diet or vitamin e supplements.
You can find vitamin E in foods like green vegetables, sunflower seeds, hazelnuts, broccoli, spinach, almonds, abalone, salmon, vegetable oil, whole grains, and wheat germ oil.
When you’re shopping for vitamin E products, you might not see “vitamin E” on the label. Vitamin E in its natural form is usually labeled d-alpha-tocopherol or simply “tocopherol.” You might also see “tocopheryl acetate” when vitamin E is added to skincare products. Vitamin E that has been synthetically produced is called dl-alpha-tocopherol.
Now that you know the basics let’s look at what vitamin E does for your skin.
Potential Side Effects
If the appropriate amount of vitamin E is used, side effects should be the least of your worries.
Some symptoms to look out for include nausea, fatigue, headache, and other allergic reactions in serious cases. Before fully using a product, try doing a patch test by using a small amount to see if your skin reacts.
Skin Benefits of Vitamin E
One walk down the skincare aisle, and it’s clear: vitamin E is a star ingredient. Here are some reasons why it’s worth the hype.
1. It’s Absorbent
Vitamin E absorbs easily into your skin, which makes it an ideal ingredient for including in moisturizers. Many ingredients can moisturize your skin, but whether or not your skin absorbs those ingredients can be questionable. Ever try to smear olive oil on your face? It’ll absorb...eventually.
2. Protects Against Sun Exposure
Vitamin E has powerful properties that help protect you from sun damage. No, that doesn’t mean you don’t still need to wear sunblock when you’re outside.
Vitamin E is an antioxidant, which helps protect against the damaging free radicals produced by the sun. When combined with vitamin C, the two vitamins work together to protect and repair. UV damage can make your skin look and feel different. Vitamins E and C work together to help your skin cells repair.
3. Skin Conditioner and Hydrator
Your skin needs two types of ingredients for proper hydration; emollients and humectants. Emollients work by smoothing and conditioning the surface of your skin, filling in cracks, and smoothing over rough patches.
Humectants work by pulling moisture to the top layer of your skin and holding it in, so skin stays hydrated and fully moisturized. Humectants help you avoid dry skin and flakiness.
Vitamin E is a powerful ingredient that has both emollient and humectant qualities, making it the perfect candidate for virtually all moisturizing creams and lotions.
4. Antioxidant Protection
We already said that vitamin E offers antioxidant protection against free radical damage from the sun, but free radicals are everywhere.
Free radicals are unbalanced molecules on a mission to become balanced. They’ll rob electrons from healthy molecules to balance themselves, leaving that molecule (and the cell where it lives) damaged.
Even though cells can repair themselves, free radical damage is cumulative. Over time, cells lose their ability to function and repair themselves. What does this mean for your skin cells? It means they’ll lose their ability to produce collagen and elastin as they should, which means your skin will wrinkle faster, lose its elasticity (read: sag) and look older than it actually is.
Free radicals come from sources like the sun, pollution, cigarette smoking, and drinking. Antioxidants work to protect your skin from free radicals by offering up one of their electrons, keeping your skin cells from becoming free radical fodder.
5. Helps With Dark Spots and Scars
Whether you picked at a blemish or developed a few sunspots, you just want them gone. Vitamin E can help fade the appearance of dark spots, helping your skin look more even-toned. If you have scars, vitamin E may help diminish the severity of the scar over time.
If you’ve gained and lost weight rapidly, your dermatologist may even prescribe you one of the forms of vitamin E that you can use in a droplet form. Applying a few drops of vitamin E oil can help reduce the appearance of stretch marks.
What Products Contain Vitamin E
Vitamin E is crazy popular in skincare products, but you should know most of the products you find on store shelves have been formulated for women’s skin, not men’s. Even if a serum or pure vitamin e oil doesn’t specify, the iu content is probably formulated for women, not men.
Disco is the skincare brand created by a dude for dudes. It’s made to work perfectly with the pH balance of your skin, which is thicker and tougher than women’s skin.
- Disco’s Hydrating Face Moisturizer contains vitamins E and C and macadamia nut oil, which helps fight the appearance of lines and wrinkles and soothes skin irritation (we’re looking at you, razor burn).
- Disco’s Mineral Sun Block contains vitamin E and protects skin with zinc oxide, a safer, more effective sunscreen than the chemicals often used in other types of sunscreens.
You’ll find quality, vegan ingredients in every product that Disco offers and nothing that will irritate your skin or cause a breakout.
Let’s Disco
The topical application of vitamin E is excellent for the skin. Vitamin E is a natural ingredient that works to keep skin hydrated, smooth, and protected. You can grab your daily dose of this skin-beneficial ingredient in Disco’s moisturizer and our sunblock.
You’ve got great skin; you just need the right products to keep it looking and feeling healthy. Disco’s got you covered with natural skincare that works.
Sources:
alpha-Tocopherol acetate | C31H52O3 | PubChem.NCBI
