Exfoliating Sun-Damaged Skin

One of the primary manifestations of sun-damaged skin is that the outer layer of skin becomes thickened, similar to a callous. This thickened layer is your skin’s response to the damage caused by unprotected exposure to ultraviolet radiation from the sun. While this thickened layer provides a minimal amount of sun protection (it is thought to protect with the equivalent of an SPF of 2), it ends up creating far more problems than advantages. As you have read in Chapter Seven on sun protection, an SPF of 2 is truly meaningless and useless for skin. This thickened outer layer of the skin produced by sun damage causes skin to look dull and more wrinkled than it really is; it also adds a yellowish or gray tint to skin and reduces the ability of good skin-care ingredients to penetrate. Using effective topical exfoliants to remove this thickened, unattractive outer layer of skin can help skin feel smoother, look less wrinkled, have a healthier, more normal skin color, and reduce the chance of clogged pores. (Removing this layer of unhealthy skin does make the skin more sun sensitive, the way it was before it became sun damaged. Though it is always imperative to use a sunscreen, it is even more so if you are regularly using an exfoliant of any kind.)