If you’ve got dry skin around the eyes or dry facial skin in other areas, you may be wondering how to best treat your dry skin and relieve itching and discomfort. We’ll tell you the best way to treat dry skin and let you know what skincare products are most effective. First, though, let’s look at what causes dry skin.
What Causes Dry Skin Around Eyes?
Dry skin around the eyes and elsewhere on the face can be caused by a number of things, including:
- Age (the older you get, the drier your skin is likely to become, although women sometimes find their skin gets oily during menopause)
- Hormonal changes
- Dry air (especially common in winter)
- Use of harsh soaps, cleansers, or other skincare products that remove too much of the skin’s natural oil
- Not drinking enough water
- Poor diet (lacking in healthful fats and certain vitamins)
- Excessive exposure to the sun (especially without the use of sunscreen)
- Dermatological disorders, such as eczema or psoriasis
In most cases, dry skin – especially severe dry skin – results from a combination of factors rather than a single cause. As you can see from the list above, some of these potential causes of dry skin are things you can do something about, while others are outside of your control.
How Do You Relieve Dry Skin?
Dry skin can be very uncomfortable. It can itch or even feel sore. Dry skin on the face can be particularly bothersome. If you scratch – and it can be hard to resist scratching sometimes – you can break the skin, resulting in scabbing and possibly infection. Of course, red, swollen, flaky-looking, scabby, or even infected skin isn’t particularly attractive, either, especially on the face.
So what can you do to relieve dryness and make your skin look and feel better? There are numerous products available to relieve dry skin, although some work much better than others, of course. We’ll tell you about our favorite products, but first, let’s look at some of the other things you can do to relieve dryness and discomfort.
- Add moisture to the air by using a humidifier. Just be sure to clean it regularly so you don’t end up dispersing mold or bacteria into the air – you don’t want to trade dry skin for a respiratory illness!
- Avoid long baths or showers and bathe in warm, not hot, water. Experts advise limiting bath time to no more than 10 minutes in order to prevent or relieve dry skin.
- Pat your skin dry with a towel after bathing. Don’t rub your skin dry. Allow some moisture to remain on the skin.
- Apply a good moisturizer after washing your face and after bathing. Our favorite brand is Eucerin and we’ll tell you more about that in a moment. If you have dry skin around the eyes, use care when applying moisturizer to that area because most are not meant to get into your eyes and may cause a stinging or burning sensation. If you do get moisturizer or other skincare products in your eyes, flush your eyes thoroughly with cool water. Contact your doctor right away if you are concerned that a skincare product has damaged your eyes.
- Make sure you drink plenty of water. The Mayo Clinic says the amount needed varies from individual to individual but most women need at least nine glasses a day, while most men need at least 13 glasses a day.
- Avoid scratching dry skin if you can, because scratching can lead to scabbing and infection, which just makes skin look and feel worse.
- Follow this link for more information on the care for dry skin.
- If self-help techniques don’t do the trick and your dry skin persists or you think you may have developed an infection from scratching, see your doctor discuss other treatment options.
Our Preferred Treatment for Dry Skin Around Eyes
Our preferred treatment for dry facial skin is offered by Eucerin. Eucerin offers a number of products specially designed for dry skin, including dry skin on the face and around the eyes. Their anti-wrinkle cream would be suitable for use around the eyes (although you don’t want to get it in your eyes) but they also offer moisturizer and face creams. Their highly-rated products are even suggested by the Mayo Clinic as being an effective home remedy for dry skin! Just follow this link to learn more about Eucerin Dry Skin Products.