Beauty maintenance tips for 40-somethings

I like to emphasize with my patients that, “It’s not the years, it’s the miles.” This starts to be particularly true for patients in their forties. 40-somethings who have taken care of themselves, stay away from smoking and the sun, and maintain their faces like I discussed in this post about beauty maintenance in your thirties should still be in pretty good shape! However, if you smoke or neglected the sunscreen as you worshipped the sun in your twenties, you may have some more intensive work to do. Genetics also play a role: people with thicker skin will age differently than those of us with thinner tissues.

A pair of pre-child 30-somethings escaping the winter in Curacao. Note the hat and sunscreen!

Whether you’re choosing to keep up your appearance to gain an edge in the professional world or just to feel like you are putting your best self forward, beauty maintenance is important. Here are my beauty maintenance tips for 40-somethings.

1) It’s time to consider Botox®.

In your thirties, Botox® is largely a preventative measure. By decreasing repetitive creasing of the skin, you can prevent wrinkles from ever happening! Otherwise, you will likely begin seeing them by your late thirties to early forties. Don’t despair though! Botox® will still help soften your wrinkles and prevent them from worsening, even if it won’t make them totally go away. For my personal Botox® story, check out this post from the archives. If you have deeper lines and wrinkles around your mouth and jawline, we can treat those with different kinds of fillers. Click here to learn more about Botox®.

2) Lasers!

In the post for 30-somethings, I talked about photofacials using IPL (intense pulsed light). IPL is an effective way to remove sun damage and can be beneficial for people of any age. However, if you’re starting to get fine wrinkles in addition to your sun damage, you should consider laser resurfacing.

Laser resurfacing with the ResurFX attachment

Modern resurfacing lasers punch thousands of tiny holes in the top layers of your skin which stimulates the growth of new collagen. Depending on the power of the laser, you may have some surface redness for a couple of hours to a week or more. Chemical peels can achieve a similar effect but you can expect a little more down time to achieve a similar effect.

3) Don’t forget maintenance!

Everything I talked about for thirty-somethings still applies. We can use all kinds of treatments and injectables, but if you don’t maintain your skin with sunscreen, retinol, etc, you won’t get the lasting benefit of these procedures.

4) You may need to consider an eyelid lift.

You know how I said, “It’s not the years, it’s the miles?” Well, your eyelids will betray your mileage faster than any other place on your face. The skin is thinnest in this region, so it’s the most susceptible to bulging and wrinkling. Genetics really play a strong role here, too. Age-related changes of your eyelid skin can make you look tired. While you may BE tired, you don’t have to look like it. In my opinion, the best work is subtle enough that no one will ever know (unless you decide to tell).

Regardless of your age, maintenance is key to helping you look and feel your best. Everyone ages at a different rate and these differences really become apparent during our forties. Come on in and sit down with me sometime to get a personalized beauty maintenance plan. I’d love to see you.