For many, cleansing wipes are a bathroom essential: they are convenient, cheap and most importantly quick, but are the making your acne worse? Let’s face it, we all dread that time of the evening when we have to take off the day’s make-up and grime in preparation for our much needed beauty sleep so anything that makes this chore easier is a blessing, right?

Are cleansing wipes making your acne worse?

Cleansing wipes contain huge amounts of chemical components to keep them moist, effective and preserved.  Surfactants and emulsifiers are some of the nasties which you’ll find in your cleansing wipes. These all help with dissolving and lifting makeup, oil and dead skin but without rinsing those ingredients off, you run the risk of leaving a grimy residue and subjecting your poor skin to an array of irritating chemicals that will sit on the skin’s surface potentially causing your already sensitive skin to breakout.

Eye Care

When using a cleansing wipe it’s easy to get into the habit of rubbing the wipe vigorously to remove a bit of stubborn eye make-up.  The skin around your eyes is extremely delicate, the rubbing motion alone will drag the skin and could cause premature ageing, let alone what potential damage the ingredients could cause.  As well as irritation, high levels of alcohol can also cause extreme dryness and premature ageing.  Always be extra careful around the eye area and when applying creams: tap, don’t rub!  This will stimulate circulation and reduce dark circles and puffy eyes!

Acne/Blemish Prone Skin

If you’re prone to spots or acne, a good daily beauty regime is extra important!  You may think you like that dry-skin feeling you get after using a cleansing wipe – especially if you’ve got oily skin.  But drying out your skin won’t improve acne – it can actually make it worse as your skin will produce more sebum to compensate!

Sensitive Skin

Those with dry or sensitive skin need to be extra vigilant with their skincare routine and avoid cleansing wipes at all costs!  While they are convenient for our busy lives, cleansing wipes are full of nasties that can irritate your skin.  Moist environments are the perfect breeding conditions for bacteria, so cleansing wipes need a high amount of preservatives to keep them free of nasty bugs.  These preservatives can be extremely irritating to even the toughest of skin so if you suffer from any sort of skin condition it’s best to stay well clear.  Worryingly, the preservative methylisothiazolinone, or MI, which can cause swelling, rashes and blistering, is often found in cleansing wipes – shockingly it’s even found in baby wipes!

Those horrible ingredients you need to watch out for:

• Methylisothiazolinone
• Parabens
• Alcohol denat (Ethanol or Ethyl alcohol)
• TriclosaN

Opt for the natural approach

Oils. I used to be afraid of them, convinced that any type of oil was going to cause a horrific acne outbreak. But then, after years of drying my skin out with harsh, chemical laden products, I learned that some oils won’t clog your pores they can even make your skin clearer! Organic, cold-pressed oils have been my skins best friend ever since!

In particular, I’m a huge fan of organic, cold pressed hemp oil for removing make up and cleansing my skin. It has a comedogenic rating of 0 which means it is non pore clogging and is safe to use on acne prone skin. It smells a little earthy and some may be put off by this but the texture of the oil on your face feels so amazing and nourishing – it’s definitely work trying, especially as a bottle of this stuff costs less that £5!

To use hemp oil as a make up remover and cleanser, simply splash you face with warm water to soften the skin and open up your pores. Then pore some hemp oil into the palm of your hand and slowly massage into your skin. Soak a cloth in warm water and press it against your face until it cools. Gently wipe your face and rinse the cloth in warm water and repeat the hot cloth step – don’t be tempted to scrub hard. Your skin is very delicate so let the oil do all the hard work,  scrubbing is completely unnecessary and you will find your skin will be soft, smooth, and free of flakes without the additional manual exfoliation and irritation that will occur from scrubbing. Impurities, dead skin cells, and bacteria will be gently swept away when you wipe your face with the hot cloth. I then use a cotton pad to remove any excess make up around the eye area. If you wish to exfoliate, now is the time to do that. I prefer to use as little ingredients on my face a possible so I opt to gently exfoliate my skin twice a week with a clean organic muslin cloth. My favourite cloths are the ones from Greenfibres – I recommend buying a load of them so you’ve always got a clean one to hand. Finish the cleansing process by gently patting your face and neck dry with a towel.

Make the switch today!

If you are guilty of using cleansing wipes or baby wipes to remove your make-up, I really recommend making the switch to something more natural. Try Micellar Water, the oil cleansing method or honey cleansing method and discover the best cleansing routine of your life!

Have you seen any improvements in your skin since giving up the beauty wipes?

Peace, Love & Clear Skin