Usually Burt’s Bees gives me all the lip hydrofication I need, you know? But for some reason this fall the bee is just not cutting it.
My lips don’t look chapped, and they look just a little dry, but last night when I took a sip of red wine they stung! And today I’m starting running again and had forgotten how hard that is on the lips - I wish to hell I’d had my little tube of lip balm in my stupid running capri pocket, because halfway through I was tempted to ask people raking leaves in their yards if they could spare some. It’s so hard not to lick them, even though I know it’s making it worse, because they’re dry and they scream “Lick me! Lick me!”
So what do you people in cold climates do? Is there some awesome product (that doesn’t make me look like a greasy-lipped monster) that you use?
I put on a thick layer of Blistex DCT at night before going to sleep, and it’s incredibly helpful. If I go two consecutive nights without it for some reason, my lips will start to peel and bleed. In drier seasons, I’ll put it on once or twice during the day; I think it makes me look like a person wearing clear lip gloss, but it’s possible that you’d refer to me as a greasy-lipped monster.
When my lips get like that, I have to bite the bullet and exfoliate, then hydrate. If you want to buy something, I suggest this lip scrub by Lush (they have a few “flavors” right now). I apply mine with my toothbrush, scrub-a-dub up and down a bit, then rinse. You could probably do the same thing at home with some sugar and some sort of oil, but it probably wont taste as nice as the Lush stuff :). Plus, the Lush stuff has all kinds of oils that actually hydrate your lips.
Anywho, after a healthy scrubbing, I use Burt’s Bees, but I’ve heard really good stuff about the Rosebud Salve. I suppose you could always go old school and just slather your lips in some Vaseline- I do that sometimes when I get a cold and am a horrible monster of chapped face-titude.
I’m a lip balm addict and I always have half a dozen options somewhere close by. The long lived favorites are Carmex and Burt’s Bees, but I’m just starting to run again and they don’t seem to stand up to the increased wind so I’ve been using Blistek Lip Medix for during my runs. It’s thicker, I can’t use it most of the time but I can stand it for the duration of the run and my lips thank me for the rest of the day. It’s mentholated so your lips tingle too!
Carmex is good and so is Herpecin L, which is my personal recommend. My pharmacist put me on to it when i developed a crack in the corner of my mouth from Vitamin C deficiency.
Yes, it’s for Herpes Simplex cold sores, but don’t let that throw you. It’s OTC, discreetly marked and it works wonders on chapped or cracked lips. Any discomfort disappears instantly and the cracked skin was gone the next morning.
Like Diosa said, you must exfoliate to get all the nasties off. Any facial scrub will do, the grainier the better. I use Neutrogena Deep Clean. Use a toothbrush on your lips (in small, gentle circles) to really up the ante. Weekly from then on just use your fingers.
Also, you gotta go with straight Vaseline. Use it overnight from a jar and use it in a tube during the day. Then when you start seeing results (in a few days), go back to using whatever you like.
Burt’s Bees or Blistex applied frequently during the day, Aquaphor before I go to bed at night. I have perennially chapped lips and dry skin and I think Eucerin products are fantastic.
Agree on the exfoliation, disagree on vaseline (or at least just vaseline). Vaseline is good for protecting your lips from the dry air, but isn’t as effective at actually putting moisture in. If I use vaseline, it’s: exfoliate, slather on jojoba oil, wait a bit, clean up any random non-lip oil areas and put vaseline on. That way the vaseline protects against dry air and jojoba oil helps to moisturize the skin itself.
Now, most of the time, your lips won’t need external hydration if you drink enough water. If you’re like me, you honestly don’t drink a lot of it (and if you have really dry skin like me, well, the problem is compounded). Drink a noticeably larger amount of water each day for a few weeks and see if it helps your lips.
With that being said, when I have dry lips that nothing else (including water) helps, I use Blistex medicated ointment. I’m usually a dirty hippie with loving the petroleum-free bunch-of-fancy-oils-blahblah lip balms, but the Blistex ointment is a friggin’ godsend.
For me, wearing long-lasting lip color all day is better than messing around with lip balms. It seals your lips once in the morning, and doesn’t come off.
