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retin-a, retinol cream
What's this lady's problem?
Just kidding. No but really though. How is it she is so youthful, healthful and beautiful at 60 after applying 28 years of Retin-a?
What is this case telling us?
(fyi, Retin-a is a topical acne med that contains retinoic acid)
I can't get rid of the thought of that pyramid that I posted in my log. What we KNOW about nutrition/health is the tiny tip of a huge pyramid, and what we don't know (and can't even imagine) is the mega base.
I suppose you can see that her hair is white at the roots, and she has a pro hair and makeup job. But her skin and lips are smooth under the makeup and her hair is thick. The whites of her eyes look clear. She doesn't look overweight or puffy. Some of those brows are penciled on.
I suppose we don't actually know if she is riddled with disease somewhere below the face.
We do know that she must have had some acne or why would she have reached for the retin-a. So to say she has a high tolerance for VA might actually be wrong.
One thought that occurs is that as a "Southern Belle" she might get vit D year round, although she does talk about the sunscreen she uses.
All I notice lately is the yellowing of most peoples skin, and her skin is quite yellow, very unhealthy looking.
Quote from Orion on January 14, 2020, 7:39 amAll I notice lately is the yellowing of most peoples skin, and her skin is quite yellow, very unhealthy looking.
Yes, I can see a browning across the upper and lower reaches of the face. (I have the exact thing going on, on my lower face)
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Retin-A and its side effects is what brought me here.
First of all, all elderly tretinoin shills online (Hot and Flashy, etc) have had injections or plastic surgery. Secondly, if they look good they would have probably looked exactly the same without tretinoin.
You should look at what skincare communities actually have to say about this drug. Even places that worship it (r/tretinoin for example) constantly have posts from people claiming that it made them sick, older looking or suddenly made them age at an accelerated rate after years of good results.
Quote from Jessica2 on December 13, 2022, 3:21 pmI believe I absorbed a lot of it through my skin and it did contribute to hair loss, especially eyebrows, which bounded back first before hair on my head did.
@anna2 Yes, look at the comments on those retin-A youtube videos, they are chock full of women saying it caused them migraines, muscle aches, dry eyes, blurry vision and hair loss. One of those YTers, I forgot her name but she is in her 60s and looks great, and has been using tretinoin for 40+ years, but she has irritable bowel syndrome horribly bad. Many accutane users go on to suffer from IBS too, so I do believe you can absorb this through creams. Most users of those creams don't know you aren't supposed to put them near your eyes (even the experts say keep it away from the eye area), so they can suffer eye damage from them as well. I never used tretinoin but I did use OTC retinol and put it right over my eyes every time. There was no warning on any box I bought about putting it on your eyes.
This is a little deep down the rabbit hole, but if you do some googling on the subject of retinoids and hollowing/rapidly wrinkling eyes (any synonymous word combinations), you will see a million posts on a million forums reporting it as a side effect - even more often than you'll hear about dry eye. Even OTC retinol does this. The aesthetic defect is similar to that from Latisse/bimatorpost, if you're familiar with it.
Since it occurs so often, what could be the reason? Generally speaking, a hollowing eye effect occurs from periorbital fat atrophy. Retinoids are anti-adipogenic, but the fact that retinoid exposure seems to burn eye fat first is curious, right?
Well, as it turns out, periorbital fat is naturally in the state of hypervitaminosis A in most humans, if you will. It's brightly orange compared to other fat compartments anywhere else, and obviously saturated with retinol when tested. Combined with thin eyelid skin, any retinol exposure anywhere on your face (doesn't even need to be close to the eyes) will cause the fat around your eyes to hit terminal retinol capacity first, which will then produce inflammation, fat atrophy, meibomian gland atrophy and God knows what else. That's why the eyes are always the first ones to be damaged by topical retinols.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11405838/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7425727/
>Retinoids that naturally accumulate in orbital adipose tissue can act on orbital fibroblasts to induce the expression of inflammation-associated genes. These data suggest a potential role for retinoids in sensitizing the orbit to inflammation.
For years before serious trouble began, my eyelids were deeply orange which made my eyes look more blue, this is consistent with vA moving there.
Also I used always the same hydrating cream (forgot the brand now, I stopped about 20 years ago) and obviously there must have been retinol in it, this was all the craze at the time (still is).
I lost my eyebrows, they are not coming back yet, just a little bit after three full years on low vA, and I feel the vA still escaping from there. Interesting to see that in Burma, girls put dots of thanaka over their eyebrows, and in must be for something else than a beautifying reason. Unfortunately I don't seem to find a photo of this, but I have observed it myself. They dip their finger in the thanaka, then make a line of dots just over the eyebrows.
Thanaka is made by crushing some murraya bark.
Maybe this is useful to pull out the vA from the eyes? Maybe Thanaka can be replaced with clay?
My eyebrows thinned out too. I am only now recovering from the the retin-A mess, and some are growing back. But they were super ratty for more than a year thus far.
Anecdotally, topical vitamin D+K cream seems to be helping a lot. Maybe it's keeping the retinoid receptors in the skin occupied.
topical vitamin D+K cream, such as?