Clean, Unclog and Minimize Large Pores

No matter if you have dry skin, if you have oily skin, if you combo skin, or if you have all of the above. Today we're gonna be talking about the important role pores actually play on our skin, also debunking myths and misunderstandings about pores, and how sugar and hormones can actually make your pores look so much bigger. Because pores are mostly due to genetics and hormones, there are still things that we can do to help them look as teeny tiny and invisible to the eye as possible. 

Pores are the little openings on our face that we like to complain about. They are very important for the healthy functioning of our skin because they produce sebum to protect your skin from dirt and bacteria in the environment. There are actually teeny hair follicles with baby hair inside the pore which you can't really see for the most part. Sebum is released to the surface of the skin through the pore. Pores are different from sweat pores, which only produce sweat from the glands. And only when the pore is trapped by dead skin, will comedones like whiteheads, blackheads or breakouts form inside the pore. (Feel like a volcano, erupting to the surface.) So a lot of you are probably wondering: why are my pores so big, and why are other people's smaller? So, generally speaking, it comes down to skin types, because people with more oily skin, will generate more sebum in the pore. So when the pore is filled with sebum, it will look larger. 

Whereas people with dry skin, they already don't produce as much sebum to begin with; which is why that hair follicle or that pore size is already smaller. But then the other end of that just means that they have to work harder in restoring all the oil to their face. Otherwise, dry as a desert. That's the general explanation as to why some are bigger and some appear smaller. Basically a lot of ingredients you find that are, like, very big marketing words on your skincare products because these are ingredients that are good for your skin, and are already produced by your skin. Yeah, naturally; like vitamin E oozes out of our sebum. And another thing is the thinner your skin is, the more apparent your pores can be, because it's kind of like that sagging effect. Right? If it's thin it just sags a little, which is why sometimes with age or aging skin it can look bigger than normal. Whereas if you have very thick plump skin, you can just imagine like everything is kind of condensed and like dense. So then your pores won't look as big, which is why things like retinols also help with pore size because it helps to like boost the thickness of skin. 

Skin Care Tips

While our pores can't actually be shrunken or enlarged, their appearance can definitely be minimized with various tips and tricks, and good skin care habits. And this takes us into some pre skin care steps for taking good care of our pores. And the first one is, face steaming at home. You can't actually open or close a pore, because in order to do that you need a muscle, and there is no muscle surrounding your teeny tiny little pore. So what they mean is, it's basically got to do with temperature. When it's hot, your skin as an organ expands, and it will like magnify that hole which is the pore. And then when it's cold it will contract. And so what face steaming does is it's basically using hot steam, and opening your pore so that it will loosen the debris that's actually filling the pore inside, which is like dirt, oil, whiteheads, blackheads and (that makes) it easier to do things like extraction. And it helps the products that we apply after to absorb a lot better, and a lot more effectively when our pore is nice and clean. So here's how you want to do face steaming at home. Fill your sink with hot water. You can boil some, but hot water from the tap works perfectly fine as well. Then you want to cover your head with a towel for 3 to 5 minutes. However long is comfortable for you. And if you find that it's a little too hard to breathe, just like open the towel up a little and let that air through. You can take breaks too, if you want. This is a treating yourself thing. And you'll find that very quickly your face will feel hot, you'll start sweating, and this is actually really great because sweat expels a lot of toxins from the face as well. So not only are you opening the pores, but you're also getting rid of that gunk. 

Doing this is one method, but it's the same as having a bath or a shower. So you don't have to do this if you just came out of the bath or the shower because it's the same thing.  And if you just can't be bothered with filling your sink with water and, you know, draping a towel over your head and putting your face over it, you could also get a face towel and wet it with hot water. Wring it, and then just put it over wherever you want to extract. If it's the nose, you just fold the towel, put it over here for like a minute or something. I mean it only lasts about like 30 seconds. That's true, and then you have to probably do it a few times as you  do it, maybe like three times. So these are some ways to open up your pores so that you can properly extract. 

 

You guys have probably seen this tool around It's basically a metal rod with a loop on one end and a more rounded spoon extractor, which has a teeny tiny hole in the middle. This tool is used to extract the comedo, which is just a fancy medical term for pimple. And these include blackheads, whiteheads and just you know. So when you're once clean pores are trapped by dead skin, things like oil and bacteria start to build up inside which forms these pimples or forms these blackheads or whiteheads, which is when you use a tool to help extract. And the difference between a whitehead, a blackhead and like a pimple, for example, is a whitehead is contained. It's not exposed to air, so it's still under skin. It's just, like, slowly building up. And then a blackhead isn't black because it's dirty. It's because it's actually been exposed to air, and air oxidizes whatever it like touches, type of thing. Think of an avocado: if you cut an avocado, it goes brown. That's basically what a blackhead is. And then a pimple is just more of that pussy build up inside. If you use it properly, get this out, very gently. So I am gonna tell you guys how to probably use this extracting tool. Using this tool is a lot better than using our fingers because there's bacteria trapped under our nails, so when we do this, it's easy for the bacteria to spread for more friends to pop up and we don't want that. First, make sure your tool is nice and sanitized. Gently press over the opening of the blackhead or pore; wiggle it around or gently roll across affected area. If nothing comes out, you can slightly adjust the angle that you're pressing down too. If it still doesn't come out easily after you have adjusted the angle, just leave it alone. Because if you press too hard, it just indents your skin and then it just starts peeling the next day. Yeah, because you broke your skin layers by pressing too hard. But that's also another thing: why you shouldn't keep going with it. Because sometimes the blackhead, whitehead, or pimple is actually very far down in the layers of just skin. Yeah, and it's just not ready. So by you going down there, you're actually just aggravating it and spreading it inside. 

 

You can use a toner or antiseptic cream, or natural antibacterial ingredients like tea tree or eucalyptus oil to the spot. Prepping and also, like, sealing it is just as important. Because if you don't, the bacteria will get inside again and then you'll have another pimple in the place where you just got one in. So after you've done that, we're now properly cleansed. Our pores have been taken care of, and it's moving on to skincare, which is the next most important thing when it comes to minimizing your pores. And we're gonna focus on serums because  serums are these jam-packed concentrated little bottles of magic that are filled with active ingredients to help you target specific skin care concerns. And there's a lot of products for pore care. So if pores are our main concern, you want to find something that is very hydrating as well as helps with blurring of the pores.  

 

So now moving on to sugar hormones and large pores, because like we said, large pores have a lot to do with genetics, but hormones as well. So how do these interplay together? So we want to mention a little bit about our oh so sweet friend, the sugar. Though, it's not that sugar itself causes acne. It's actually what happens when we eat it, and how our body reacts to it that actually causes the breakouts. So if you're over- indulging in sweets, it doesn't really matter what you follow up with skincare. Because if your body isn't happy with what you're consuming, which is a lot of refined sugar, then, you know, it's not going to be happy outside either. Sugar has a high glycemic index. And glycemic index is basically the ranking for foods based on their sugar level. And sugar level affects our hormones. So how exactly does it affect our hormones? When you eat certain foods that are high in sugar, particularly refined sugar, your body quickly converts this into glucose, which then goes into your bloodstream. This makes insulin levels in your body increase, and insulin is a hormonal response to sugar in the bloodstream. Then when your insulin spikes, this is directly linked to the receptors that are connected to the pores, and it will signal the pores to produce more oils. So the oils in the pores increase, which makes them appear larger. And then when the pores are larger, you're also increasing the risk that they get filled with dead skin, debris and dirt, which then makes you break out more! 

But it's not even just the pores that get affected. When your insulin goes up, your body goes into fat storing mode. Which is why high sugar diets cause very rapid weight gain, and why you can't lose weight without reducing the amount of sugar you're consuming. No loss, no gain! If you want to have clear skin, you've got to cut out the sugar! So here are some of the tips that we personally have tried to reduce sugar in our (lives). So the first thing I try to do is I generally don't drink much soda to begin with, because it's loaded with so much sugar. And there's always healthier options like water, which might be a little boring, but you can throw some frozen fruit in there, or just fruits in general, to make it have some sort of a flavor. Or there's also teas. For me, soda is non-negotiable. Like I try very hard to not drink it.  The sugar from refined sugars that you find in sodas are different from the naturally derived sugars you find in fruits. So that's like one way to cut some portion of sugar out because it's like, you're kind of drinking it sometimes to wash food down, right? So it's kind of like wasted calories and wasted sugar, so that's one step that you can do. 

Another thing you can try is also reduce the sugar that you put in as a supplement to other drinks like teas, coffees or even oatmeal and yogurt. Sometimes we like to sprinkle sugar on top. So if you're ever craving something sweet, you can replace what you would normally eat, like a cookie or a slice of cake, or anything loaded with refined sugar with something like fresh fruit. They're loaded with tons of vitamins, minerals and antioxidants that are actually really good for your skin. So if you can, swap out: this is like making these minor lifestyle adjustments. Yeah. Like when you're dehydrated, instead of drinking you know, soda or a fruit juice, you can just drink water. And when you crave something sweet, instead of eating what you would normally eat, you can maybe grab for a piece of fruit. And it might not taste the best in the beginning, but it grows on you.