It’s not a surprise that the moisturizers, serums, cleansers, and toners that feature ceramides are flying off the shelves. They are found almost everywhere. Who wouldn’t want to purchase a lotion with a scientific-sounding word that claims to repair the skin’s moisture barrier? The truth is that ceramide products are effective. The misrepresentation is when a brand leads customers to believe that the consumer’s skin barrier will be repaired and made healthy simply by using ceramide products.
Ceramides are lipids found naturally in the skin. They rest in the outer layer of skin and are responsible for keeping skin cells hydrated and preventing moisture from escaping. They make up roughly 50% of the outer layer of the skin. If someone is living in a dry climate or works with skin-drying chemicals, and is unmindful of their skin’s barrier, their levels of ceramides will drop. This can cause dehydrated skin that becomes irritated and makes skin even more reactive to products applied to it.
The skin care theory makes sense when it comes to adding ceramides back into a person’s skin care products. In skincare with ceramides, deficiencies are being replaced. What’s unexpected is that it would be most ceramide products are not made the same and most brands are not disclosing the details of what’s in their products.
It is a fact that there is more than one type of ceramide. There are ceramide NP, ceramide AP, and ceramide EOP, for example. The research is in favor of products with multiple types of ceramides being more effective than products with only one type. Generally, there is little to no detail made available by products about which ceramides are included and in what ratios. Instead, they make some vague mention of ceramides and then call it a day.
Second, ceramides perform the best when they are combined with cholesterol and fatty acids. It isn’t about just throwing ceramides into a cream. Your skin barrier requires all three lipids in a particular ratio to rebuild itself effectively. Many of the products omit this component completely, or they include such a minuscule amount of ceramides that it’s practically for show—just enough to make it to the label.
Third, ceramides are costly to formulate correctly. Therefore, whenever I observe a $12 drugstore moisturizer boasting ceramides as the main selling point, I become dubious. It’s not to say that inexpensive products are ineffective—I’ve been proven wrong in the past—but effective formulations of ceramides are typically more expensive to create. If the price seems suspicious, look at the positioning of ceramides on the list of ingredients. If they are located after the preservatives, they are most likely ineffective.
What brands won’t tell you is that ceramides work very gradually. If your barrier is completely destroyed, it can take weeks of regular application before you see a change. They won’t provide you with immediate results like hyaluronic acid. You won’t wake up the next day with skin that is glowing and plump. Over time, you will notice that your skin stop stinging when you apply products, or that your skin feel tight an hour after you apply moisturizer.
Last year, I had a disaster from overusing retinol. My skin became raw and flaky and I had reactions to everything. I bought a cream with ceramides in it hoping it could help with skin recovery. In the first week I saw no improvement, but then my skin stopped getting worse, which was a sign of progress to me. In week three I started to notice my skin was less tight. The results of using this product were boring, but they were effective in helping my skin recover.
If you want to try using ceramides, I recommend CeraVe Moisturizing Cream. It’ll run you around $15 to try it, but it contains three ceramides and cholesterol. It’s thick and boring, or ceramides don’t make a product fun to use. A lighter option would be Dr. Jart+ Ceramidin Cream. It absorbs faster and works better under makeup. I keep both of these creams depending on how severely damaged my skin is each week.
We’ve established ceramides are ineffective and boring, but if you keep putting actives on your face without pausing to let it recover, your skin barrier will be destroyed. If this is the case, or ceramides are some of the only good ingredients that will help you skin.
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