apennington's blog

That’s right, I said it! This year – this decade – I want you to focus on beauty. Being beautiful means being healthy, and I want you to do everything in your power to make yourself more beautiful. Sound vain, trivial, and superfluous? Well, not really. While I’m not suggesting you get plastic surgery or injectable fillers, Botox®, or laser, I am suggesting that you look at your skin as a reflection of your overall health and that you make smart choices to protect your beautiful skin and take action to make your skin and body healthy.

I didn’t suffer with acne until I was an adult. Just into my thirties, I noticed more breakouts. What’s worse, the annoying red pimples left brown marks on my skin for weeks to months! Now I understand why.

We human beings come in a delightful rainbow of colors, from porcelain to pink to olive and brown to darkest ebony. So while we’re not all dark skinned, in a way, we’re all “people of color,” and we have the innate intelligence of our bodies to thank for giving each of us the perfect skin tone for our native habitat.

Kermit the Frog used to sing, “It’s not easy being green.”
My, how things have changed since then! Today, companies and products are scrambling to reposition themselves as “green.” It’s certainly trendy, but how much of it is just marketing? Stand at any drug store cosmetics wall and you'll see the color green on fresh new packaging, along with words like Natural, Pure, Organic, Mineral. But what do new color schemes and claims really mean? What's different about so-called “green” or “organic” or “natural” cosmetics?

November is healthy skin month. This is a good reminder that, even though we’re exposed to less sun now, it is still a great time to protect the appearance of and marvel at the uniqueness of our body’s largest organ. I’ve always admired the visual beauty of different skin tones. But understanding the science and purpose behind the various shades of our human tapestry expands my appreciation even more. This month, in a blog called Skin Tones, I share some insights on why we all have ”skin of color.”

I can tell what my 3-year-old daughter has been snacking on because it’s visible all over her precious face. Would you be surprised to learn that the telltale signs of what you have been eating – or avoiding – are equally noticeable just by looking at your face? It’s true. Dermatologists explain that our skin is a window into our overall health and can show clues of what’s going on under the surface.

My toddler daughter routinely expresses concern over the red birthmark on my left calf. She pats it and says, “Mommy, you have a boo-boo. Let’s put some cream on it.” She wants to “make it better” for me, to make this mark go away.

I thank her for her concern and tell her that it’s OK – it’s just a little mark on my skin called a “birthmark.” She listens as I explain, puzzled, and then looks for her own birthmark, which she doesn’t have – further compounding the mystery. 

Fall is a wonderful time for self-nurturing and introspection. As the weather cools and leaves change colors, many of my patients feel the need to look at areas of their lives they’ve let fall by the wayside. After the summer sun (and tan!) fades, we have a wonderful opportunity to take stock of the health of our skin and overall lifestyle and habits to prepare for the winter.

Cosmetics is a multibillion-dollar-a-year industry with limited regulations. The FDA lacks the power to approve products or an ingredient used in cosmetics and has not specifically determined what is “safe.” Because compounds placed on the skin can readily be absorbed into the body, is this something to be concerned about?

The vigorous debate about health care reform is grabbing headlines, and I think the energetic conversation is an extremely important one to have. The bloated, inefficient way we deliver what we call health care is costly, and the results we get for the money are not satisfactory. So it is a good thing to shine a focused light of inquiry on ideas to improve the situation. But it could take a long time, and it won’t be easy.