This is, by far, my favorite beauty related thing to do to my skin. Now, I have never professionally gotten this done(though I want to one day!), but I’ve always been curious in the past about dermaplaning, especially since social media has plenty of videos and before/after photos related to it. Now, if you haven’t heard of dermaplaning, that’s just fine because I’m going to explain what it is and what the key benefits there are to doing this procedure.
What Is Dermaplaning?
Dermaplaning is a skin treatment that uses an exfoliating blade to, at a 45 degree angle, skim over and remove the dead skin cells and little hairs, or “peach fuzz” on the surface of your face. The basic concept of dermaplaning is akin to shaving, since a blade is used and is dragged along the skin.
What Are The Benefits To Dermaplaning?
“Why would I ever need to shave my whole face with a razor?”, you may ask yourself. Your skin is exposed daily to environmental toxins, external aggressors, buildup of dead skin, and this can cause the top layer of your skin to appear dull and uneven, as well as making it look aged. Dermaplaning aims to get rid of debris that accumulates on your skin, deep acne scarring, fine lines and wrinkles, removing texture and dead skin, and while the results are different for everyone in addition to reports on results being mostly anecdotal, I know that I have noticed a huge difference on my own skin after each treatment as well as with continued use of the procedure, and hopefully you will too! I also feel like my skincare penetrated deeper into the skin and is more effective, which is always a good thing!
What Do I Need To Know Before I Dermaplane At Home?
The first and most important thing I should mention is that it is almost always better to go to a trained professional for procedures or treatments, even simple and low risk ones, such as these as it lowers the risk of infection or injury. Second, since you are essentially exposing the layer of your skin beneath the dead skin on the surface, protecting your skin and using sunscreen is absolutely necessary. If you have any big bumps or acne on the surface of your skin, wait until things have “leveled out” a little bit more to avoid irritating your skin further. Also, it should be known that the results of this procedure are not permanent, so you would want to do this about once a month or so. That being said, you absolutely can do this procedure on yourself in the comfort of your own home provided that you take the necessary precautions as well as follow the correct sanitary protocols. And luckily, there is little to no recovery time after this procedure(YAY!), though there may be slight sensitivity or redness for a day or two.
Safety Tips
- Don’t apply too much pressure!
- Use the blade at a 45 degree angle
- Sterilize your tool with 70% alcohol before and after each use...if you want to use both alcohol and barbicide (overnight), go for it! As you may know by now, there’s no such thing as being too sanitary in my book haha! #germaphobe
- Use a laser-cut or smooth blade as opposed to one with ridges or machine-cut
- Pull the skin tight and use short strokes against the grain of the hair on your face
- Don’t start the procedure with anything on your face...make sure it’s clean and dry
- Avoid applying anything but skincare after the treatment for the rest of the day (that means no makeup no matter how bad you want to try it out on that new smooth dolphin skin!)
- Avoid getting too close to your eye area
- Make sure your hands are clean
- And lastly, make sure you don’t have any of your furbabies around to mess with the process or possible try to nom on the tool (I may or may not be speaking from experience haha)