Sleep is important for your skin for so many reasons. The act of sleep is a recharge not just for your skin and energy levels, but for your overall physical and mental health too. There is a reason we always feel a certain way (good or bad) depending on how our sleep was the night before. Here we take a look at three aspects as to how sleep can affect your skin and why it plays such an important part in skin health.
Bodily Functions: Did you know that your body and cells repair themselves in your sleep? In your restful state your body is given the opportunity to conserve energy and get to work on repairing and rectifying the day-to-day wear and tear that we undergo. This includes healing any cuts or bruises we may have, helping to get any inflammation under control and working to balance and harmonise our hormones and hydration levels. Without enough high quality sleep, some of these ascpets can become more prominent in everyday life. Take inflammation for example - high levels of this in the body contributes to the likes of acne, blemishes, psoriasis and more.
Collagen Production: Your cells repair themselves while you sleep and as such having sessions of high quality sleep equates to high quality cell repair. This is also true of collagen production (one of the main building blocks of skin) in that it is assisted by high quality sleep in order to optimally be produced and work for your skin. A lack of / less optimised sleep impairs on this process - resulting in subpar benefits from this collagen production which should be working to keep your skin plump, firm and youthful. In essence, a lack of sleep can actually speed up the ageing of your skin as it negatively impacts on your natural collagen production and levels.
Stress Levels: It has been proven that a lack of sleep (and the resulting tiredness the following day) leads to an increase in the stress hormone known as cortisol. What does this do? It can cause an increase in oil production, resulting in acne and breakouts. Coming back to the point above about inflammation, stress can also contribute to this and exacerbate skin conditions like acne and eczema. Stress and a lack of sleep together can also lead to cravings for high calorie foods in an attempt to replenish energy levels. Once again, this type of food can also increase oil production and inflammation levels as it is usually lacking in nutrition and the negative knock-on effects continue for your skin.
How Does Sleep Affect Your Skin?
As you can see, sleep affects our skin in both positive and negative ways. We offer treatments here at Remedi London that can help enhance and improve your sleep quality cycle to in turn enhance the condition of your skin. This includes the innovative Rebalance Impulse treatment which helps to lessen bodily and mental stress while also helping to improve your quality of sleep too.