No more perioral dermatitis: skin care after zero therapy

The zero therapy is finally behind you - an important step to free your skin from perioral dermatitis . This skin disease, often called "stewardess disease" or "perioral dermatitis", is caused by over-cared skin that reacts to too many care products, highly concentrated active ingredients and external stress factors with redness, dryness, small nodules and usually a light triangle around the mouth. Now that your skin has calmed down, a minimalist and tolerable care routine is crucial. Strengthen your skin barrier to avoid relapses. Here you can find out how to bring your skin into a healthy balance step by step.

In zero therapy, you stop using all care products and only clean the skin with water . If you are still in the middle of the acute phase or would like to find out more about zero therapy or perioral dermatitis, you will find helpful tips for this intensive period in our articles.

Every day, pay close attention to how your skin reacts to your actions. It is possible that you started your skin care routine too early. In this case, take a step back.

Remember: your skin's tolerance threshold is now very low and you should definitely take that seriously. This is the only way you will be able to completely calm down your skin. It is better to hold out for a few months than to constantly have to walk around with this irritated skin. Perioral dermatitis that has not healed will always come back. That is why it is important that you establish a healthy and irritation-free skin care routine even after the zero therapy so that you do not end up in this situation again.

Once your perioral dermatitis has calmed down, it is very important that you prevent any irritation. Even if everything has healed, the perioral dermatitis can unfortunately come back if you use the wrong products or too many products.

Make sure that you gradually introduce your skin care routine. One product at a time. Give your skin a little time to get used to new products. Depending on how you went, it may not have seen any skin care for a long time. This can also be quite a change for your skin.

See how your skin reacts to changes and act accordingly. If it gets really bad again, take a small step back and try again over the next few days. Your skin may get a few spots after being so dry. Every skin reacts differently and the skin cycle lasts at least 28 days. You should definitely keep this in mind. If you follow the tips when setting up your skin care routine and you don't experience any severe rashes, itching, pain or inflammation, things will definitely get better again quickly. Set up a healthy and minimalist skin care routine.

In general, you should pay attention to these ingredients in the future:

• Fragrances : Irritate the skin and can cause allergies.
• Essential oils : May irritate sensitive skin and cause contact allergies.
• Alcohol : Dries out the skin and weakens the skin barrier (except fatty alcohols, which are very well tolerated).
• Highly concentrated active ingredients : Introduce ingredients such as retinol or vitamin C only gradually and in low concentrations.
• Acidic peels : Avoid strong AHA/BHA peels that overload the skin.

Here are a few tips for each step of your basic routine:

If you used a mild cleanser during the zero therapy and liked it, then stick with it. Otherwise, look for another mild cleanser. It is best to use a cleanser with very mild surfactants. Surfactants that are too harsh will wash too much oil out of your skin and have a drying effect. As a result, your skin will lose moisture, which it desperately needs now after the perioral dermatitis.

After all, your skin was deliberately neglected a little during the zero therapy period. Now it's time to make up for that. But in moderation, in a healthy and mild way. By the way , soap is not a mild cleanser . Ash soaps and supposedly mild soaps are also not suitable at all.

It's best if your cleanser doesn't contain any strong active ingredients . You shouldn't use peeling cleansers during this phase either. This would unnecessarily irritate your skin.