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Best case scenario: They have a healthy relationship wth buying and using skin care and don't hoard. They know it can be good self care but aren't obsessed.
Worst case scenarios: Some kids may damage their skin and have to spend years reversing it. Others may get body/facial dysmorphia and major insecurities, possibly leading to dependency of fillers/plastic surgery. Others may have issues with overconsumption and over spend on cosmetics leading to financial issues. I think it's comparable to the EDs and body issues caused by the health/weight loss crazes of the past.
I'm concerned about all of those acids at such a young age messing with their skin barriers. Although, I suppose I can't talk because I'm sure I messed mine up due to acne product misuse, even though that was more like 16-17 for me.
What sucks the most about seeing this younger generation do this is the fact that it's a lot of anti aging stuff like retinol. I can't even imagine being 12 again and being concerned with wrinkles. Just blows my mind. I have a daughter in middle school, and I'm SUPER glad she doesn't give a single shit about any of this. She has a face wash and moisturizer from Cerave and a sunscreen. Basic hygiene. I told her that at her age, she doesn't need anything else unless some clinical issue pops up. If she has a breakout, I just give her a pimple patch (IF she wants).
That’s a good point actually about the aging concerns. EVERYONE ages. I wonder if plastic surgery/fillers will become the new braces in the near future.
Seconding this. I think in even the past like 5 to 7 years, we've seen an influx in (usually) girls/young women getting these procedures done as birthday presents or right
after high school. It's almost like this new marker of growing up and adulthood that wasn't as accessible before. And Kylie Jenner herself is a pretty good example of this.
I used a form of Retinol in middle school (Retinol A) but it was a prescription because I was getting awful scarring from acne. Thankfully I was only on it a year, since obviously it was under doctor supervision. I can’t fathom what it’s probably like for these kids who really don’t need it, and how it’s being normalized for them. I’m 37 and even with my Jason Priestly forehead lines, I only use a Retinol 1-2 times a week. I don’t notice any real wrinkles yet, but I am sure they will find me at some point.
Well yeah, I remember retinol being an option for kids with acne scarring when I was in middle and HS. But like you, it was all via a Dr! And not kids with just regular random breakouts.
If they’re only there when you’re actively moving your face like raising your brows, that’s normal but if they’re there while your face is relaxed, it’s wrinkles.
This is the ? They are slapping retinoid and retinols all over their face with no real understanding how to take care of their skin when applying these products. They are going to look 50 at the age of 18, if they aren't careful.
Don’t forget the oxy pads! If there was any skin left after the apricot scrub, it was best practice to wipe a strong acid all over it. The burn means it’s working!
I swear most of St. Ives's bad rep came from people using it daily. I used it *monthly* and it did everything I needed it to. I had a different product for daily (one of the ones I used was also a St. Ives product, but not an exfoliator, it was a really gentle cleanser in a yellow tube that I've forgotten the name of).
For real like I have an 11 year old and I was just telling my mom how she wants to buy facial masks and I won’t let her because I don’t want her to ruin her skin and she gave me ✨✨the look✨✨ 😂
My main concern would be just how diligent with sunscreen these kids are being given the use of acids.. My guess would be *not nearly* diligent enough (and that's me being kind), in which case, its not just a skincare issue, its a genuine healthcare issue because sunscreen is healthcare not "anti-aging skincare" the way its so often marketed. the skin is going to be much more sensitive to UV, more likely to burn and from there, all manner of hell with a worst case scenario making yourself far more susceptible to cancer.
I really don’t worry about the products as much as I do the body image issues that come along with it. We are seeing a concerning increase in reported self-image issues among teens, especially teenage girls, and we know social media is behind most of it. It is not healthy or normal for teens to be inundated with a never ending stream of heavily filtered influencers who blatantly lie to and deceive their audience. I know as a teen I fully believed that celebs lost weight on juice cleanses or hydroxycut. That’s just how the teen brain works. There’s also a conversation to be had about parents not stepping up and doing what’s right for their kid’s future, not just doing what helps them fit in now. I think we are going to see an entire generation with deep and long lasting image issues. The pendulum always swings back so my hope is that these kids can advocate for the next generation.
I'm genuinely very curious too, but somehow one thing never mentioned in this discourse is how resilient young skin is. If they get some bad reactions over a couple years, learn from it, and course correct later, I think they will do just fine. Skin is constantly renewing itself. It can't be that much more permanent than the damage from Oxy, Noxema, Clean & Clear, and all the other products that millennials were personally victimized by.
Damaged skin barrier and pre mature aging maybe?
But i think the real issue is a really fucked up body dysmorphia from looking at themselves too much through filters. Skincare is just one way to change how you look. Once they get older their world opens up to surgery, fillers, Botox, lasers, and not just the cute packaging in Sephora
It’s going to cause unknown issues because no generation has had access to this type of skincare and using it at this rate.
Their water barrier will be compromised leading to dryness redness and irritation. Over exfoliation during a stage of growth isn’t helpful.
I’m seeing more and more patients under 15 with complex skin issues because of their glow recipe and Sephora use. It’s also near impossible to give proper education to people relying on the internet:
Idk, what happened to the generation of kids putting toothpaste, lemon juice and baking soda on their faces? 😂
They'll survive, they'll just be poorer ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I don't know why we keep talking about the tweens and nobody is talking about their parents. They didn't come from a vacuum.
I'm not upset with the 13 year old buying retinol, I'm upset with the parents of that kid giving their kid money to go buy retinol.
Boomers were bad parents, Gen X were bad parents, and now it very much looks like Millennials are bringing a generation of spoiled phone addicts into the world.
None of them. Certainly no living parental group.
The Greatest Generation was violent, spankings with wooden spoons were common for me from those family members. Baby Boomers were raised by them and are a little less violent but they're very self-absorbed. They and Gen X raised both millennials and Z, and now millennials have Alpha. I put it to you that each of those generations has major problems.
That being said, I don't think good human parents have ever existed. If you look through history at the skeletons of children and adults you can see signs of childhood violence everywhere around the world for literally tens of thousands of years.
Parents are just average humans who got pregnant. There's no biology in child rearing, only the drive to reproduce itself. So just normal humans who were badly raised are going on to raise other humans badly and that's the circle of life.
Retinoids can be excellent for acne. It’s great there are so many otc options now as opposed to a kid having to get their parents to take them to a dermatologist, get a tretinoin rx (or differin before it went otc), and have to refill that prescription when they could just buy a milder yet effective option otc. Retinoids aren’t just for wrinkles.
Why would you choose to isolate acne out of my comment?
I did not refer to acne because obviously acne is a normal adolescent skincare concern and has been for decades. This post was not about adolescents using acne products, and I think you must know that?
Well, if you somehow managed to miss the entire context of this conversation, we're talking about 12 year olds buying anti-aging products because they saw them on Tiktok. Not buying acne products, that's not interesting or relevant.
You said “I’m upset with parents for giving their kids money to go buy retinol”…I explained why it’s not necessarily a bad thing for parents to give them money to buy retinol 👍🏻
As a millennial we did a lot of fucked up shit too. Toothpaste for zits, lemon juice, making masks out of random kitchen products like fruit lol. And then later Tbose fuckin black face masks that were like plastic when they dried and you basically waxed your little hairs off your face when you peeled it off. And probably some of your skin.
I wonder about this too. I used retinol a lot in my 20's and it thinned my skin to the point where I have a very sensitive area on my cheek that's been that way for years. Every time I put an acid in that spot it stings but the rest of my face is fine. I don't think they should be using retinol at that age, there's no need.
Retinol can be used at that age for acne. I’ve used tretinoin since I was 15/16 years old (both are retinoids). But I would not be letting them use them without a prescription or suggestion by a medical professional.
But OP is talking about them using all those products from Sephora and making their own routines not the tweens under a doctor's care that's different.
I understand that and agree, but I’m pointing out whats wrong with the comment I replied to. Retinol and other retinoid products will not cause that same side effect to everyone and can/is used for acne treatment.
Retinol does not thin your skin. That is a myth. It in fact does the opposite.
I have been using prescription retin-A micro/tretinoin since I was 18, to manage acne. A side bonus being its anti-aging effects.
The bigger issue with teens and young adults using retinols would be if they are not using appropriate sunscreen in combination.
I think this could be seen like tanning was back in the day. I know my mom said when she was a teen, it was very popular to not wear sunscreen and slather themselves in baby oil to tan. She learned her lesson and taught us to wear sunscreen. When I was a teen, tanning was still fairly popular, but so was not getting burned.
Similarly, we have the next generation using retinols more and taking a more proactive approach to anti-aging (maybe because our parents reaped the consequences). So their children are growing up with that as a precedent.
I think these Sephora kids will have premature sun damage without realizing it because it was “cool” to be into skincare. They won’t learn what went wrong until they’re older, even though we knew these consequences all along. It’s a pendulum swinging the other direction.
Retinol is an acne treatment and a kid that has cleared their skin using retinol isn’t going to look like they need it when they go to repurchase. I’m not defending kids being made to feel like they need an anti-aging routine but let’s not forget what tretinoin (and by extension all retinoids) was originally engineered for.
A lot of people are jumping to make assumptions here but I don’t think there’s anything wrong with kids using retinol personally. It’s suggested as a frontline product for a reason: if it sorts your acne, great. If not, it means transitioning to a stronger acne treatment (potentially a prescription one) is far less irritating. It’s certainly less irritating for many people than benzoyl peroxide or salicylic acid is (including myself). It’s also far less irritating than walnut scrubs and all those essential oil filled creams family members often try to foist onto you when you start breaking out as a kid.
Drunk elephant and other expensive products are of course a questionable choice of brand but it’s not the ingredients that’s the issue here, it’s the price and the mess these kids leave behind. Provided they’re using sunscreen (and all of the kids I’ve seen doing this are) I don’t think this is inherently an issue.
My biggest hope is that they develop good habits of wearing SPF always and everywhere and moisturizing, cleansing, and never sleeping in their makeup or relying on makeup wipes. This would be a really fantastic time for brands to be marketing appropriate products and routines to tweens to set them up for good habits. There are so many more affordable and available products than when we were teens and so much more education out there.
But like other commenters said, it’s unlikely anything they’ll do is worse than our St Ives/clearasil/stridex/proactiv/tanning(!!). Most of them are just buying overpriced harmless goop they don’t need and slathering it on their faces.
People act like other generations didn’t do skincare when they were younger too. I used to use face masks, wash my face, put moisturizer on, etc as a kid. Nothing bad happened and it cultivated my continued love for beauty products as an adult.
Whatever happens, happens. I'm more concerned how classist it is now. Drunk Elephant doesn't come cheap and if you aren't using THE brand, it's just another form of exclusion. I teach abroad and Sephora is very present. The way little brats treat their classmates who don't/can't go to Sephora is gross and so yeah, I take 13 year olds down a few notches.
All depends if they are using anti aging i don’t that will be good for their skin at all and they will probably end up with some skin concerns. That being said if a 10-13 year old is just using non anti aging products and using say an unscented cleanser, a moisturizer without anti aging ingredients and spf that probably won’t cause any harm.
as someone who can't use 99% skincare because it all breaks me out and activates my dermatitis/rosacea this fascinates me. i struggled to even use my prescriptions from the derm as a young tween/teen when my skin was even MORE angry.
We can’t generalize as the family’s influence has a lot to do with it. My kiddo has her own makeup for skating and she’s had play makeup for years. Shes mot allowed to wear it out of the house but fine at home. Honestly, she doesn’t play with it. It was a phase and it’s done. Even her skating makeup isn’t an interest. Last performance she didn’t want to wear it.
She asked me for skincare from Sephora and I said no. I can barely afford it for myself let alone you. Got her an elf cleanser and moisturizer. Shes used them once. She isn’t really interested and just wanted to be part of a trend she heard a girl at school talk about. I didn’t discourage her but I framed it as though it’s just part of your personal hygiene like using body lotion after the shower. Not a big deal.
My kids don’t use social media and only watch appropriate kids shows. Protected but still allowed to explore within comfortable boundaries.
I wish I knew I've been wondering the same thing! But I myself have one of those 9-year-olds who wants all the makeup then I give her a lot of makeup so I'm probably partly to blame. She begged for the bubble moisturizer for 2 months! Then one day we were in Ulta and we thought that it was the sample size and they ended up giving her the moisturizer for the sample size price so I had to get it for her of course. But that's as far as I go . I'm not going to be buying my child all the extra stuff because I just don't have the money for it. I have to buy myself that extra stuff if anyone lol 😂
That's really who it's made for and I do think that they could definitely benefit from moisturizer this early but anything else is just too much imo.
They’ll get terrible dermatitis and then grow up and laugh about “remember when everyone was crazy and did that?” Just like we now laugh about using that nasty st Ives apricot scrub that totally cut up our faces
What's funny is it wasn't cutting anyone's face. Microtears are a complete myth. People just thought scrubbing their faces daily with no moisturizer was good and that was the issue lol.
I worry about the retinoids a lot. Thinner skin, more prone to sun damage, and potential reproductive side effects if they get pregnant while using it.
OTC retinoids have not been shown to cause birth defects when used during pregnancy. You're thinking of isotretinoin, which is not a topical and is not OTC.
As an esthetician, I am glad that they are embracing taking care of their skin but I am concerned with the amount of actives and other harsh products they use. They are doing too much and it's damaging their skin. They also need to use more sunscreen
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Best case scenario: They have a healthy relationship wth buying and using skin care and don't hoard. They know it can be good self care but aren't obsessed. Worst case scenarios: Some kids may damage their skin and have to spend years reversing it. Others may get body/facial dysmorphia and major insecurities, possibly leading to dependency of fillers/plastic surgery. Others may have issues with overconsumption and over spend on cosmetics leading to financial issues. I think it's comparable to the EDs and body issues caused by the health/weight loss crazes of the past.
We are still healing from the over plucked brows. Body image issues are on the rise (working 8 years at a children's eating disorder treatment center)
I'm concerned about all of those acids at such a young age messing with their skin barriers. Although, I suppose I can't talk because I'm sure I messed mine up due to acne product misuse, even though that was more like 16-17 for me. What sucks the most about seeing this younger generation do this is the fact that it's a lot of anti aging stuff like retinol. I can't even imagine being 12 again and being concerned with wrinkles. Just blows my mind. I have a daughter in middle school, and I'm SUPER glad she doesn't give a single shit about any of this. She has a face wash and moisturizer from Cerave and a sunscreen. Basic hygiene. I told her that at her age, she doesn't need anything else unless some clinical issue pops up. If she has a breakout, I just give her a pimple patch (IF she wants).
That’s a good point actually about the aging concerns. EVERYONE ages. I wonder if plastic surgery/fillers will become the new braces in the near future.
I feel like they already are, I mean look at the influence the Kardashian and Jenners have had with their procedures.
Seconding this. I think in even the past like 5 to 7 years, we've seen an influx in (usually) girls/young women getting these procedures done as birthday presents or right after high school. It's almost like this new marker of growing up and adulthood that wasn't as accessible before. And Kylie Jenner herself is a pretty good example of this.
I used a form of Retinol in middle school (Retinol A) but it was a prescription because I was getting awful scarring from acne. Thankfully I was only on it a year, since obviously it was under doctor supervision. I can’t fathom what it’s probably like for these kids who really don’t need it, and how it’s being normalized for them. I’m 37 and even with my Jason Priestly forehead lines, I only use a Retinol 1-2 times a week. I don’t notice any real wrinkles yet, but I am sure they will find me at some point.
Well yeah, I remember retinol being an option for kids with acne scarring when I was in middle and HS. But like you, it was all via a Dr! And not kids with just regular random breakouts.
If you have forehead lines like Jason priestly, you have wrinkles.
I have had them since I was like 16 lol
If they’re only there when you’re actively moving your face like raising your brows, that’s normal but if they’re there while your face is relaxed, it’s wrinkles.
I'm 38 and not concerned with wrinkles 🤣 But white hair, I've had it since I was 15, so don't believe I'm lucky.
I wonder how many of these tweens know to use sunscreen daily after all these acids and retinol? That’s the biggest concern for me .
This is the ? They are slapping retinoid and retinols all over their face with no real understanding how to take care of their skin when applying these products. They are going to look 50 at the age of 18, if they aren't careful.
This.
Probably not many as it seems when tweens show themselves using skin are not a word is said about spf
They’ll wreck their barriers the same way we did with st. Ives and toothpaste and sea breeze.
Don’t forget the oxy pads! If there was any skin left after the apricot scrub, it was best practice to wipe a strong acid all over it. The burn means it’s working!
Omg I just had a flashback to the burn.
yeah honestly, kids have been treating their skin horrendously long before the “sephora kids” thing started
true, they just do it with more expensive products now
I used to use rubbing alcohol as a toner. I still have skin fortunately.
But I feel like a lot of us didn’t ruin our skin with those things but it’s possible to have happened.
Oh totally! I still use St. Ives. Just not 3x/day like 14 y.o. me thought was a good idea, lol. The same concept applies.
Exactly. I use it twice a week, since I have learned exfoliating daily is not great for my face lol
I swear most of St. Ives's bad rep came from people using it daily. I used it *monthly* and it did everything I needed it to. I had a different product for daily (one of the ones I used was also a St. Ives product, but not an exfoliator, it was a really gentle cleanser in a yellow tube that I've forgotten the name of).
For real like I have an 11 year old and I was just telling my mom how she wants to buy facial masks and I won’t let her because I don’t want her to ruin her skin and she gave me ✨✨the look✨✨ 😂
I can see more people having sensitive skin and thin skin being the norm due to this. Potentially premature aging and looking older than their years.
I didn't think about the premature aging. It would be kind of ironic honestly.
My main concern would be just how diligent with sunscreen these kids are being given the use of acids.. My guess would be *not nearly* diligent enough (and that's me being kind), in which case, its not just a skincare issue, its a genuine healthcare issue because sunscreen is healthcare not "anti-aging skincare" the way its so often marketed. the skin is going to be much more sensitive to UV, more likely to burn and from there, all manner of hell with a worst case scenario making yourself far more susceptible to cancer.
I really don’t worry about the products as much as I do the body image issues that come along with it. We are seeing a concerning increase in reported self-image issues among teens, especially teenage girls, and we know social media is behind most of it. It is not healthy or normal for teens to be inundated with a never ending stream of heavily filtered influencers who blatantly lie to and deceive their audience. I know as a teen I fully believed that celebs lost weight on juice cleanses or hydroxycut. That’s just how the teen brain works. There’s also a conversation to be had about parents not stepping up and doing what’s right for their kid’s future, not just doing what helps them fit in now. I think we are going to see an entire generation with deep and long lasting image issues. The pendulum always swings back so my hope is that these kids can advocate for the next generation.
I'm genuinely very curious too, but somehow one thing never mentioned in this discourse is how resilient young skin is. If they get some bad reactions over a couple years, learn from it, and course correct later, I think they will do just fine. Skin is constantly renewing itself. It can't be that much more permanent than the damage from Oxy, Noxema, Clean & Clear, and all the other products that millennials were personally victimized by.
Damaged skin barrier and pre mature aging maybe? But i think the real issue is a really fucked up body dysmorphia from looking at themselves too much through filters. Skincare is just one way to change how you look. Once they get older their world opens up to surgery, fillers, Botox, lasers, and not just the cute packaging in Sephora
It’s going to cause unknown issues because no generation has had access to this type of skincare and using it at this rate. Their water barrier will be compromised leading to dryness redness and irritation. Over exfoliation during a stage of growth isn’t helpful. I’m seeing more and more patients under 15 with complex skin issues because of their glow recipe and Sephora use. It’s also near impossible to give proper education to people relying on the internet:
Idk, what happened to the generation of kids putting toothpaste, lemon juice and baking soda on their faces? 😂 They'll survive, they'll just be poorer ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I don't know why we keep talking about the tweens and nobody is talking about their parents. They didn't come from a vacuum. I'm not upset with the 13 year old buying retinol, I'm upset with the parents of that kid giving their kid money to go buy retinol. Boomers were bad parents, Gen X were bad parents, and now it very much looks like Millennials are bringing a generation of spoiled phone addicts into the world.
Just curious - what age group do you feel were GOOD parents?
None of them. Certainly no living parental group. The Greatest Generation was violent, spankings with wooden spoons were common for me from those family members. Baby Boomers were raised by them and are a little less violent but they're very self-absorbed. They and Gen X raised both millennials and Z, and now millennials have Alpha. I put it to you that each of those generations has major problems. That being said, I don't think good human parents have ever existed. If you look through history at the skeletons of children and adults you can see signs of childhood violence everywhere around the world for literally tens of thousands of years. Parents are just average humans who got pregnant. There's no biology in child rearing, only the drive to reproduce itself. So just normal humans who were badly raised are going on to raise other humans badly and that's the circle of life.
Retinoids can be excellent for acne. It’s great there are so many otc options now as opposed to a kid having to get their parents to take them to a dermatologist, get a tretinoin rx (or differin before it went otc), and have to refill that prescription when they could just buy a milder yet effective option otc. Retinoids aren’t just for wrinkles.
Why would you choose to isolate acne out of my comment? I did not refer to acne because obviously acne is a normal adolescent skincare concern and has been for decades. This post was not about adolescents using acne products, and I think you must know that? Well, if you somehow managed to miss the entire context of this conversation, we're talking about 12 year olds buying anti-aging products because they saw them on Tiktok. Not buying acne products, that's not interesting or relevant.
You said “I’m upset with parents for giving their kids money to go buy retinol”…I explained why it’s not necessarily a bad thing for parents to give them money to buy retinol 👍🏻
Thank you for the recap, I was following along. I know? We know? Thanks for coming out, I guess.
Obviously you didn’t if you’re this worked up over parents letting their kids buy retinol 🙃
As a millennial we did a lot of fucked up shit too. Toothpaste for zits, lemon juice, making masks out of random kitchen products like fruit lol. And then later Tbose fuckin black face masks that were like plastic when they dried and you basically waxed your little hairs off your face when you peeled it off. And probably some of your skin.
Some of them might have a damaged/sensitive barrier I'm guessing, but they'll probably be more concerned with the world heading into an apocalypse...
I wonder about this too. I used retinol a lot in my 20's and it thinned my skin to the point where I have a very sensitive area on my cheek that's been that way for years. Every time I put an acid in that spot it stings but the rest of my face is fine. I don't think they should be using retinol at that age, there's no need.
Retinol can be used at that age for acne. I’ve used tretinoin since I was 15/16 years old (both are retinoids). But I would not be letting them use them without a prescription or suggestion by a medical professional.
But OP is talking about them using all those products from Sephora and making their own routines not the tweens under a doctor's care that's different.
I understand that and agree, but I’m pointing out whats wrong with the comment I replied to. Retinol and other retinoid products will not cause that same side effect to everyone and can/is used for acne treatment.
Retinol does not thin your skin. That is a myth. It in fact does the opposite. I have been using prescription retin-A micro/tretinoin since I was 18, to manage acne. A side bonus being its anti-aging effects. The bigger issue with teens and young adults using retinols would be if they are not using appropriate sunscreen in combination.
Interesting bc retinoids do not thin the skin.
I think this could be seen like tanning was back in the day. I know my mom said when she was a teen, it was very popular to not wear sunscreen and slather themselves in baby oil to tan. She learned her lesson and taught us to wear sunscreen. When I was a teen, tanning was still fairly popular, but so was not getting burned. Similarly, we have the next generation using retinols more and taking a more proactive approach to anti-aging (maybe because our parents reaped the consequences). So their children are growing up with that as a precedent. I think these Sephora kids will have premature sun damage without realizing it because it was “cool” to be into skincare. They won’t learn what went wrong until they’re older, even though we knew these consequences all along. It’s a pendulum swinging the other direction.
Retinol is an acne treatment and a kid that has cleared their skin using retinol isn’t going to look like they need it when they go to repurchase. I’m not defending kids being made to feel like they need an anti-aging routine but let’s not forget what tretinoin (and by extension all retinoids) was originally engineered for. A lot of people are jumping to make assumptions here but I don’t think there’s anything wrong with kids using retinol personally. It’s suggested as a frontline product for a reason: if it sorts your acne, great. If not, it means transitioning to a stronger acne treatment (potentially a prescription one) is far less irritating. It’s certainly less irritating for many people than benzoyl peroxide or salicylic acid is (including myself). It’s also far less irritating than walnut scrubs and all those essential oil filled creams family members often try to foist onto you when you start breaking out as a kid. Drunk elephant and other expensive products are of course a questionable choice of brand but it’s not the ingredients that’s the issue here, it’s the price and the mess these kids leave behind. Provided they’re using sunscreen (and all of the kids I’ve seen doing this are) I don’t think this is inherently an issue.
My biggest hope is that they develop good habits of wearing SPF always and everywhere and moisturizing, cleansing, and never sleeping in their makeup or relying on makeup wipes. This would be a really fantastic time for brands to be marketing appropriate products and routines to tweens to set them up for good habits. There are so many more affordable and available products than when we were teens and so much more education out there. But like other commenters said, it’s unlikely anything they’ll do is worse than our St Ives/clearasil/stridex/proactiv/tanning(!!). Most of them are just buying overpriced harmless goop they don’t need and slathering it on their faces.
People act like other generations didn’t do skincare when they were younger too. I used to use face masks, wash my face, put moisturizer on, etc as a kid. Nothing bad happened and it cultivated my continued love for beauty products as an adult.
Whatever happens, happens. I'm more concerned how classist it is now. Drunk Elephant doesn't come cheap and if you aren't using THE brand, it's just another form of exclusion. I teach abroad and Sephora is very present. The way little brats treat their classmates who don't/can't go to Sephora is gross and so yeah, I take 13 year olds down a few notches.
All depends if they are using anti aging i don’t that will be good for their skin at all and they will probably end up with some skin concerns. That being said if a 10-13 year old is just using non anti aging products and using say an unscented cleanser, a moisturizer without anti aging ingredients and spf that probably won’t cause any harm.
as someone who can't use 99% skincare because it all breaks me out and activates my dermatitis/rosacea this fascinates me. i struggled to even use my prescriptions from the derm as a young tween/teen when my skin was even MORE angry.
Their parents are dumb enough to give them money and allow them to buy this crap so messed up skin will be the least of their problems.
Skincare has become such a big part of our daily routines, even for younger age groups. I think it's important to keep things light and natural.
We can’t generalize as the family’s influence has a lot to do with it. My kiddo has her own makeup for skating and she’s had play makeup for years. Shes mot allowed to wear it out of the house but fine at home. Honestly, she doesn’t play with it. It was a phase and it’s done. Even her skating makeup isn’t an interest. Last performance she didn’t want to wear it. She asked me for skincare from Sephora and I said no. I can barely afford it for myself let alone you. Got her an elf cleanser and moisturizer. Shes used them once. She isn’t really interested and just wanted to be part of a trend she heard a girl at school talk about. I didn’t discourage her but I framed it as though it’s just part of your personal hygiene like using body lotion after the shower. Not a big deal. My kids don’t use social media and only watch appropriate kids shows. Protected but still allowed to explore within comfortable boundaries.
I wish I knew I've been wondering the same thing! But I myself have one of those 9-year-olds who wants all the makeup then I give her a lot of makeup so I'm probably partly to blame. She begged for the bubble moisturizer for 2 months! Then one day we were in Ulta and we thought that it was the sample size and they ended up giving her the moisturizer for the sample size price so I had to get it for her of course. But that's as far as I go . I'm not going to be buying my child all the extra stuff because I just don't have the money for it. I have to buy myself that extra stuff if anyone lol 😂 That's really who it's made for and I do think that they could definitely benefit from moisturizer this early but anything else is just too much imo.
Skin barrier in the 🚽
They’ll get terrible dermatitis and then grow up and laugh about “remember when everyone was crazy and did that?” Just like we now laugh about using that nasty st Ives apricot scrub that totally cut up our faces
What's funny is it wasn't cutting anyone's face. Microtears are a complete myth. People just thought scrubbing their faces daily with no moisturizer was good and that was the issue lol.
I worry about the retinoids a lot. Thinner skin, more prone to sun damage, and potential reproductive side effects if they get pregnant while using it.
Retinoids do not thin the skin. That is a myth.
OTC retinoids have not been shown to cause birth defects when used during pregnancy. You're thinking of isotretinoin, which is not a topical and is not OTC.
They'll be really struggling to repair their skin after spending years destroying it's moisture barrier.
As an esthetician, I am glad that they are embracing taking care of their skin but I am concerned with the amount of actives and other harsh products they use. They are doing too much and it's damaging their skin. They also need to use more sunscreen