Don’t Hide Your Face: How to Time Your Chemical Peel Perfectly
Put it on on a Tuesday night, or some people who feel a little quicker on a Wednesday night. So then you've got approximately three days.
Right.
And then by Friday evening, so like when you leave work, now it's gonna kind of start, and then you're gonna have Friday, Saturday, Sunday to get it all on.
Are you terrified of ruining your skin after a TCA peel? Well, today we are gonna go over everything you need to know: when to stop your retinoids, when to start your prep products, your aftercare, and all that. We're gonna put it right on a calendar for you, so it's as simple as possible.
Yeah.
Well, let's start it off with a lot of times in the group, you'll see questions like this. So Saskia says, okay, I need help.
How on earth are you guys managing to fit a TCA peel into your daily lives? Exclamation point, question mark. I've had it for months, but every time I never end up taking the leap because I have a workout the next day, an important event, or a meeting, or it's already bedtime. I would love to know how you guys schedule these, when you schedule them, and any tips.
So I really need to take a vacation or cancel everything.
Yeah, you don't need to take a vacation. I always tell people the same thing, and I always just use the weekends off as an example. Obviously, shift this according to your schedule. Not everybody has weekends off.
Yes.
But if you know the fundamentals of how acids work, you know that when you put that on, within three to five days, you're going to start the flaking process. And you're going to have to try it once to see. So you could always just do one layer or a milder peel and see when your dryness starts, but put it on on a Tuesday night, or some people who peel a little quicker on a Wednesday night. So then you've got approximately three days. And then by Friday evening, so like when you leave work now, it's going to kind of start. And then you'll have Friday, Saturday, and Sunday to get it all off. And it won't be all off, but it'll be mostly off. So by the time you go back to work on Monday, the whole center of your face is done. It's just little bits around the hair.
Okay. Well, wear your hair down or, you know, something like you can totally hide it. It's going to be mostly gone.
Yeah. It's not, it's not as bad as you think it really isn't. And then, you know, obviously, the tips of just like, you know, putting on more hydration and things like that.
Like, I find that washing your face when your face is still really damp, barely dry. Now, like, I try to put like a water or something on hyaluronic, it's kind of my go-to. Like, hyaluronic or the regenerate both have a lot of hyaluronic in them.
Yes.
Put that on your damp skin. Then I'd like to put on some emo oil or the essential healing blend. And if I'm going to work, let's say, you know, and I still have a lot of my face, I got to go to work.
I will usually take a little smidge of Aquaphor.
Yeah.
Either just a tiny bit, my hands rub it, and kind of get that all over it.
Cause that kind of seals it in. They also have that Aquaphor spray now. That's a really good one.
It gives you a nice light layer, and then put that in. And now you really look fairly decent because nothing, it's when it's lifting and flaky that's when it looks bad, you know? So don't put makeup on, like, and then don't mean makeup. Like you could put some eyeshadow on and some, some lashes or whatever, a couple of little, some lipstick, a little bit of blush, but don't put foundation on your face that will like instantly cake up and look terrible.
But if you just kind of go the natural route, a little bit of blush, put your lips and eyes on. I don't think anybody's really going to notice. Like, there are ways to hide. And I've, I've helped people in the front lobby in the middle of a horrific-looking thing, and they don't even notice. And I'm like, you know, “pardon me. I'm sorry.”
I look so scary. And they're like, “What do you mean?”
Then they're intrigued. Then they want to know everything.
Oh, I guess. Yeah. I'm like, it's awful because they don't notice critics.
So we think everybody is looking at every single thing.
No, they're not. They're not.
I've actually had them be like, “Oh, your skin's so beautiful.” I'm like, “Come on.” You don't even see me.
Yeah.
You don't even see; you're not looking, because you see, like, this is peeling, and this looks dark because this part's peeling. You're like, oh, right.
Because, like, day three is when you look really wrinkled.
Yeah.
So like you'll smile, and you're like, “Oh my Lord, my under eyes are just…”
You look like you're 35 years old.
Yes. And I do get those calls sometimes. “Oh my God, I did this peeling. Is this going to go away?” You know?
Yeah. They're like, oh my gosh, it's not peeling, but I look like I'm a hundred. You're right on schedule.
Keep going. You'll be peeling in like another day or two. You're fine.
That means that the skin is separating. It's a good sign.
It is.
So you can totally, totally work with it.
Oh yeah.
You know, and go to work because nobody cares.
Yeah.
Nobody cares, but you, you're the only one who's concerned about what you look like. And there could be one evil person at your workplace who says, “Ha ha, you look like that.” But I really doubt it. I really doubt it. Most people won't even notice.
Well, then we have the two peel boosters, which help the skin peel a bit more quickly.
A little bit. You could probably knock at least a day off, I would say.
And that's either putting the Luminosity on, like right after you rinse your peel off, you put Luminosity on for, you know, three days, four days. When you start flaking, stop using it, or do a Dream Peel once. And that's only after TCA and Jessner.
Right.
That can speed it up a little bit, but it's really, it's not so bad. Just jump in and start with one layer.
Yes.
You know, then you'll see when your dryness starts, and you'll know if you're a quicker peeler or a slower peeler. “Oh, I started peeling, you know, day two.” Well, all right. Then maybe you should do your peel on, you know, Wednesday or Thursday evening. So, you know, when you're going to start peeling and then get it off.
That's when a patch test can come in handy as well.
Exactly.
A little patch test. I always recommend, like, maybe, you know, here, like, somewhere inconspicuous, and then do it exactly like you would a regular peel. You know, if you're planning to do two layers, make sure you pre-treat that area as well, like the rest of your face. But that's a good sign for you to tell, kind of, how your skin's going to react.
Yeah. How quick it going to start? And you just kind of gauge that and go with that.
But I think, I think it's not going to be nearly as bad as you think it is.
Right. Agreed.
Yeah.
Okay. So let's talk about the pre-peel stop list. When do you stop producing products? When do you start back up again? Yeah. Before you're, uh.
Yeah.
So while it's super duper important to prep, and you know, four weeks isn't the end-all be-all. You can prep for longer than four weeks. Some people prep for eight or more weeks, but as long as you've prepped for at least four weeks, you're using an acid, a very basic minimum, and an acid cleanser, melanin inhibitor, and your retinoid. I mean, that's key. You should be putting SPF on, but those three are key. But the thing is, you don't want to just use those up until the date and just put your peel on.
Right.
You need to give your skin a little break. So, right? So you have to stop applying leave-on acids, like Serum 15 or Serum 30. So stop that. Stop your retinoids.
Correct.
Like, so Fusion A, Tretinoin, Adapalene, whatever you're using. Stop both of those four to six days prior to applying your peel. Now, some people, there is a little smidge of a retinoid in Fade Bright. Some people are a little bit more sensitive. You could stop that one a couple of days before, too.
Do you have to? No, but you're going to find that out. You're going to gauge that. If you think that you're more sensitive, that makes you more sensitive, then make sure to stop that, too. You know, because there is a retinoid in there. There's a little bit of acid in there. Right. It's not mandatory, but you may want to, but you know, other than that.
Yeah. Because if you use that retinoid or Tretinoin right up until the day of your peel…
It's going to be far more aggressive.
It's going to be…
It's going to sting. It's going to burn even more than it would have.
Yes. Yeah. Because that's the thing. They're sensitizers. They can make you more sensitive. So, if you want your peel to be as comfortable as possible, you need to stop things like that. So stop the things that make your skin super sensitive.
Right.
And if you know, also if you're more sensitive in general, you know, use things like numbing cream and fans and, you know, stand up for the freezer, do whatever you have to do to calm your skin.
Let's talk about what to expect after your peel. So let's talk about, like, right after you finish applying your last layer of TCA.
What can we do?
What do we do?
Yeah. So that is actually, it's like a really good magical time where you could put like either a booster on or a treatment or a peptide, nothing that's an acid to, you know, no Tretinoin, no Serum 15, nothing like that.
But if you want to put on like a special booster, like, like for example, we could put on fade bright if you're dealing with hyperpigmentation or copper, if you're, you know, trying to work on scars or anti-aging, you know, like this, the CP serum or super CP serum, GHK, those are really good to put on any of the Dr. Platinum potions, Regenerate. There are a lot of great things. And because you just kind of, you know, pre-peeled that skin, like some, some skin came off, like, you know, even though the majority has it come off, like when you put an acid on, something comes off, and now everything's just going to penetrate so nicely.
Those pores, and everything, are going to penetrate.
So now's the time if you've got your goodies that you want to put them on, put them on, then do, of course, your healing products, whether it's, you know, Emu Oil, or if you're putting Luminosity on, the only time you wouldn't put those other products on is if like, you're going to put Dream Peel on.
Yeah.
If you're going to use Dream Peel as a finishing booster, just apply it. But if you're not putting that on, you can put all the other goodies that you want on.
But just then, not the next day.
Not the next day.
Let's just, just that magic window there, you know, I don't know, six hours, 12 hours, something that first day you can put those on and they're going to benefit your skin. After that, just focus on your healing products and keep your skin as moist as possible. And there's no way to moisturize dead skin sitting there.
You'll dry, but like kind of like where I was kind of saying before, you know, right after you're done washing your face, your skin is moist. Try to trap as much water in as you can. You could put some nano-hyaluronic on, because it's just an active that pulls water.
You'll put that on, trap it in with your emo oil, your essential healing blend, Aquaphor if you need to. I hesitate to tell people to use too much Aquaphor because it's an occlusive ointment. It's not going to allow oxygen to your skin. Only use it as needed.
I like to mix, like I'll do a pump of Emu Oil, maybe a little dollop of the Aquaphor. I'd like mix different things together. Maybe a little bit of healing oil.
Oh yeah. Yeah. I like to mix the oil and the healing oil every time. Sure. I love that.
But yeah, just don't, you know, unless you've done like a really aggressive peel, you don't need to like cake on the Aquaphor or Vaseline or whatever. Aquaphor is preferred.
Yeah. A little bit more breathable than.
There are benefits to Aquaphor.
Vaseline's more of a barrier.
Yeah. Well, I mean, there are both barriers, and I've had a couple of questions too. Like people who have, you know, wear a CPAP mask or things like that. “Like what can I do?”
Yeah.
And I'm like, “Aquaphor, right?” Aquaphor is that barrier. Or if you've done a body peel, and obviously you want to try to use like looser clothing, skirts, loose pants, and things. But if for some reason you're wearing something that's a little bit tighter or something, Aquaphor that's your barrier to help prevent aggravating your skin. Because, you know, you would think, “Oh, put on some nylons, and I just did a peel.” It's not going to feel good. You might want to wear some loose pants and just deal with it for sure.
For sure. Absolutely.
Well, I wanted to hit on some of these reviews for the Dream Peel. Yeah. Where like, “Dream Peel with my TCA peel works so much better. I feel like my peeling started days sooner, and I peeled much more than with the TCA alone.” And this one down here too, “I did one layer of Dream Peel after three layers of Jessners on Wednesday night and was practically done fully peeling by Monday morning.” That's so fast.
That is very fast.
That is five days total. That is fast.
And, you know, for some people, I just don't want everybody to think that's going to work for everybody, because some people, yeah, it does help and works perfectly and no issues. And other people, it might only be like a day. So that's why I always say, “Oh, you can get a day or so,” because I like to underpromise and overdeliver.
Right.
But, you know, some people definitely do get more days. And that Dream Peel not only helps it to peel more aggressively and quickly, but, you know, you're also getting the benefits from that vitamin A. It's not like the original thing was, 'you're getting these benefits,' but a secondary benefit was that it generally came off a little bit quicker. As it peeled more aggressively, and it came off, you know, so there are lots of benefits to, you know, adding those boosters on. But there again, I just want to stress, use them separately first. If you're going to do the Dream Peel, you have to do the Dream Peel all by itself first.
Make sure you don't have any allergies or issues. You'll understand it can make you feel a little warm. It can make you more sensitive before you combine them.
Yes.
That's just my one point I want to make.
I personally, not with fusion.
I think Dream Peel is a game-changer.
Yeah. Yeah.
That's, I wouldn't do a TCA or a Jessner peel without it. Now that I have used it, I love Dream Peel on its own. And it's kind of strange because I am one of those individuals.
You're sensitive.
That is sensitive to retinol. But for some reason, my skin loves it.
And when I put on that, I'm like you, I like the TCA 7. I will do multiple layers of 7, follow it with the Dream Peel. And I probably, it might take 5 days to peel, maybe.
Oh gosh.
See, no matter what, I'm still a slower peeler.
Yeah.
I'm every bit of 7, 8 days.
Yeah.
No matter what I do.
I might start peeling at 5 days. Do you know what I'm saying? Like, I don't peel right away either. But again, I'm not super aggressive. And we have that same scheduling conflict as our first review person said.
You know, that's why I said I can relate.
Like, I can't always look like that at work. I have to do a video.
Exactly. Sometimes when we're podcasting, it's hard to squeeze in a good eye peel here and there.
Yeah, it is.
A girl needs an eye peel.
Didn't you do one last week?
I did not.
Oh, you were going to.
I was going to because we had last week off from taping. So I had, you know, high hopes for what I was going to do, and, you know, as she said, scheduling happens, and life happens. And here we are.
But I can always squeeze in a quick Mandelic.
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Mandelic is nice.
Literally no downtime.
And I do feel like my skin feels refreshed and tighter even after, you know, Mandelic or two here and there.
For sure. For sure.
One time, I did a TCA and multiple layers in Dream Peel while I was out shopping for granite countertops.
Oh, yeah.
So, you know, and where we live here, there's a road, 23 mile road, and there are multiple granite counters, granite places in a row. So I had my little, you know, map. It was on a Saturday. And I'm like, OK, “I'm going to go to these four places with my, you know, measurements or what have you.” That was my task of the day. So I felt like I looked OK. I go into the first place, you know, I have a hat on. I, you know, have my hair down, have my, you know, hyaluronic acid and everything. Help me go in, get my quote, and come out. Oh, my God.
You know, the mirror that flips down. It was insane. So then, you know, put a little hyaluronic down.
OK, yeah. Looks good. Go to the next place.
You know, same thing. It was like, your skin just sucks it in because it’s just dry. It little sample of hyaluronic acid that got me through my five stops. And, you know, then I went home and then just slathered myself up with Emu Oil and Aquaphor and probably didn't go anywhere the rest of the day.
But I just remember thinking, like, I was so confident, like, oh, yeah, “this looks great. It's great.”
I like it very much.
Then you come out, and you're like, oh…
There's only like 20 minutes…
Oh, this stuff is like fanning out from your mouth, and it looks awful.
Oh, my gosh. You know, and it was crazy. But yeah, I just kept moisturizing with that a little bit and then got me through my visits.
Well, you know what? That makes me just think of one more kind of like closing thought on this, too, is like, you know, when you are getting that flake, you know, you don't want to peel it, right? You know, it's not like I don't know. You could use your nail to pinch off a piece. But the thing is, you never want to like pull against where it's peeling because that's where you know it's not just that dead skin. Now you're pulling. Oh, now that one was still attached.
And that's how you end up with PIE again, like you end up with that erythema, that pink mark. And it's going to take weeks or months to heal for sure. So you don't want to do that.
So, like my suggestion, if you're you know, you come home, you know, either A, you can, of course, take little manicure scissors and snip that off. But I feel like if you just wash your face and people who like are pickers and pullers, I'm like, “wash your face again.” You know, as long as you don't have super long nails or even if you have nails, that's not a problem as long as you're not like scratching your face. But just do like with your soapiness, your face soapy, and just do a little like circular motions.
And yeah, gently.
And the skin that's ready to come off?
For sure.
It's just it's going to come off, and you're not going to be pulling at it. Just gentle little circular motions, splash your face, and that will get a lot of that off. Then go ahead and lube back up again. And that will help you, like for people who feel like this, decide whether you can wash your face. I don't care if you wash your face five times that day; gently get some of that off.
It's so satisfying because your skin feels smoother. You can tell.
You feel so much, but you feel tight and crappy. And then when you don't have to, you're done washing your face. You feel so much better.
You're like, “Ah, I feel like I can move”. And then, you know, just try to trap that water in as much as you can. That's why I always grab for that hyaluronic, like just because it's hygroscopic. So it pulls moisture. It's pulling moisture from the air, from your body to your face. Put that on, trap it in with the oils.
And like if you're stuck at work or something, you know, get one of those little water mister spray bottles, you know, spray your face again, you know, kind of get that in there. Maybe you can reactivate the hyaluronic acid again; as long as it's on your skin, it will help. It will help.
It definitely will. You will get through it.
Yeah.
It's not fun or comfortable, but when you're done, some people do enjoy it.
Yeah.
Some people love watching that skin come off.
Remember, we used to have t-shirts that said, don't…
Yea we still do?
Oh, okay. Cause it was like, don't mind me. Like I'm in the midst of a chemical peel or something.
Yeah. We have those. There's, like, if you're on the website and you go to a page, I don't know, it says, like, clothing or shirts or something. And it's really just a link to where they print it off and mail it to you directly. We don't like to hold stock in those. It's just like a one-off, but yeah, those are cute shirts that tell you, like, so you would go out. So like, “I'm just peeling, you know?”
Right. Yeah. Don't mind me.
Yeah. Yeah. There it is. Yeah. The peeling skin, t-shirts, bags, mugs, and leggings. Yeah. You can get it. Anything with the cute little things to at least alert people. If you're, like, wearing a t-shirt where you're going, “I'm peeling.”
I remember someone in the group recently said something like, "Oh, they wanted a shirt that didn't say' consistency is key. '" '" Or it said something, or might've said something. “Don't mind me, I'm peeling” as well. Like somebody else said that. And it made me think of these.
Yeah.
In the past. And actually, my, my, I just talked to the marketing guy the other day, and he's like, “You want me to design some new shirts for you?” I'm thinking “probably.”
Yeah. Let's update on those that have been on there for like, who knows how long.
Look at all that stuff.
Yeah.
There's a lot of fun stuff.
I didn't even realize all that was on there.
I know we had a little contest with the artists, and they came up with a few different designs. We just picked some of them and thought it was fun, but they're all peeling.
That is fun. And it's a good conversation piece with your girlfriends. You know, like I have gone out to dinner on occasion, and you know, you're like, “Oh great. I'm supposed to go with my girlfriends out to dinner, and I'm looking all wrinkled up.” And you know, so you give them the little, like, “Hey, don't mind me. I did a chemical.”
“What did you do? Can you get me a chemical?” Yes, I can.
And I've worn my shirt. I've worn my shirt to work. I have every single one of them. So yeah, I will wear them if I'm peeling. If I think of it, I'm like, yeah, I'm going to grab that shirt.
Yeah, for sure. Make an announcement before they say anything, but most of the time, people aren't looking anyway. No, it's like we feel the need to, you know, give them the little, “Hey, don't look at me.” And then they look.
If you hadn't said anything, they would have just been like, “Oh, hi, how's it going?”
Yeah.
So if you have a funny story, like, let's say you were at the grocery store, buying a car, whatever, buying granite, like if something funny happened and you like, realize that, like, tell us about it, comment below, and tell us what was, uh, what was funny and what happened to you? Were you scared?
Right. Yeah. We can all relate to those stories.
It'd be fun to give everybody a laugh so we can all, you know, feel like a group.
Yeah. Yeah.
That'll be fun. I love it.
And of course, if you have any other questions, comments, or whatever, reach out to us at support@platinumskincare.com or call us Monday through Friday at 1-800-917-3155.
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And of course, if you have more questions, view all of our videos, but here's a great one to get you started. Our after-chemical peel care video has lots of Q&A for you. Yes.
Enjoy.
