Your Dark Spots Need a Peel, Not Another Serum

Sometimes when you're working on spotting, you know, like I was saying, it's not always the same layer under layer. You know, people are like, I have more spots now that I did the peel. No, no, you don't. It's just spots that were further down in different places; as you're exfoliating, they're coming up, coming up, coming up. Well, now get them off. And then the more come up, and as long as you're using things, you know, like DNA repair enzymes, vitamin C, melanin inhibitors, you're going to reduce that damage. And at some point, that skin is going to come up nice and clear and beautiful, and then just keep on top of it and protect it, and you're going to have beautiful skin. Just start training.

All right, so it is peel season, as we know, we've been doing tons of podcasts regarding, you know, which acid is best for you and all kinds of different things. But today we're going to focus strictly on peels for pigmentation.

Yeah, that's a big problem for a lot of people out there. I think it's obviously one of the biggies.

For sure. And now, since, you know, here our summer is almost over, which is sad, but, you know, a lot of places don't have the four seasons as we do here in Michigan. So it's sunny sometimes year-round, all the time, right?

Yeah.

Maybe rainy year-round, depending on where you are.

Right.

But neither here nor there, if you have experienced pigmentation, you know, notice more pigmentation over the course of the last three months. If somebody is ready to dive in and really wants to work on pigmentation with chemical peels, let's break that down and help guide them through a nice peel series.

Yeah. And I feel like this is probably other than wrinkles. I mean, this is the number one thing that people are always having problems with. I understand that just as much or more than anybody, because I have melasma, hyperpigmentation, and, you know, with melasma, you get like big blotches of it, and peels can really help. Obviously, your daily products play a huge role, and you need your melanin inhibitors and stuff, but peels can really help it along. They can at least help remove what's on the surface.

And if you're continually doing peels, then, you know, you can maybe keep on top of this as long as you're staying out of the sun, wearing your SPF 50, shading your face, I think you're going to do well. So I think some of my favorites for, let's say, somebody that doesn't want to see a lot of flaking, right? Let's just start there. Like, I don't want to see any flaking. I have to go to work. I'm a nurse, things like that. I would generally recommend the Lactic 50. And I know the number's high, but that doesn't mean it's strong. Lactic is a very comfortable peel. You're not going to be really seeing anything. You might get a little hint of dryness. You know, you're not going to have flakes all over, nothing along those lines. So this is something that you can do weekly or every other week. I think a lot of people like to do every other week if they like to use their retinoids, because just like even the stronger peels, you still have to stop your retinoid use four to six days prior. So if you want to work that in, want to do that every other week, if that's not a concern for you, because really there's not much downtime. Some people, they might not get any flaking at all. You might be able to do your peel, and somebody like you learns your skin. Maybe it's like, you know, three days, four days, you're done.

You know, you can go back, use your retinoids for the rest of the week. Next week, do it again. Just, you know, find what works best for you for sure. Put it on and give it, you know, six to 10 days. Let's see, do you have dryness? Where's your flaking? When is your skin fully healed? That way, you know which regimens will work best for you. But lactic is well, well known, right? For helping with hyperpigmentation, and you'll find it in other peels like Jessner because it's beneficial for hyperpigmentation, but I really like this one; it doesn't matter if you have dry skin, normal skin, oily skin- anybody can use this.

Got it. So that's a great starting point. If you do not want to see a lot of visible peeling, you don't want any downtime. That's one of the options.

Any downtime. Now, one of my pretty much favorites, though, is Mandelic. We have the 22 and the 40. And I actually find that this one doesn't sting as much as lactic. Lactic stings a little bit more than this one.

Lactic does have a little bit of a bite.

It does, surprisingly so. So this one feels a little bit more gentle when you're applying it, but you might see some flakes. You definitely are probably going to have some dryness. Definitely are, probably. Yeah, you will probably have some dryness for, you know, maybe three, four days after, up to like five, six days. I have seen people get a good deal of flaking, though, surprisingly so.

It depends on your skin, because you might get more flaking or even a little peeling with your first peel.

Yeah. And then it kind of calms down.

As you go, it kind of, like, your skin almost acclimates, and you get a little bit of that dead skin off at the first peel or two, and then it kind of evens itself out.

It does. And I mean, I really like this one. So somebody came to me, and they have sensitive skin. It's okay if they can handle a little bit of dryness, a couple of flakes here and there. I would say, hey, do Mandelic. And like lactic, you can do this once a week. You can do this once every two weeks. Just kind of do that first week or first couple of weeks and see what your timeframe is. Some people will tell me, you know, three to five days, they're done. Other people, I've had someone tell me, you know, six, seven, eight days, they still have some dryness and flaking. So you've got to find out before you, you know, decide if you're gonna do this weekly or every other week, but the key is to just keep doing it. And this is excellent for hyperpigmentation. It's excellent for melasma.

Like a series of eight?

Well, yeah, I always say six to eight, but yeah, eight preferably. And then, you know, there's always a question of, like, well, what happens after that eighth one? Like, do I have to stop? How long do I have to stop? You don't really have to stop, right? You can continue if you are not happy with your results yet. Go ahead and keep going, you know, or some people like to take a break for a couple of weeks, two, three weeks, a month, and then do another series. It's up to you. But a lot of times I find that people are, they start, they've been taking their pictures, they're seeing some change. They don't want to stop, right? They just want to keep going because you keep going, use your daily actives, your melanin inhibitors, to target that and keep going with your peels, and you will see huge changes.

Oh, yes.

Now I wanted to talk about this one too, because, okay, this is our dream peel. This is vitamin A, but there's also a huge amount of vitamin C in this. And as we all know, vitamin C is wonderful for, like, brightening and evening your skin tone, which is why I pulled this. So, just like retinoids can help turn things over more quickly, this helps to turn things over. But that vitamin C, that's a huge amount of vitamin C. So this could be another, you know, superstar. This is once a month. And I think a lot of people like this one because it doesn't sting at all when you put it on. And you get- some people get a lot of flaking; some people don't get a lot of flaking. It's kind of hard to say whether you're getting flaking or not; it's still working. Like, you don't have to have an excessive amount of downtime. I think most people do get that all over, kind of like you did, like a milder peel, like a Mandelic, or like folliculitis, Face Dandruff, that's good, but like rolling.

Yeah. Like if you had, like, soap or oil or something and you were, like, rolling it, you would get little balls of skin. You're just getting, it's not huge, not big, heavy flaking, but it's flaking everywhere.

But like I get quite a bit of flaking with that, and some people do. And I kind of found that people who are long-term tretinoin, Retin-A users, they will get less flaking with this than someone who is not on a daily or even weekly regimen with, you know, retinol or tretinoin.

True. And, you know, like we normally recommend this goes on like one night; maybe your first time, test your sensitivity because it's kind of like a delayed reaction, right? It could be like two, three days later, and all of a sudden you feel like you have a sunburn, but it felt like nothing when you put it on. That's kind of what happens with high vitamin A. So one night to start, two nights the next month, you can work up to three nights if you want.

Sure.

People who take prescription retinoids might be able to do four nights. I'm not, I'm not saying you can't do four or even more potentially. I don't; there's not really a stop. There's a recommendation, but everybody's skin's different, and I've even seen them peel from this. Like they're like, I've been on, you know, 0.1 tretinoin for 10 years and I peel when I put that on. And then you have somebody say, well, I don't peel at all, but my skin looks great and smooth, and it's so glowy. And we're like, keep it up. You don't have to be peeling all over. So this could be a great one too.

Absolutely.

And then if we want to do stronger, you know, I would say usually when I talk to people, at least, and I know that maybe they've been using Mandelic for a while, they've been using Lactic for a while, and it's working, but it's not enough. And they really want to go for a heavy hitter.

Looking for something stronger.

Then you have to move into a layered peel. And there are a couple of acids, you know, we have TCA layered, Jessner's is layered, and Jessner is probably the most sought-after acid. Suppose you're going to be doing hyperpigmentation, because it's a combination of acids, and it's salicylic and resorcinol and Lactic again, like I was saying, Lactic's in here. So the reaction of those three acids, you know, works wonderfully, and you can layer this, you know, starting at, you know, two layers. I think most people do; you can work your way up. There's really no ending with Jessner's. Like, you could be like five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10 layers. You just, just work your way up. But I really like this one. It's a one-time-per-month peel. I think most people who try Jessner really like it. I'm sure there are a few that are like, " It's not working, but I hear really good things. I see really good photos. So like if you've been doing one of the milder peels and you're ready to kind of move up in strength, this is a great one.

And I know that, like, I have TCA here. TCA can also be used for hyperpigmentation. We have a lot of people that do that. And I think the people that tend to go for this one are the people that are also trying to work on wrinkles at the same time, right? So TCA, obviously, all of the acids help with skin turnover. So we can use TCA by itself, or we can, you know, if you get into the advanced peels, you can do Jessner plus TCA, which I really love, or plus the Dream Peel.

I have a question about the Jessner. And this question comes up often. If somebody is working on pigmentation and they opt to buy the Jessner, they're still going to get anti-aging benefits from the Jessner, correct?

Right.

Yes.

Obviously. Yeah. Anything that forces a controlled wound or forces your skin to regenerate itself.

Yes.

I mean, yeah, this is great for acne. This is great for hyperpigmentation because of the acids in here, but all acids are good for aging and just your skin's health in general. Like, people who do peels have much healthier skin because we're just forcing that turnover: regenerate, regrow. And so we have, like, fresher, newer skin on top, and we just have that lovely glow that somebody who doesn't do peels just doesn't have. But yeah, this is going to help stimulate collagen and all of those good things. Like TCA, yeah, nothing, nothing beats TCA. It's like the number one really for collagen and elastin. But all of these acids do help a little bit subtly.

I had a customer this morning who was working on pigmentation. She purchased the TCA 13. Then she started watching some videos, and she was like, oh…

I think I got the wrong one.

I think I got the wrong one. Is this not going to work for me? And I said, well, no, absolutely. I mean, this is going to serve its purpose. You have it there. Go ahead, start with one to two layers. You're still going to get benefits with anti-aging as well as help with pigmentation because it's still going to exfoliate the skin. All of those things, all those check marks are going to be, you know, clicked. And I think she did buy the Jessner as she progressed, so maybe she could alternate and then start piggybacking them together as an advanced peel down the line.

Yeah. I mean, I think like for another advanced peel, like Jessner plus the Dream Peel.

Right.

I mean, like, how excellent is that?

For sure.

Or Jessner plus TCA plus Dream Peel. But like, you know, that's where the progression is. So we've got everything from the very mildest.

Yes.

Lowest downtime, lactic, and then mandelic. And then our Dream Peel, our Jessner, our TCA- all of these are going to work wonderfully for hyperpigmentation. I will just say, you know, with with melasma, be a little bit more relaxed with your, you know, what you anticipate changing. Things will change, and things will get better. But melasma is a battle you don't win with peels alone. You know, it's just something that's it's by your hormones are causing the problem. It's not necessarily, you know, you're out getting sun all the time. So that's going to take a little longer, and you might need to be a little bit more aggressive. Because I know there are areas that I have that, you know, they're there.

Another question I just thought of: if someone has a new pigmentation spot, let's say they never had a spot on the side of their face and now all of a sudden they notice, oh my gosh, you know, after the summer of boating or what have you, now I have this new spot. If they treat that spot, either a spot treatment or an all-over treatment, if they try to attack that right away, are their results going to be better than if they wait two, three years and go, oh, now I have a little bit more. Like, so if they're trying to treat a fresh pigmentation spot, are they going to get better results? That's, I guess, my question.

I think no matter what, it doesn't matter how old those marks are.

Right.

Right. You know, they're new.

But if they’re new, I think it might come off more quickly.

Okay.

I do believe that will come off more quickly. I mean, no matter what, a mark is created deep below and works its way up. So I don't know when, when, when the mark is at its surface. Obviously that's going to come off really easily, and it might be a different shape below it. The next layer below might have moved over, might be irregular, but for sure, you know, if you think about it like that, where it was created deep down and worked its way up, I think they're all going to come off. It's just a matter of time. And I know we just had, we just had an email that just went out the other day. I think I saw it this morning with a girl. She had all the freckling on her back, and she did one peel, and a good deal of it was, like, probably a third of it was gone. It was like, wow. You know, you don't realize how much damage. So, so like, I also don't want people to be fearful. Like, if you have so much hyperpigmentation, so many spots around me, do the peels. I mean, you're going to probably see an amazing transformation after like one peel. And then just keep going, keep taking your photos and keep documenting.

Because, you know, sometimes when you're working on spotting, you know, like I was saying, like it's not always the same layer under layer. You know, people are like, I have more spots now that I did the peel. No, no, you don't. It's just spots that were further down in different places; as you're exfoliating, they're coming up, coming up, coming up. Well, now get them off. And then more come up. And as long as we're using things, you know, like DNA repair enzymes, vitamin C, melanin inhibitors, you're going to reduce that damage. And at some point, that skin is going to come up nice and clear and beautiful. And then just keep on top of it and protect it. And you're going to have beautiful skin. Just start treating.

Perfect. So basically, a good rule of thumb is to be consistent, stay the course, take your photos, and do a series of six to eight peels.

At least.

At least.

Yep. 

 And then just go for it.

Yeah.

Well, good. If you have any other questions or, you know, we think of something that we haven't covered.

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