Fruity Beauty

Stretch

If it wasn’t enough to have all of the internal changes going on in your body, and the emotional ones in your head, pregnancy will also show itself on your skin.  Some people will be lucky enough to glow throughout their 9 months, but even these women will probably encounter other skin issues along the way from conception to birth!

Any area of your skin that is has pigmentation to it, such as facial freckles or even the skin around your armpits, will become darker.  It may not even be that noticeable under normal conditions, but once your pregnant, the pigmentation will deepen.  You’ll find that this is even more evident after you’ve been out in the sun so it’s imperative that you use a good sun block (one that blocks UVA as UVA can actually penetrate through to the baby!) when going out in the sun.  A more visible display of pigmentation change on the face is known as chloasma, also known as a “mask of pregnancy” and the neck, cheeks and bridge of the nose are the affected areas which turn a shade of brown.  You can’t do anything to get rid of chloasma until after the baby is born when it will fade by itself, but you can use some form of blemish covering make-up to tone it down if not cover it completely.

One of the problems that arises on a pregnant woman’s face is spider veins.  These occur because of the blood vessels that constrict and dilate depending on your body temperature are more sensitive during pregnancy, and when these tiny blood vessels break they leave a mark known as spiders veins.  Don’t worry about them though; they usually fade quickly once the baby is born.

Stretch marks are something that pregnant women dread, and they are mostly unavoidable.  Some women will have them but as they are so fine they can’t be seen unless they’re looking for them, other women will either spend their pregnancy covering them up with clothes and/or cosmetics, or alternatively wearing them like a badge of pride!  The overall elasticity of the skin is largely what determines how much skin damage you will incur from stretch marks, so it’s more a question of what you can do to improve that elasticity before you become pregnant, rather than once baby’s already in the making!  One thing you can do during the pregnancy however is to follow a good nutritional diet because quick excessive weight gain will test even skin with great elasticity!  Massaging oils and lotions into stomach once the baby has been born will help encourage the skin back into its normal state, and in most cases stretch marks fade over time until they are hardly noticeable silvery lines.

Pregnancy affects a woman’s body in both a positive and negative way as the changes in hormone levels rise and fall.  The best way to get through the pregnancy without being stressed out about the way these changes affect your appearance is to follow skincare routines that promote wellbeing in your skin, and accept the things that are going to happen as being outside of your control.  Remember, as long as the baby’s healthy, you can live with the process!  Right?