Thursday, March 29, 2007

Sleep Wrinkles

Ok, maybe some of you know about this, but I learned a new one this week. I’ve always learned that our skin healed itself during our sleep. I had no idea that the way we sleep can add wrinkles to our skin--- permanently!

It seems that one day those pillow wrinkles that those of us who sleep on our sides wake up with will eventually become permanent (is that really a sentence? 18 years in the importing business leaves me at a lack of proper English sometimes ;) ). Now, I don’t know about you, but I’ve seen some friends with some very funny pillow lines on their face in the morning.. I’m having a good laugh imagining those permanently etched on their face ;).

The way this pillow wrinkle issue happens is similar to how the repetitiveness of facial movements eventually becomes permanent in crows feet & forehead wrinkles. After years of sleeping in the same position (on your side) every night, you will wake up one day & the pillow wrinkles won’t fade away. Yikes! I always sleep on my side!

These wrinkles tend to show up mostly on the cheeks & chin on women…and let’s not forget our cleavage (guiltily I’ll admit I’ve already started noticing that one L ). Apparently, you men tend to press your faces into the pillow, as men primarily get pillow wrinkles on their foreheads.

So, how do we try to evade this problem? I’m not sure I can get used to sleeping on my back, but perhaps we should all give it a try…although we may all need nose strips for snoring then; but , hey, it’s better than wrinkles, right?

The choice in your pillowcase can make a difference also. It seems that cotton pillowcases cause this problem more than a silk or satin pillowcase. I can see how the slippery surface of a satin pillowcase would work. My mother has slept on satin pillowcases all of her life (she takes one everywhere she goes & even slips it on over hotel pillowcases) to protect her hair (oh how I remember the days of her hair wrapped in toilet paper too ;) ). Maybe this (partially) explains why my mother looks so gorgeous at 73! While intending to save her hair, she's also saved her skin.

I gotta ‘borrow’ one of those pillowcases when I go home next time!

Apparently there are now 'Sleep Bras' available for women to keep our breasts apart during sleeptime...helping to eliminate cleavage wrinkling. The best site I found was www.sleepbra.com . This pillow has a breast pillow inside the bra. Who knew that my breasts needed pillows to sleep on also?? I was always told that they made good pillows, not needed pillows :P. Anybody own a sleep bra & feel it works (and want to share with us)?

Of course, we could all just start sleeping less too ;).

3 comments:

Unknown said...

I just saw ( on the NBC Today Show) that using a satin pillow case keeps wrinkles away.. who would have thought. It it is because of the copper content in satin. I am going to try it

Paulett said...

My Mom always told me to sleep on a satin pillowcase to help avoid pillow wrinkles. She did and her skin looked so smooth her whole life. My hairdresser says that during the night your face gets caught on a cotton pillowcase and you get those pillow creases on your face in the morning. Cotton just absorbs the moisture from your skin and your hair. Moisture that your skin needs to avoid wrinkles and moisture that your hair needs to be healthy.

I found a company on the web, A Touch Of Satin, that has a page that talks about all the benefits of sleeping on satin. Here's a link to the page if you want to read what they have to say. I purchased a set of satin pillowcases from them and I couldn't be happier.
http://www.atouchofsatin.com/benefits_of_sleeping_on_satin

Well, I hope this helps and thanks for the great information. You really bring up some very interesting points! Wrinkles are a problem, that if dealt with correctly, can be greatly reduced or avoided!

Joy said...

Yes, I agree,it's true that sleep lines turn into permanant wrinkles on your face. Theres a physician developed material that can help. It's called the DreamSkin Pillowcase and it's the first and only one of it's kind and is really soft.