What Happens When You Switch to Simple Skincare
Share
Truthfully, nothing dramatic happened when I switched to tallow. My skin did not freak out, it just slowly got better. But I hear from enough people who do hit a rough patch when they simplify that I wanted to explain what is going on, so a couple of hard weeks does not scare you off something good.
Here is something no one warns you about when you simplify your skincare. Sometimes your skin gets worse before it gets better. You strip your routine down, switch to something clean and simple, and instead of the instant glow you hoped for, you get a week or two of congestion or breakouts. Most people panic, decide the new thing is breaking them out, and run back to the old routine. That is the mistake. Here is what is actually happening, and how to know whether to hold on or let go.
First, the myth of purging
You have probably heard the word purging, the idea that a product has to break you out before it clears you up. It is real, but it is misunderstood, and knowing the truth protects you from being fooled.
True purging only happens with active ingredients that speed up your skin's cell turnover, like retinoids and exfoliating acids. They push the clogs already forming under your skin to the surface faster, so you break out sooner than you would have, then clear. That is genuine purging, and it runs about one skin cycle, four to six weeks.
Here is the part brands do not tell you. Tallow and honey are not actives. They do not speed up your cell turnover. So if you break out after switching to a simple tallow product, it is usually not purging in that strict sense at all. Which means the honest question is not how long to wait for a purge. It is what is actually going on.
What is really happening when you simplify
Usually one of a few things, and none of them is your new product being evil.
Your skin is rebalancing. If you spent years stripping your skin with harsh cleansers and actives, it likely got into the habit of overproducing oil to compensate (link). When you stop stripping it, it takes a few weeks to recalibrate, and during that adjustment you can look oilier or more congested than usual. That is not the product failing. That is your skin relearning how to regulate itself.
Or it is a coincidence. Hormones, stress, and your cycle break you out on their own schedule, and sometimes one lands right as you switch products (link). And sometimes it is simply that you are using too much. If you are coming from products that are mostly water, a little goes a lot further than you are used to, and a heavy hand can be too much at first. Start light. As your skin rebalances and its microbiome recovers, you may find you want a little more later on, and by then your skin can handle it.
Give it real time
Here is what I have learned making these products. Good skin is not instant, and neither is the right fit. It took me a full year of adjusting my day cream before I truly loved it. A year. So if your skin takes a few weeks to settle into something new, that is not failure, that is normal.
Give it a full skin cycle, about four weeks, before you decide anything. Keep the amount light and let your skin catch up. Most of the time, the result that scared you in week one is gone by week four, and what is left is skin that finally got the time it needed.
The honest part
A lot of brands will call any reaction purging, because purging means keep using the product, which means keep buying it. I am not going to do that. Simple skincare often does come with a short adjustment as your skin rebalances, and that is worth waiting out. But if your skin is genuinely unhappy, that is real information, and you should trust it. Give it a fair, patient chance. Just do not let anyone, including me, tell you to ignore your own skin.
Once I decided to be a purist about what I put on my skin, nothing could deter me, which is exactly why I spent so long on different formulations before landing on the ones I love. In a world built on instant gratification, I have learned the best things are the ones that take time and patience.
Where we land
Simplifying your skincare is a little like detoxing from anything. There can be a rough patch before the payoff. Use a little less than you think, give it a full skin cycle, and watch which direction it is trending.
We need to spend less time fighting our skin and more time supporting it. Tallow is genuinely good for you, so even if you are not sold on it for your face, let it work on the rest of you. Your body is far more skin than your face, which makes it the bigger place to cut down on the toxins you absorb every day.