A veteran magazine beauty editor/writer (and a member of the 40+ club), Genevieve Monsma created MediumBlonde to help Gen Xers and Baby Boomers age the way they want.
All in Skin
I woke up one morning last winter with tiny bumps all over one eyelid. At first, I thought the smattering was just crumbly, pilling eye-shadow I’d neglected to remove the night before. But no, the bumps were definitely attached to me. And as I peered at them in the bathroom mirror, I suddenly realized what they were. Ugh: milia.
Prior to the demise of More Magazine, I was researching a story for the August issue on the most flattering makeup in your forties, fifties, sixties, etc. I figured the makeup artists I was interviewing would advise choosing a more hydrating foundation as you got deeper into menopause—or maybe they’d suggest sweeping on a brighter blush to counteract increased sallowness. What I wasn’t expecting was to hear this. . .
If you’ve ever tried Retin-A (or one of its many cousins: Renova, Avita, Tazorac, generic tretinoin, etc.), you know the usage downsides: redness, flaking, stinging. Some MDs will tell you to just push through the irritation period (and walk around with a flushed, flakey face for months)—or to wait thirty minutes after you cleanse to apply. However, I don’t know about you, but by the time I get around to washing my face at night, I'm beat. No way I’m delaying bed for another half hour.
Applying bronzer hardly seems like something that requires instructions. You sweep a big, fluffy brush over copper-colored powder. Dust it over your face. Done.
Not quite.
As I write this, my face is slathered in Fresh Vitamin Nectar Vibrancy Boosting Mask ($62; fresh.com).
I had oily skin in my teens and twenties. I was even on Accutane in college to stem my skin’s over-abundant sebum flow and clear up my chronic acne. So, for me, for years, oil was the enemy.
When a beauty product is billed as maximum-strength, I’m in. Why waste time with something that provides moderate results when a super-charged formula gets you to the finish line quicker? Not so fast.
I got my ears pierced in kindergarten. Thus, my lobes spent nearly four decades supporting oversized hoops, dangly plastic circles (hello, ‘80s) and chandelier earrings. By my late thirties, my earring holes had morphed into stretched-out slits, and the diamond studs my husband gave me as an anniversary present drooped from my ears like wilted flowers.
Last spring, I made a desperate, early-morning run to Sephora on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. What I walked out with surprised me...
Most of us are pretty good about investing time and money into taking care of the skin on our faces—but anything south of the neck? It gets short-shrift.
