Winter Lip Care: Complete Winter Skin Care Tips from Murad

Winter often means significant changes to your skin care routine and the skin care products you use. Many of us need to be more responsible about both hydration and using a great skin moisturizer when the air around us becomes drier as winter sets in. One area of winter skin care that often gets overlooked is lip care. Your lips can be among the first areas to suffer from the drier air and harsher weather conditions in winter. Just like with your face, taking some extra precautions to ensure that you have beautiful, healthy lips all winter long can pay off in both the short and long term.

Winter Lip Care Tip: Understand the Difference Between Lip Treatment and Lip Protection
One of the most important things you can do to ensure healthy lips in winter is to understand the difference between a lip treatment and lip protection. This is true whether you’re using women’s skin care products or men’s skin care products. Lip protection is a lip balm or thicker lip covering that is designed to protect your lips from the elements. It’s typically waxier in consistency and may not simultaneously treat or moisturize your lips. Most important, since you will most likely wear it outdoors, it should include sun protection. A lip treatment is a formula you apply to moisturize or repair your lips. It can also be worn outside, but may not protect your lips from the elements as effectively. During the winter, stock up on a form of lip protection as well as a lip treatment. Wear your lip protection outdoors, and switch to your lip treatment when you come in from the cold!

Winter Lip Care Tip: Hydrate Externally and Internally
Much like the skin on your face and body, your lips require extra moisture during the winter months to avoid drying and chapping. Of course, a moisturizing lip treatment is key, but eating and drinking enough water during the day to remain hydrated is also important. The cellular construction of water in fruit and many vegetables breaks down more slowly in your body, so keeping seasonal fresh fruit in your diet, as recommended in Dr. Murad’s best-selling book The Water Secret, can help your lips as well as your skin as a whole. A healthy diet will keep you feeling healthier overall during the long winter months.

Winter Lip Care Tip: Lipstick Is Not a Lip Treatment!
Just as an under-eye concealer may hide fine lines, dark circles or bags under your eyes but won’t heal or reduce those symptoms as effectively as an eye treatment cream, lipstick will not give you healthy lips. A cosmetic approach to healthy skin is not a solution, it’s simply a cover-up! How do you solve this dilemma while also wearing lipstick? Apply a moisture-rich lip treatment under your lipstick or a thicker lip protection balm on top of your lipstick when you’re headed out.

Winter is tough on your skin from top to bottom, but that doesn’t mean winter needs to “win.” Paying as much attention to your lips as you do the rest of your face by keeping them protected and moisturized can pay off in healthy, soft winter lips.

Click here to learn about Murad skin care products, including lip treatments and moisturizers that are great for winter weather.