Episode 26: All The Ways You Can Treat Redness

Hannah Furst:
Hi everyone, Hannah here. The world is pretty weird at the moment, and it's hard to think about anything else. So I want to take a moment before we get started to acknowledge what's happening and talk about it for a minute. As far as our podcast goes, unless you tell us otherwise, we are going to stick with the regular programming for now. We know that skin care is absolutely not serious compared to everything else that's going on, but I think we could probably all use a little distraction.

Hannah Furst:
We know that podcasts like these can offer a welcome escape during these uncertain times. In saying that, if there's any content you want us to cover during this time, related or not to the current Coronavirus situation, please don't hesitate to reach out to us via Instagram @adorebeauty. The whole team at Adore sends you our best wishes. Please stay safe, listen to the experts, and be kind to each other.

Hannah Furst:
Welcome everybody to Beauty IQ the podcast.

Joanna Flemming:
I'm your host, Joanna Flemming.

Hannah Furst:
And I am your co-host, Hannah Furst.

Hannah Furst:
Welcome back everybody.

Joanna Flemming:
To another episode.

Hannah Furst:
Another episode.

Joanna Flemming:
Finishing each other's sentences, look at us.

Hannah Furst:
I know. There's a couple of things to update you on content wise.

Joanna Flemming:
This sounds like an internal [crosstalk 00:01:07].

Hannah Furst:
So basically there's been quite a few comments on social, and some messages that we've received that says, "Can you list all of the products that you talk about in one place?" So we've done it.

Joanna Flemming:
I mean they were in the episode notes, but still.

Hannah Furst:
They were in the episode notes, but we actually now have it is adorebeauty.com.au/podcast. Super easy to remember. You can basically go there, if you are a new customer that's never shopped with us before, you'll also get $15 off.

Joanna Flemming:
Bonus.

Hannah Furst:
Yeah, bonus. So check that out on the landing page, as well as all of the episodes listed. And if you click into the episode, you'll have a list of products that we spoke about, but you can go to the episode notes if you want.

Joanna Flemming:
Or you could just type it into the search bar, that works too.

Hannah Furst:
And the other thing that we've been working on together is we've got some video content.

Joanna Flemming:
Oh I didn't know what you were going to say there, what have we been working on?

Hannah Furst:
We've been working on some YouTube videos, which I've spoken a lot about my haircare routine for my sister's wedding, I was about to say my wedding, but my sister's wedding. I actually recorded a video of all the products that I used, and how you actually use those products to get that really sleek-

Joanna Flemming:
Shiny, glossy hair.

Hannah Furst:
You said it was the best I've ever looked.

Joanna Flemming:
It was.

Hannah Furst:
Yeah. If you go to our YouTube channel it's Adore Beauty, I think you just type that in. And then coming out this week is Joanna's done a video on Retinal and Vitamin A. So you can actually go and have a look if you want to learn more about it.

Joanna Flemming:
We're just content queens. We're just churning out the content. We live for the content.

Hannah Furst:
Literally. So now you can get us in video form on Adore Beauty's YouTube.

Joanna Flemming:
So if you don't feel like the episode on Monday's enough, you can go onto YouTube on Tuesday.

Hannah Furst:
And if you have that YouTube subscription you can just listen to it. You can simulate your own podcast session in the car.

Joanna Flemming:
Exactly. You're exactly right.

Hannah Furst:
What's the subscription called? It's called YouTube ...

Joanna Flemming:
I don't know.

Hannah Furst:
I was about to say Red Tube, that's a porn site.

Joanna Flemming:
And on that note ...

Hannah Furst:
On that note, what's on this episode?

Joanna Flemming:
So on today's episode we are talking about ingrown hairs, that's been highly requested. And we're also talking about all the ways you can treat redness. And of course our PWDKWN, products we didn't know we needed, for anyone that's new to this podcast.

Hannah Furst:
So ingrown hairs.

Joanna Flemming:
So my ex-boyfriend had this massive ingrown hair in his groin region that was there for months, and months, and months, and you know me, you know what I'm like, I'll get anyone's blackhead out.

Hannah Furst:
You'll get like a scalpel and do surgery.

Joanna Flemming:
I've gotten a blackhead out of people's backs at work. If I see one, I will get it out for you, it could be anyone.

Hannah Furst:
She did offer to squeeze a pimple on my back once.

Joanna Flemming:
I did, and I would happily do it again.

Hannah Furst:
You would have done it. Would you have used a tissue at least?

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah. Yeah, I would have used a tissue on my fingertips, and I would have used hand sanitizer, and then washed my hands obviously. So yeah, he had this massive ingrown hair, and I remember extracting it out when we were in Hawaii, and it honestly was the longest-

Hannah Furst:
Please don't do that at home.

Joanna Flemming:
It was two hairs, yeah don't do it at home. But it was two hairs, and it was so satisfying. And then it made me miss getting ingrown hairs-

Hannah Furst:
Oh, two hairs.

Joanna Flemming:
... because I used to get them all the time from waxing.

Hannah Furst:
Oh my God, yeah. So I've had long ones come out like that before. But okay so I heard a story, maybe it was my ex-boyfriend, not my ex that I talk about from the wedding, the one before that. I think it was one of his friends or something, I remember him telling me that they had to get surgery on their butt to get an ingrown cut out because it was so infected.

Joanna Flemming:
Really? Wow.

Hannah Furst:
Yeah.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah.

Hannah Furst:
They can be dangerous.

Joanna Flemming:
They can be.

Hannah Furst:
They can get really infected.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, they can. So I asked a friend, an ex-colleague of mine, Kristie Phillips, she's now a cosmetic nurse, she works at Hope Dermatology. And I knew she knew heaps about ingrown hairs, because she used to do the laser at the clinic that I worked at, so she came across it all the time. And I asked her exactly what is an ingrown hair and how do we treat them? So she explained that it's a foreign body inflammatory response to ingrown hairs, which can happen anywhere. It can happen in both guys and girls, and it's when the hair is shaved, waxed, plucked or tweezed. And it's when the cut hair retracts beneath the skin's surface. So I guess that kind of ... does that make sense?

Hannah Furst:
Yeah, it makes sense because especially I would get more ingrown hairs when I shaved.

Joanna Flemming:
Yes, but she did also mention that it's more common in people with curly hair.

Hannah Furst:
Well that's me.

Joanna Flemming:
But also that kind of explains why you get them in your pube area, because they're like curly hairs.

Hannah Furst:
Yeah, that totally makes sense.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, I haven't had pubes in so long, I'm trying to remember what it was like.

Hannah Furst:
It makes sense that it's not growing upwards, it's actually growing sideways.

Joanna Flemming:
Because it's curly.

Hannah Furst:
Yeah.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, so it's like curling back on itself and can cause an inflammatory response.

Hannah Furst:
I'm just having such flashbacks about ingrown pubes.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah.

Hannah Furst:
They're so horrible. It's like a bit bump.

Joanna Flemming:
But also kind of satisfying.

Hannah Furst:
No because it gets to a point where you can't get it out.

Joanna Flemming:
Oh yeah, I quite enjoyed it. But I haven't had them in so long I can't remember the trauma of it.

Hannah Furst:
I had a really bad, you would never do this at home, I used to just pick at it until it scabbed, and then the scab would usually get the hair to the surface and it would pull it out.

Joanna Flemming:
Okay.

Hannah Furst:
I would not recommend doing that, because [crosstalk 00:06:19].

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, don't. That's not a professional-

Hannah Furst:
[crosstalk 00:06:22] for infection.

Joanna Flemming:
Yes, exactly. So apparently the best solution according to Kristie is laser hair removal, of course because she used to do it in clinic.

Hannah Furst:
Totally, yep.

Joanna Flemming:
So she used to tell her patients that the laser will normalize the hair growth. So it helps because the hair's reduced and it's thinner, so that can improve.

Hannah Furst:
I've literally stopped getting them since I started getting laser.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, completely. I haven't had an ingrown hair, I mean I don't have anything there, but if I did, but I haven't had an ingrown hair in so long.

Hannah Furst:
And mine still grows back, because I'm still halfway through my treatments.

Joanna Flemming:
You're in an early phase, yep.

Hannah Furst:
But really it's reduced, like I hardly get them now.

Joanna Flemming:
But if you don't want to have laser hair removal, which is totally fine, you can allow the hairs to fully grow out, which she said apparently no one ever wants to do. And then there's using a laser for a longer cut, shaving the direction of the hair growth is apparently a-

Hannah Furst:
I don't know what direction it grows it.

Joanna Flemming:
It could be wild, who knows.

Hannah Furst:
It's wild.

Joanna Flemming:
And then of course topical AHAs and BHAs, but obviously avoid any sensitive bits because that can help obviously it resurfaces the skin.

Hannah Furst:
So not right on there.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, so don't put it on your labia I guess is where she's going with that. Yeah, so that's her diagnosis and treatment. But I thought I'd ask an expert because it is more of a dermatological concern, is that how I would say it?

Hannah Furst:
Is she saying an electric razor?

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah.

Hannah Furst:
Rather than ...

Joanna Flemming:
For a longer cut, and then shave in the direction of the hair growth I think is what she's saying.

Hannah Furst:
Okay.

Joanna Flemming:
And you can also use Vitamin A, but again not on the sensitive areas. And if it doesn't resolve, or if you're getting-

Hannah Furst:
Also for youth.

Joanna Flemming:
And also if you are just really struggling with them and nothing seems to be working, go and see a dermatologist, that's her advice.

Hannah Furst:
So if you do have an ingrown hair though, you can go to your GP can't you?

Joanna Flemming:
You can probably go to a dermatologist to have it extracted or something.

Hannah Furst:
Because at a certain point I know that you need to get them surgically removed.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, so if it's infected or really inflamed and it's not resolved, definitely go and see your GP and get a referral to a dermatologist and then they can treat it from there.

Hannah Furst:
What's your worst ingrown hair story?

Joanna Flemming:
I had a really nasty one, I've actually still got a bit of post-inflammatory hyperpigmentation, like a little spot on my pubic area.

Hannah Furst:
Same. Same, I get it in there like the-

Joanna Flemming:
Mine's on the top.

Hannah Furst:
What do you call that, the crease?

Joanna Flemming:
Mine's like right at the top, but I remember having a really really nasty one, and it was there for weeks and weeks. And eventually I got rid of it, but it left a little scar there.

Hannah Furst:
And they can grow really big. I haven't had one in ages, but they grow big and they're like black.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, yes.

Hannah Furst:
Because you can see the black hair, and they're coiling.

Joanna Flemming:
Yes.

Hannah Furst:
Have you ever had a coiled one?

Joanna Flemming:
Yes.

Hannah Furst:
And it comes out and it is so long, like scary long.

Joanna Flemming:
Yes, that's what my ex-boyfriend's one was like, except it was two. It was amazing, I'll never forget it. I think I've still got a photo on my phone.

Hannah Furst:
I have found, because I started getting laser, because I was getting scars, well is that hyperpigmentation?

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah.

Hannah Furst:
On my stomach from ingrowns.

Joanna Flemming:
From ingrowns? Yeah, okay.

Hannah Furst:
Because I would wax it or pluck it.

Joanna Flemming:
Okay, yep.

Hannah Furst:
And so I'd end up they'd get ingrown and then I'd have a scar there. So I started getting laser, and that completely cleared it up.

Joanna Flemming:
Completely resolved it, yeah.

Hannah Furst:
Literally if you are prone to ingrowns, like I was prone to ingrowns having curly hair, it was like a game-changer.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, absolutely. Highly recommend laser hair removal don't we? I think we probably talk about it on every episode.

Hannah Furst:
I do. My only thing with it is if you wanted to grow back your bush, which like maybe I will one day, it's a little bit hard to reverse the effects of it.

Joanna Flemming:
Very true. But if you do end up having kids, your hormones can stimulate a bit of hair growth, so you might be able to grow it out, you never know. Yeah, any-who.

Hannah Furst:
It's also expensive I would say. I'm sick of paying for it.

Joanna Flemming:
It's certainly much more affordable than it used to be. Anyway, that's ingrown hairs.

Joanna Flemming:
So welcome to our next guess, Brooke Holmes from Me Skin and Body is here to chat all things redness. So Brooke, I've come in to have Laser Genesis with you, as most people who listen to the podcast will know, I have rosacea, and concerns with redness. And I've now had three sessions and I rave about it.

Brooke Holmes:
And look at your skin.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, exactly.

Brooke Holmes:
It's amazing.

Joanna Flemming:
So I wondered if you could tell us a little bit about redness. What causes it in the skin?

Brooke Holmes:
Yep, there are many causes, many influencing factors for redness. Some people are genetically predisposed due to their heritage and background. Lifestyle, pollution, eating certain foods, drinking coffee can stimulate the vascular networks in the skin and make them quite red over time, allergic reactions, sun exposure. Yeah, there are many things that can make the skin become red, and sometimes we can do everything that we feel is right as far as skincare goes, and it's just not working, so then we need to bring in the big guns like Laser Genesis.

Joanna Flemming:
Yes. So is there a particular skin type that's more prone to redness than others? I have mainly an Irish background, I won't go into my DNA test results, but it was mostly Irish. And I think rosacea for me is quite hereditary.

Brooke Holmes:
Definitely. So we find that generally people, we classify skin types as Fitzpatrick, so there's a scale that goes from one to six. You'd probably be sitting at about a two, which is fairly fair skin, dark hair, dark eyes, but your skin's quite pale. So people from English, Irish, Scottish sort of backgrounds tend to have more of a predisposition to rosacea and redness. But you can still see it in other background and skin types as well.

Hannah Furst:
Do you flush when you drink alcohol?

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, and I get hot as well. But I find that my biggest trigger is sun and heat.

Hannah Furst:
Yeah.

Joanna Flemming:
And exercise as well. I get a little bit flushed with exercise, but not too bad because I don't go too hard.

Hannah Furst:
You do Pilates, I don't think you're sweating too much in Pilates are you?

Joanna Flemming:
Oh when you come to one of my classes we'll see. So can you tell us how Laser Genesis works to treat redness or rosacea, and what is it?

Brooke Holmes:
What is Laser Genesis?

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah.

Brooke Holmes:
So basically Laser Genesis is a laser, it's a 1064 wavelength, so 1064 nanometer laser. It is attracted to the oxyhemoglobins in blood, which is basically the red pigment in your blood. So it's not attracted to pigment, or the water in your skin, like some lasers are. So essentially it heats the skin and shuts down the vessels in the area. Not all of them obviously, otherwise your skin would fall off. But yeah, it selectively shuts down the smaller vessels and helps to just essentially reduce that diffused redness that is associated with rosacea. So yeah, that's basically how it works.

Joanna Flemming:
Are there any other laser treatments that you can use for rosacea and redness?

Brooke Holmes:
There are, some people choose things like IPL, there are I think the V-beam's another one.

Joanna Flemming:
Yep.

Brooke Holmes:
Lots of different things. But we've found for us that Laser Genesis is the best for just your general diffused redness. Because A, there's no pain. B, there's no downtime. Everyone loves it, everyone comes back and time and time again is happy with the results. But also the machine that we have is the Cutera XLV, so that one of the hand pieces on that device does solely Laser Genesis. The other hand piece actually has a 532 and a 1064 wavelength laser beam on it, and you can target vessels. So small vessels, large vessels, we can really kind of break the skin down into areas and treat all kinds of vascular issues. It's the best vascular laser on the market.

Joanna Flemming:
So if you don't have diffused redness and you've got more like [crosstalk 00:14:07] capillaries that you can see, you can still treat it with that machine?

Brooke Holmes:
100%, yeah it's an amazing machine for that.

Hannah Furst:
What would be the difference between the redness that you get in your cheeks and the redness, I get redness, the only place I get redness is around my nose.

Brooke Holmes:
Yeah, so that's probably what you would just call your broken ... a lot of people call them broken capillaries, dilated vessels. Essentially it's just the vessel walls become weakened over time, and you could be blowing your nose a lot, hay fever sufferers get it. Some people that do a lot of extractions on their nose if they're prone to blackheads tend to get quite red, and lots of little obvious vessels on the nose. And you can just target that with the XLV and cauterize them and they're gone. Sometimes they come back, if you're prone to them they can come back. Also using things like Vitamin C can help to strengthen those vessel walls to prevent them from weakening over time, so that they're not as likely to come back. But yeah, lots of options.

Joanna Flemming:
It sounds like a super hectic treatment, but there's literally no downtime.

Brooke Holmes:
None.

Joanna Flemming:
I've only had the Laser Genesis part though, so is there any downtime for if you're targeting specific vessels?

Brooke Holmes:
There can be. So you can, look everyone's skin's different but you can get little scabs from when you've broke down a vessel, sometimes people can bruise. But those things all resolve in sometimes 24 to 48 hours, sometimes a little bit longer. If you're doing larger areas with say a 532 laser, like if someone comes in with really vascular sun damaged skin and you're treating their entire cheeks, even sometimes the nose and forehead, the wound healing response is going to be a little bit slower, especially if they're a little bit older. So you might get two or three days of downtime there where there's a bit of swelling in the area. But it's very manageable for pretty much everyone. And we can ice, we can recommend antihistamines. We give you the right aftercare to reduce that as well.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah. I was just so surprised that there was no downtime with Laser Genesis, I couldn't believe it.

Brooke Holmes:
And it doesn't hurt as well. [crosstalk 00:15:55].

Joanna Flemming:
Doesn't hurt at all. Why is that, why does it not hurt at all?

Brooke Holmes:
Well because it's pulsed as well, so we're not just holding that beam. It's a long wavelength laser, so it's going very deep in the skin. And if you're treating at that depth and you're just flashing slowly to the area, it will hurt. But because it's pulsed, so it's like you're waving the handpiece over the skin and it's pulsing into the skin, so yeah that's one way it doesn't really hurt that much. But a 1064 blast to the skin on an isolated vessel without any [inaudible 00:16:27] that will hurt.

Hannah Furst:
Did you get numbing cream?

Joanna Flemming:
No.

Brooke Holmes:
No.

Hannah Furst:
Oh.

Joanna Flemming:
You don't need it, it feels like little raindrops on your skin. It's actually really quite pleasant.

Hannah Furst:
That sounds like tears, not raindrops, like warm tears rolling down your cheeks.

Joanna Flemming:
But it's like a raindrop sensation on your skin.

Brooke Holmes:
Yeah, little hot spots. So we're essentially aiming to increase the temperature of the skin in each area, ideally sort of around 44, 45 degrees. But sometimes it'll creep up quite quickly to up to 50, in which case we move. We've got a temperature gauge on the machine that tells us how hot your skin is getting. So we know without you telling us.

Joanna Flemming:
You know when it's getting uncomfortable?

Brooke Holmes:
Yeah, but some people can handle 50 and they wouldn't even put their hand up, whereas I've had clients twinge when it's 38 and I'm like this is just a warm day outside.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah.

Brooke Holmes:
So yeah, but we're trying to bulk heat the dermis essentially to get the ideal response in the skin, and we're keeping it at that temperature. So it's just a sustained and gradual heating that we're trying to achieve.

Joanna Flemming:
And to give you an example of how much I love this treatment, someone asked me the other day on Instagram if I could only get one treatment in a clinic for the rest of my life what would it be? And I said it would be Laser Genesis.

Brooke Holmes:
Yeah, me too. Definitely.

Joanna Flemming:
For sure.

Brooke Holmes:
And look we say come in once a month for it, but I sometimes have them every week.

Joanna Flemming:
And so you recommend for the treatment of diffused redness four to six treatments. I think I've had three now.

Brooke Holmes:
Yeah, so four to six. Look I don't like to give people an exact number, because often then it sort of sets expectations and they might be disappointed if after four they haven't got a great clearance, so we sort of say four to six. But sometimes people come in after three and they're like, "Oh my God that's amazing."

Joanna Flemming:
Well I've noticed such a difference from three. I'm like what would happen if I went for six?

Brooke Holmes:
Yeah. Well look eventually though think about it if your redness is at a point where you don't have much there, the target is gradually being reduced. So when we're doing the treatment we don't have a lot of visible redness, so there's not a lot for the laser to pick up on. So you're still getting the collagen stimulation, and all of those benefits, but there's not that much more redness to wipe out. So you're just back to that ... it's sort of like a filter for your skin. It's like airbrushes, your skin gets to the point where it's perfect.

Joanna Flemming:
Well that's the thing is it's not just for redness.

Brooke Holmes:
No.

Joanna Flemming:
It's antiaging as well.

Brooke Holmes:
Totally.

Joanna Flemming:
Hannah, I reckon you should try one.

Hannah Furst:
I know, I have not done laser [crosstalk 00:18:42]-

Brooke Holmes:
I've heard you speak of having oily skin concerns.

Hannah Furst:
Yeah, I do.

Brooke Holmes:
It actually temporarily shuts down the saline production in the skin.

Hannah Furst:
The [inaudible 00:18:49].

Brooke Holmes:
Yeah, so it helps, it's really amazing for people with really oily skin. That's one of the benefits of it as well, so with acne it kills the acne bacteria.

Hannah Furst:
Okay, yeah. [crosstalk 00:18:53].

Brooke Holmes:
There's not many people that won't benefit from it really. I couldn't think of anyone.

Joanna Flemming:
Yes. I feel it strengthened my skin a lot. I've had no rosacea flare-ups since I have started it.

Brooke Holmes:
Yep, and you'll just be happy wearing less and less makeup.

Joanna Flemming:
So Brooke I was wondering if someone isn't going to have a professional treatment, are there any products or ingredients that you recommend in terms of topical skincare that can help with redness?

Brooke Holmes:
For redness, there's plenty. So my first favorite ingredient for redness, which I think you will agree, is hyaluronic acid. So often when the skin's red it means the barrier's compromised, so we need to work on strengthening and rebuilding that. The best way to do it is introducing Hyaluronic acid, but also ingredients like ceramide, so your lipids, your oils to kind of replenish that barrier function on the skin. Niacinimide's also really good, but again antioxidants, anti-inflammatory ingredients, things that are just going to work on creating a healthy ecosystem in the skin, probiotics is another one as well. So topically and orally I think is really important.

Joanna Flemming:
Yep.

Brooke Holmes:
The probiotic mask from Aspect, and also The Reboot from Cosmetics is another one that I love, which is a serum that's got hyaluronic-

Joanna Flemming:
It's got both of those?

Brooke Holmes:
... and yeah your probiotics in there. So I love those. Oils, so just using lots of nourishing face oils I think always really helps as well. Yeah, there's a lot you can do, but diet and lifestyle play a big role. So one supplement that a lot of people don't realize can really help the skin is essential fatty acids, so taking either fish oil if you can, the body recognizes fish oil more than it does some of the plant based essential fatty acids. But if you're vegan, or prefer not to take fish oil, then flax seed oil, hemp seed oil, things like that. Because essentially the skin, the cell membranes are made up of essential fatty acids.

Brooke Holmes:
So you've got to lock that water into the cell somehow, and if the membranes are weakened, the water just basically evaporates out of the cell and you end up with dehydrated skin, you end up with a compromised barrier. So replenishing those essential fatty acids internally, which our body doesn't make all of them so we need to be consuming them, that is really really important for maintaining the integrity of the skin and yeah preventing the weakening of the barrier, which will then result in redness over time.

Hannah Furst:
I also color correct around here with [crosstalk 00:21:12].

Brooke Holmes:
That can help.

Joanna Flemming:
I mean that's always a quick fix if you can't afford professional treatment or ...

Hannah Furst:
Do you ever do that?

Joanna Flemming:
Not really because my redness is so wide, I'd have to color correct my whole cheeks.

Hannah Furst:
Because we had a guest who had really bad rosacea, and Ross when he said that he put red blush all over his face.

Joanna Flemming:
Yes.

Hannah Furst:
That was his color correcting.

Brooke Holmes:
What, just to make it all red?

Hannah Furst:
He's a makeup artist, no he'd get it all even redness, and then he'd put foundation over the top.

Joanna Flemming:
Ross if you're listening, go and get Laser Genesis.

Brooke Holmes:
Come see us. I've heard of yeah the green corrective base, but not red. Interesting.

Hannah Furst:
I thought that was a really interesting approach to evening out skin tone.

Brooke Holmes:
Yah.

Joanna Flemming:
And my last question because a lot of people ask me what's the product that you use to keep your rosacea under control, and I keep having to say it's not one product and it's often lifestyle related.

Brooke Holmes:
It's totally lifestyle and gut health. Gut health has a big influence rosacea, not so much just general redness, but rosacea particularly. So they have found that there are actually potentially links between the Helicobacter pylori gut that we have, we all have it in our stomach, but it's the bug that's responsible for stomach ulcers. And that if there's a lot of that present that they've noticed a bit of a correlation between rosacea sufferers and having that particular thing. So making sure you've got a really healthy gut flora is important for managing rosacea as well, and removing the triggers. So if it's spicy foods, or coffee, alcohol's a huge one, all of those things.

Hannah Furst:
Oh, lucky I don't have rosacea. You should have seen my dinner last night.

Joanna Flemming:
A red wine and a hot curry.

Hannah Furst:
No but I pour chili into all of my food, like chili flakes.

Joanna Flemming:
Really?

Hannah Furst:
Yeah.

Brooke Holmes:
You'd feel it, your cheeks would get really hot, if you had rosacea.

Hannah Furst:
Yeah but the only time, and actually this happened to me last night because I'm treating my chest, I've got pigmentation on my chest, so I brought my acid down to here-

Brooke Holmes:
What are you treating it with?

Hannah Furst:
... and my whole chest went completely red, like bright red. My face was okay.

Brooke Holmes:
Your face is possibly more used to [crosstalk 00:23:24]-

Hannah Furst:
More used to it.

Brooke Holmes:
Yeah that happens to me sometimes as well. I can flush a lot more here [crosstalk 00:23:31] acids, I'm used to retinoids on my face. But now I just say your face stops at your boobs, so take everything [crosstalk 00:23:36].

Joanna Flemming:
Totally.

Brooke Holmes:
And I've liked the sun a little bit too much in the past growing up in Byron. So I've always looked after my face, but chest got a bit more tanned, and so now I'm seeing-

Hannah Furst:
I think a lot of people are doing that now, they're doing the whole SPF on their face, but they're forgetting their neck, and their chest, and their hands.

Brooke Holmes:
And it ages a lot quicker the skin on your chest is really thin.

Hannah Furst:
Yeah, it is. I feel like it's almost as thing as your neck [crosstalk 00:23:59]-

Brooke Holmes:
I've been doing Genesis on my chest and it's great. Yeah.

Hannah Furst:
Can you do that?

Brooke Holmes:
Yeah, totally.

Hannah Furst:
Yeah so someone could come in and say ... can I do my whole body?

Brooke Holmes:
You can actually use it for like casserian scars, and all sorts of things, yeah scars.

Hannah Furst:
What is this machine? It's amazing.

Brooke Holmes:
Yeah, it's magic. So you can treat pretty much anywhere that you wanted to really. So I'm doing my chest and neck, focusing on that area a little bit more now just to sort of even it out.

Hannah Furst:
Okay. So if someone's listening to this and they don't have redness or rosacea, can you give us a wrap-up of everything else they can have treated with Laser Genesis?

Brooke Holmes:
Well like I said it helps to regulate sebaceous activity, so great for those with really oily skin. It stimulates collagen, so anyone that's concerned with aging, fine lines, wrinkles developing, [crosstalk 00:24:42].

Hannah Furst:
Is that laser in general? [crosstalk 00:24:44].

Brooke Holmes:
Not necessarily, if you're just referring specifically to Genesis, then yeah. Different lasers target different things. So some of them are focusing on the water content in the skin, others are attracted to pigments, some are attracted to redness. Some of them are [inaudible 00:24:59] some are non, so this is specific to genesis. Not saying that others don't do it as well, but yeah it's such a huge [crosstalk 00:25:05]-

Hannah Furst:
I know the word laser just covers so many, laser hair removal.

Brooke Holmes:
So Genesis does all those things, but like I said yeah any vascular concern it will help with. It's not going to get rid of your larger dilated vessels, that's when we bring in our XLV to sort of target those. But yeah pretty much any aging concern, and melasma actually funnily enough. We are getting fantastic results. We're really known for treating that, and it is a difficult condition to treat because it tends to flare up with a lot of lifestyle factors. It can come and go too so you need to be onto it with your home care, sunscreen, and yeah treatment wise we're finding if we're combining Vitamin A peels for example or skin needling with Laser Genesis, we're working on eliminating the pigment that's there, channeling it to the surface, and removing that vascular driver that is often there with melasma, because it is an inflammatory condition. Yeah, getting great results combining the modalities, so yeah.

Hannah Furst:
Wow.

Brooke Holmes:
So many options.

Joanna Flemming:
Well I'll be in next week.

Brooke Holmes:
Come in.

Hannah Furst:
How many more have you got? No I definitely want to try it and see how it goes with my oily skin.

Joanna Flemming:
For your oiliness, you'll love it. I've had three sessions, so yeah come with me next time.

Hannah Furst:
Sounds good. [crosstalk 00:26:20]. Can we do a couples?

Joanna Flemming:
We can do one after the other.

Hannah Furst:
We love getting couples treatments side-by-side. [crosstalk 00:26:25].

Brooke Holmes:
We had a client in today that's like, "I want to come in on a Saturday for Laser Genesis," and literally the machine's booked out more in advance than some of our senior therapists. It's literally you have to wait about a month for a Saturday appointment for Laser Genesis because it's just on 24 hours a day.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, you definitely need a second one.

Brooke Holmes:
We need another one.

Joanna Flemming:
Well thank you so much for coming in to chat all things redness.

Brooke Holmes:
Thanks for having me.

Joanna Flemming:
Thanks.

Joanna Flemming:
So now it's time for our PWDKWN, product we didn't know we needed.

Hannah Furst:
You're really trying to get that to catch on.

Joanna Flemming:
Well we did a hashtag, it's on a gif.

Hannah Furst:
Yeah, we've got a gif.

Joanna Flemming:
It's in a gif. So Hannah, what is yours today?

Hannah Furst:
So many blondes would know that they use a purple shampoo, and I actually don't know that many brunettes know this, because I certainly didn't know this. But you can actually use a blue shampoo if you're a bottle brunette, as I am.

Joanna Flemming:
Even natural brunettes.

Hannah Furst:
Even a natural brunette. So I told you this didn't it, it's my secret shame. No, but I'm now regularly box dying my hair. That sounds a bit gross, box dye, doesn't it?

Joanna Flemming:
I didn't think of it that way, but sure.

Hannah Furst:
Every time I think of it I'm like I box dye. So I was blonde last year I think, like a year-and-a-half ago, and literally the bane of my existence is orange-brown hair, it's so orangey. So I started to use this ash brown, I like an ashy brown color. So I started using that, and then my hair would go orange again, and then I'd dye it again, and then it would go orange again. So I've discovered this new shampoo, it is the Redkin color extend brown lights shampoo. And it is a blue toning shampoo, so it has a really intense blue pigment to it. You actually kind of have to use gloves, well I think that they recommend that you use gloves, I clearly didn't because it's me.

Joanna Flemming:
Obviously.

Hannah Furst:
And my hands were quite blue, so it's a really intense blue shampoo. So basically purple shampoo will neutralize is it yellow?

Joanna Flemming:
Yellow tones, yeah.

Hannah Furst:
And the blue will neutralize-

Joanna Flemming:
Orange.

Hannah Furst:
Orange, thank you. Yeah, so it'll counteract the brassy and that orange undertones that brunettes will tend to find, particularly if you dye your hair.

Joanna Flemming:
I'm the worst with brassiness.

Hannah Furst:
It's so bad. And it's quite affordable at $31.

Joanna Flemming:
Oh that's all right.

Hannah Furst:
I think that's really good.

Joanna Flemming:
That's cheap.

Hannah Furst:
That's cheap for me, but some people-

Joanna Flemming:
It's not supermarket label, but-

Hannah Furst:
Some people pay like $9 at the supermarket.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, but if you're buying like salon quality hair products. Just out of interest, what box dye do you use?

Hannah Furst:
It's like a-

Joanna Flemming:
You should tell us, someone's going to ask.

Hannah Furst:
Schwarzkopf ash brown. Actually someone messaged me the other day on Instagram and was like, "Love your color. Where do you get it done?" And I was like-

Joanna Flemming:
The supermarket.

Hannah Furst:
I said, "Box dye from the supermarket." I feel like I'm bringing box dye back.

Joanna Flemming:
You might be.

Hannah Furst:
It's Schwarzkopf, how do you say that?

Joanna Flemming:
Schwarzkopf, you're saying it right.

Hannah Furst:
Schwarzkopf color specialist 5.1 cool light brown. And you can get that at the supermarket nearest you.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, except you won't be able to get toilet paper.

Hannah Furst:
Yes, you won't be able to get ... I did actually, I got one of the last on the weekend.

Joanna Flemming:
Did you?

Hannah Furst:
Yeah. I was very lucky because I ran out.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, did you have to go up to Linda's?

Hannah Furst:
Yeah, I went up to mom and dad's and stole two rolls.

Joanna Flemming:
She was like get out of here.

Hannah Furst:
Mom says that I use too much toilet paper. So when I used to live with them she used to buy me especially one-ply toilet paper because she's like ... I yank at it.

Joanna Flemming:
That's another cringey convo for another day, Hannah's use of toilet paper. So my product is the new Aceology butt masks, which is technically known as Aceology's Cheeky Butt Mask Trio, which has three butt masks in it.

Hannah Furst:
Can I be honest if there's ever a product that you actually didn't know you needed, this has to be it.

Joanna Flemming:
I did laugh when I heard about it and I was like that's such a good idea, but do we really need butt masks? Like come on. But I used-

Hannah Furst:
But.

Joanna Flemming:
Pun intended.

Hannah Furst:
Pun intended.

Joanna Flemming:
So there's three in there, there's I'm bouncy, smooth operator, and juicy peach. I used I'm bouncy about two nights ago, and I tell you what it really did make a difference.

Hannah Furst:
I don't look at my butt enough to know.

Joanna Flemming:
I hate to say it but-

Hannah Furst:
Your butt looks juicier.

Joanna Flemming:
It does, the texture was really smooth, and the tone was all even, and it really did look bouncy. I don't know if it was a placebo affect.

Hannah Furst:
Did you have like a special friend?

Joanna Flemming:
No, I didn't have a special occasion at all, I just thought I'm going to treat myself.

Hannah Furst:
I said special friend, not special occasion.

Joanna Flemming:
Oh, no special friend either. But just for my own self care, I was also doing their peptide mask at the same time.

Hannah Furst:
I saw that on your Instagram. So did you lie on your front?

Joanna Flemming:
No I just stood in the bathroom for 20 minutes.

Hannah Furst:
Because you clearly can't sit down.

Joanna Flemming:
I had my top on, yeah.

Hannah Furst:
See if it was me I would lie front on the couch.

Joanna Flemming:
Front on yeah.

Hannah Furst:
Did you wear a G-string or just wore nothing?

Joanna Flemming:
No just naked on the bottom, and then just slapped them on. So it's a sheet mask soaked in a serum, and you just put it on.

Hannah Furst:
What serum is it?

Joanna Flemming:
So they all have different ones, so it depends on which one you choose, but they've got some pretty good ingredients in them. You know how much I love Aceology sheet masks, so I was happy to use it on my ass. But also probably would have put them on my face too, but I don't know if they recommend that.

Hannah Furst:
The butt mask on the face?

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, but I was really surprised.

Hannah Furst:
Put it on your tits as well.

Joanna Flemming:
You could. You could put it anywhere that you want tone and hydration really, you could put it anywhere. And then squeeze out the rest of the serum from the packet and just rub that on your body.

Hannah Furst:
Nice.

Joanna Flemming:
But yeah there's some really good ingredients in the products. Which one did you get? You got a sample as well.

Hannah Furst:
I did, I haven't used it yet. I will let you know how I go. I got the juicy, what's the juicy one?

Joanna Flemming:
Juicy peach?

Hannah Furst:
Juicy peach.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, okay. Maybe you should do an Insta story about it.

Hannah Furst:
Yeah, well I wasn't sure if I should put my butt on Instagram.

Joanna Flemming:
I've done it.

Hannah Furst:
Yeah. Our direct boss just started following us on Instagram.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, yeah. Well I've put my ass on Adore, so ...

Hannah Furst:
Yeah, that's true.

Joanna Flemming:
So yeah that's my product I didn't know I needed, a butt mask.

Hannah Furst:
I like the names, bouncy butt, cute.

Joanna Flemming:
I'm bouncy, smooth operator, and juicy peach.

Hannah Furst:
So the juicy has hyaluronic acid, Allantoin, and Centella, what the hell is that?

Joanna Flemming:
That's like a soothing one, a soothing and hydrating one.

Hannah Furst:
Okay.

Joanna Flemming:
So it like plumps it up. And then the smooth operator's designed for inflammation and texture. So if you get butt pimples it's great for that.

Hannah Furst:
Huang Qin, what's that?

Joanna Flemming:
Let's just not [crosstalk 00:33:07].

Hannah Furst:
What the hell is Allantoin, and Centella Asiatica?

Joanna Flemming:
They're both meant to calm the skin.

Hannah Furst:
Oh, okay. How the hell do you know that?

Joanna Flemming:
Because I wrote an article on it.

Hannah Furst:
Oh, right.

Joanna Flemming:
And then I'm bouncy, which is the one that I used, that's all about hydration as well.

Hannah Furst:
Peptides.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, peptides in there, a bit of anti-aging, smoothing.

Hannah Furst:
And Allantoin.

Joanna Flemming:
Your new favorite ingredient. I actually think that's how you pronounce it, but I've never had to say it out loud.

Hannah Furst:
That is my new favorite ... can I just see what the hell-

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, look it up.

Hannah Furst:
Extracted from the root of the comfrey plant, allantoin is a non-irritating ingredient that soothes and protects the skin.

Joanna Flemming:
There you go.

Hannah Furst:
I'll feel really stupid if that's not how you say it. If someone's like ...

Joanna Flemming:
Do the pronunciation thing again. Do the pronunciation.

Hannah Furst:
Allantoin.

Speaker 4:
Allantoin.

Joanna Flemming:
Allantoin. You sure? What.

Hannah Furst:
Lady are you sure? That doesn't sound right.

Speaker 4:
Allantoin.

Joanna Flemming:
Allantoin.

Speaker 4:
Allantoin.

Joanna Flemming:
Okay.

Hannah Furst:
Okay, so I was saying it wrong.

Joanna Flemming:
We're going to say Allantoin.

Hannah Furst:
Scientists or botanists listening are going to send me some angry DMs.

Joanna Flemming:
Well look-

Hannah Furst:
Is it a botanist?

Joanna Flemming:
... on this podcast it's Allantoin.

Hannah Furst:
Interesting.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, so loved my butt mask. I actually would probably do a butt mask with my friends. So yeah, I mean it's certainly not a product you need, but if you feel like doing something wild.

Hannah Furst:
But this is the product that you don't need that you didn't know you needed.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah, exactly. What's going on in your personal life, just to wrap things up?

Hannah Furst:
My dad told me yesterday, I mean I think he might notice that I've been dating quite a bit.

Joanna Flemming:
Yeah.

Hannah Furst:
He was like, "Hannah no kissing," because of the Coronavirus.

Joanna Flemming:
Oh, he knows what you're like.

Hannah Furst:
He knows what I'm like.

Joanna Flemming:
Kisses on the first date, yeah.

Hannah Furst:
Kisses on the first dance.

Joanna Flemming:
Any time, first drink.

Hannah Furst:
Kissing at the bar before we even speak. No, and so-

Joanna Flemming:
That's good advice.

Hannah Furst:
That's probably good advice for me at the moment.

Joanna Flemming:
We need to get back on [inaudible 00:35:10].

Hannah Furst:
Yeah, yeah we do. Do you know the Shameless girls actually talked about that?

Joanna Flemming:
Did they?

Hannah Furst:
Yeah, I think one of them was on-

Joanna Flemming:
Get us on Zara Michelle?

Hannah Furst:
Well I can get you on because I'm on.

Joanna Flemming:
Refer us.

Hannah Furst:
I can refer you.

Joanna Flemming:
Amazing, do it.

Hannah Furst:
I think I just have to pay $5, but you can pay me back.

Joanna Flemming:
I'll buy you a coffee.

Hannah Furst:
No, no, no you can transfer me $5 [inaudible 00:35:33].

Joanna Flemming:
Done. That wraps us up for another week.

Hannah Furst:
See you next week.

Joanna Flemming:
Thanks everyone for joining us today.

Hannah Furst:
Don't forget to subscribe and tell your friends, it helps other people to discover us. And also we really want to know what you thought about this podcast, so if you can leave us a review that would be much appreciated.