By: Martine Gann
Recently a user of my products mentioned that she knew petroleum products were bad, but she didn’t actually know why.
So I decided to delve into this explanation:
But also, it stops your skin from absorbing.
From absorbing anything at all.
Any nourishing product that may actually be in a cream, (which also contains petroleum products) can’t actually be absorbed by the body.
They completely work against them in fact. And are therefore the opposite of anti-aging.
But yet the cosmetic industry has spent a lot of money on expensive studies trying to convince us that petroleum by-products under pseudonyms are good for you.
This is because they are inexpensive binders and fillers for their products.
The more they convince the public that these ingredients are good, the more money they can make.
Below is a list of common ingredients which are ACTUALLY petroleum byproducts:
Mineral oil
Paraffin
Petroleum jelly
Petrolatum
Liquid paraffin
Mineral oil specifically is the waste product from refining petroleum - think toxic sludge - which means it is incredibly cheap. And that is why it is so heavily used in the billion-dollar beauty industry. Don’t be fooled by their expensive advertising.
Big cosmetic companies try to state that mineral oil (or any of the other names for petroleum products) protect your skin by making a barrier between your skin and the environment. Keep moisture in, keep contaminants out.
Well, ok…. In actuality, it does create a barrier, but that barrier is suffocating your skin. When you cover yourself in this product, your skin can’t breathe. It can’t secrete toxins, so instead bacteria gets trapped to incubate under the petroleum layer and build up - causing blemishes.
Additionally you'll notice these companies never mention mineral oil having any nourishing value, because it doesn’t. It is, after all, derived from a highly toxic product: petroleum.
Another interesting point is mineral oil can’t be metabolized. And since it can’t be metabolized, your body doesn’t know what to do with it so it gets stored in your body’s fat cells. It basically just sits around in your body indefinitely.
In a 2011 study, scientists went so far as to say, “there is strong evidence that mineral hydrocarbons are the greatest contaminant of the human body”.
To add insult to energy, since most of us are interested in keeping our skin as youthful as possible, mineral oil slows down cell renewal while breaking down collagen and connective tissue (collagen and the connective tissue help keep your skin looking youthful and firm).
Don’t be fooled by “anti-aging” skin care that has petroleum byproducts.
These products are actually more likely to age your skin, give you adult acne and even cause wrinkles.
This doesn’t hurt the companies though as they can just turn around and sell you an anti-wrinkle cream which, big surprise, has an ingredient in it that aggravates the skin. Creating slight inflammation, the product swells your skin, making your wrinkles appear to disappear for a short time, but actually doing nothing to help your skin or prevent more aging. Not a very good long-term plan.
There is even some very hard to find research linking mineral oil to estrogen imbalance in women and skin cancer.
Mineral oil masks itself as estrogen. This can cause estrogen dominance and that can lead to side effects such as depression, weight gain, thyroid problems, allergies, autoimmune disorders and maybe even breast cancer.
In a 2009 study published in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology, researchers found that moisturizers containing mineral oil might have something to do with the increase of sunlight induced cancers in the United States. The results of their study indicate that “several commercially available moisturizing creams increase the rate and formation of tumors when topically applied to UVB-pretreated high-risk mice”.
In summation there is really no benefit and many many detriments to these petroleum by-products.
Read your labels. Know the aliases for petroleum by-products, and say no to petroleum byproducts in your beauty regimen. Your skin will thank you.
Martine