Fighting the flake

Affordable products to combat dry skin

By Roshni Riar, Staff Writer

I think I speak for a lot of people when I say that autumn is my favourite season. This is for a lot of reasons: It’s crisp, pretty, and you can wear some cute outfits without freezing or sweating profusely. The one thing that detracts from my love of autumn is how my skin changes with the season. As if protesting the drop in temperature, my skin stamps its foot down and decides to dry up, leaving me constantly double-checking my reflection to see if it looks like I’m moulting.

Fighting dry skin is tough and doing it on a budget is even tougher. I’ve devised a solid step-by-step skincare routine for anyone who also suffers from dry skin but doesn’t want to break the bank or spend an overwhelming amount of time in Sephora trying to decipher one product from the next.

Face wash

When choosing a face wash, it’s important to find something that will actually combat the issue you’re struggling with. It’s great to have good treatments and secondary products but when cleansing, you want to make sure you aren’t aggravating your skin and therefore making it harder to see and feel results.

CeraVe Hydrating Cleanser is my go-to face wash. You can find it at most drugstores for $16. It’s a great unscented, no fuss, cream cleanser loaded with ceramides and hyaluronic acid, both of which are major moisturizers for the skin. However, they can prove aggravating if your skin is really sensitive. I use it both at morning and at night and it leaves my face feeling clean, but not stripped.

Pre-moisturizer

There are plenty of great toners out there, but the game changer for me was Avène Thermal Spring Water. It’s available at any drugstore with a dermatological skincare section. You can get a 300ml can for $22 and trust me, it’s worth it.

After cleansing, you spray a layer of fine mist on your skin and let it dry. It’s soothing, makes your skin incredibly soft, and improves the efficacy of your moisturizer when you apply it right after using the thermal spring water, while your skin is still slightly damp. While this isn’t technically a toner, it’s an impressive product that you can use as part of your routine and even throughout the day if your skin needs a refresh.

Moisturizer

Here is where a lot of people have trouble. Finding the right moisturizer often involves a lot of trial and error, which is fair enough. I’ve bought countless moisturizers and abandoned them halfway through because I didn’t like the smell or the texture, or it was too light or too heavy. It’s especially tricky finding the balance between deep moisturization and not feeling super greasy.

Neutrogena’s Hydro Boost line offers a gel cream packed with hyaluronic acid that has been, by far, the best moisturizer I’ve found. A tub will set you back $20 and will last you quite a while, since a little goes a long way. An “extra-dry skin” option is offered, which is the one I use. It’s not greasy and absorbs really easily because it is water-based as opposed to oil-based, which is slow to absorb and can clog pores. It’s a good moisturizer for both morning and night.

Chapped lips

Chapped lips are the absolute worst. Aquaphor, a healing ointment made by Eucerin, is a cheap and effective product to alleviate the discomfort and peeling that comes along with chapped lips. A tube costs $9 and is a nice size, easy to have on you when you might need it. The consistency is a bit like Vaseline, which is a little weird, but this stuff seriously works. I recommend putting a thick layer on your lips before bed and applying light layers throughout the day if necessary.

As with anything to do with skincare, what works for you or me might not work for someone else. However, with a skincare routine this cheap, you can certainly be unafraid of trying it out!