Emer O'Callaghan: 'If your skin is not getting enough hydration, it shows in fine lines'

Well, our summer has certainly heated up, that’s for sure, and that can bring problems when it comes to hydration.

Every day as a beauty doctor and skin specialist, I work with clients of all ages, trying to help everyone look and feel good about themselves and their own beauty.

And while I specialise in skin, working with the two best professional skin care brands, Guinot and Dermalogica, I find one of the most noticeable things that is wrong when working with people is they really have no idea of how beneficial and vital water is to their health and beauty.

Water is life, they say, and I couldn’t agree more.

We are made up of 80% water, each and everyone of us, yet research by The World Skin Association tells us that eight out of ten people are still not drinking enough water for their body size and weight.

As warmer weather hopefully arrives, there really is no excuse for anyone to not drink enough water. It will cool down the body, hydrating you inside and out.

Here are my top tips on getting that H2O into you this summer.

LACK OF WATER ON THE SKIN

The best comparison I can give you on how dehydrated skin looks is to picture a lovely juicy grape. That’s your beautiful skin fully hydrated. Now picture a raisin, which is just a grape dried out, and see all its lines and wrinkles and how dishevelled looking it is compared to a juicy grape.

Well, that’s how your skin goes when you do not drink enough water and it gets so dehydrated.

To explain it as basically as I can, picture a pint of water. You’re meant to be drinking eight of them a day.

You get thirsty, which is always the first sign the body is dehydrated, and you drink back a full pint, so that water immediately goes straight to the vital internal organs of the heart, lungs and brains, just to keep you alive.

It then filters into the other internal organs and many systems we all have inside us - so that’s the first port of call for the water.

As the internal organs are needing the water first, the only organ of the body on the outside gets the water last - and that’s the skin.

You’d be so surprised how many still don’t seem to comprehend that their skin is in fact an organ, and the largest one of the body too. It’s also the most neglected.

I can tell you from working with skin every day for 23 years, I see this neglect.

If your skin is not getting enough hydration, it shows in fine lines, which then turn into a wrinkles. 

As I always say, no-one ever just wakes up with wrinkles, they form over time from not giving the skin the correct products, hydration and care.

When I see someone, regardless of their age, with a face full of lines, I know they have been severely dehydrated for many years.

I have clients that have come to me with so many lines and wrinkles who thought, because they were 60 or 70 years of age, it was normal. But we reversed these lines and wrinkles with facials, products, and, most importantly, by educating them on this magic wand that we in the beauty world know as water.

Water is the fountain of youth, and those who know it reap the very many health and beauty benefits.

START SMALL, BUT BE CONSISTENT

When I am trying to educate a client on water, we will start on one small one litre bottle, and some of the older ones really make me laugh as they gasp in horror at the thoughts of drinking a litre. I remind them how they drink two litres a day in pots of tea, and they laugh.

I also tell them they can sip it for hours, and soon see that bottle go down. I tell them to bring it around with them too in their hand bag - I do this myself.

After they have got used to this one litre bottle, I tell them to step it up to the advised daily amount of 1.5 to 2 litres. I tell you, the difference is phenomenal in people - not just their skin but their health and energy - and they see and feel it too.

TEA/COFFEE ARE NOT BETTER THAN WATER

Just look around, everyone is walking around drinking coffees these days,but did you know that for every cup of tea or coffee you drink, you would want to drink that exact same size cup three times to rehydrate your body.

Not too many are doing that, I tell ya.

I love tea myself, but this is simply no substitute for pure water.

ENERGY AND SUGARY DRINKS

It amazes me that people would give their plants pure water, but their kids get an energy drink laced with sugar and caffeine.

Parents are oblivious to the marketing that targets young kids.

I’m not a fan of energy drinks, I wouldn’t drink one if you gave it to me free. I just know that combination of sugar, high colourings and caffeine is of no health benefit to anyone, let alone a child.

We never had these drinks when I was a kid in the ’80s, all we got in the O’Callaghan house was plain tap water, no cordials, no sugary stuff and on a Sunday, we would have a big bottle of Tanora and it was shared out between us.

God, did we savour it!

HYDRATING YOUR SKIN

I did one of my popular beauty videos on this recently and you can watch it on the Emerald Beauty Clinic Facebook/Instagram/ TikTok pages now.

I always encourage my clients to drink water daily - even when you arrive at Emerald Beauty Clinic there is always a lovely cold glass of water and lemon waiting for you.

This is how we beauty doctors show you the importance of water.

I always recommend clients drink plenty of water too post facial so they can flush out any toxins in their system.

I do lymphatic drainage movement in my facials, and this is excellent to remove built-up fluid we all get in our face and neck.

The amount of clients who say their face looks slimmer after my facials, and this is because I drained away all the excess fluid there that gives us that bloated, puffy face.

While it’s all well and good to get the most hydrating facials and creams and serums, the truth is you also need the water. It’s free, but so many take it for granted.

• Emer O’Callaghan, a Beauty Doctor and Skin Specialist, won Irish Beauty Therapist of the year and works at Emerald Beauty Clinic, 021 4365949. A Multi Award Winning Gold Standard Clinic 2008-2025, www.emeraldbeautyclinic.ie, follow us on Facebook/instagram/Tik Tok
• SPECIAL OFFER: All next week, our award-winning Dermalogica Dry and Senstive Skin Facials are reduced from €125 to €95, 90 minutes. Treatment includes a full skin analysis, complimentary eyebrow shape, samples and treats. Appointments necessary, to book call Emerald Beauty Clinic on 021 4365949. Free parking.