by Dr. Steven Wallach
Plastic surgeons like Dr. Wallach can perform amazing transformations with procedures like facelifts and brow lifts. But plastic surgery still isn’t the fountain of youth. The aging process will march along its inevitable path, and while you can try and slow its signs, you can’t stop the process. Just ask Ponce de Leon. That said, there are certain behaviors that speed up the aging of your skin. In effect, they taking typical aging and hit the fast forward button. Here are the three worst offenders. Obviously, if you care about how you look, you’ll avoid or adjust any of all of these causes
Smoking
Smoking has a very detrimental effect on your skin. And just being a casual smoker, a few cigarettes here and there, isn’t any better. Smoking causes wrinkles by narrowing the blood vessels in the outer layers of the skin. This causes less blood flow and reduces the amount of oxygen and nutrients that get to the skin. Smoking also damages important connective fibers like collagen and elastin, causing static wrinkling.
UV Exposure
Sun exposure causes most of the skin changes we think of as a normal part of aging. The UV rays in sunlight damage the elastin in the skin. When these support fibers break down the skin begins to sag, stretch, and lose it elastic properties. The sun also causes the most prevalent form of cancer in the U.S., skin cancer.
An Unhealthy Lifestyle
Other unhealthy lifestyle choices age your skin more quickly. A poor diet, excessive alcohol consumption, dehydration, sleep deprivation, and other factors can act to prematurely age your skin.