Ep. 177 – Addressing Underregulated Ingredients On Personal Care Products! The Truth About Skincare with Trina Felber

I am thrilled to have Trina Felber back on the show today! Trina was with me in episode 153, where she spoke about the mouth microbiome and reversing tooth decay naturally. She is joining me today to tell us the truth about skincare. 

Trina is the Founder and Creator of Primal Life Organics. She is a wife, mother of three, dental health and natural skincare expert, Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist, Yogi, Paleo advocate, and educator. Trina loves creating products that heal, soothe, mend and repair the body and soul.

The personal care product industry is worth seventy-one billion dollars, and it is severely under-regulated. The media has been telling us so many things about skincare for so long that most of us don’t know who and what to believe anymore. There are also many aspects of skincare that many women tend to take for granted.

The first episode with Trina was extremely popular, and this one is just as illuminating, helpful, and mindblowing! You will learn about the physiology of the skin, how the unhealthy ingredients in skincare products affect your body, and what you can do to protect your skin. Stay tuned for more!

“The skin is your second gut, and there’s no protection there.”

Trina Felber

IN THIS EPISODE YOU WILL LEARN:

• How under-regulated the personal care industry is.
• The hidden toxins and synthetic hormones in tap water.
• The negative ways in which unhealthy chemicals and other ingredients in skin care products can affect women.
• Why the skin is such a vital organ, and how our skin speaks to us.
• The permanent imprint that some chemicals in skincare products and Botox injections leave in your body.
• How to protect your skin.
• How the skin changes when women go through the hormonal changes of perimenopause and menopause.
• Trina discusses the plant-based ingredients that stimulate collagen and elastin production to keep your skin firm.
• How to put together a routine to keep your skin healthy and looking great.
• How to avoid getting skin problems from wearing a mask.
  

Connect with Trina Felber

On her website

On Instagram and Facebook

Connect with Cynthia Thurlow

• Follow on Twitter, Instagram & LinkedIn
• Check out Cynthia’s website
• Check Out Dry Farm Wines: www.dryfarmwines.com/cynthiathurlow

About Everyday Wellness Podcast

Welcome to the Everyday Wellness podcast with Cynthia Thurlow! Cynthia is a mom of 2 boys, wife, nurse practitioner, and intermittent fasting and nutrition expert. She has over 20 years experience in emergency medicine and cardiology, but pivoted to focus on food as medicine. She loves to share science-backed practical information to improve your overall well being and is grateful to be interviewing leaders in the health and wellness field.  Her goal with Everyday Wellness is to help her listeners make simple changes to their everyday lives that will result in improved overall wellness and long term health.

Presenter: This is Everyday Wellness, a podcast dedicated to helping you achieve your health, and wellness goals, and provide practical strategies that you can use in your real life. And now, here’s your host, Nurse Practitioner Cynthia Thurlow.

Cynthia: All right, today, I am thrilled to have Trina Felber back. She joined me in episode 153 talking about reversing tooth decay naturally, the mouth microbiome, and there was so much to unpack in that episode that we had to do a second one. Considering how popular Trina’s first episode was, I know that this will be equally informative, helpful, and will blow your mind. So, welcome back, Trina.

Trina: Oh, thanks, Cynthia. I’m super excited to blow everyone’s mind, again.

Cynthia: [laughs]

Trina: Trust me, skincare is so much fun to talk about, because there’s so many things people take for granted. We’ve been– Just like dental, we’ve been fed so many things through media, through magazines, through TV, through everything, and we don’t know who to believe and what to believe. So, I’m going to give you the truth. We’re going to bear the bones, today.

Cynthia: Oh, yeah. Well, I was reading last night that the personal care product industry is a $71 billion industry that is severely underregulated. So, let’s start from there. Let’s talk about the severely underregulated personal care product industry, and then segue into skincare, which I think for every woman who’s listening is a huge focus of where we are. There’s a lot of greenwashing, we’ll talk about that. A lot of terminology that’s designed to woo us and entice us into purchasing, and I think it’s a twofold issue. There’s this greenwashing aspect and marketing, and then there’s also, quite frankly, there are chemicals and ingredients in a lot of these products that are very unhealthy and we don’t realize it.

I think that that’s really important to talk about, because I feel like on so many levels, most of the women who follow me on social media or in programs, they’re struggling with weight loss resistance, they’re struggling with health issues, they’re struggling with metabolic inflexibility, and it’s very hard to sometimes wrap your head around the fact that a lot of the products we use on our body, on our face, etc., can impact our hormones and our health in negative ways.

Trina: Oh, totally, totally. You’re going to be surprised, even ladies, if you’re like, “Oh, this one’s not for me because I use great skincare, I know, it’s good.” Stay tuned, because I’m going to show you the hidden toxins and that includes how possibly birth control pills are actually getting into your system through your skincare, because it’s in there.

Cynthia: So scary. So, on our last episode together, you mentioned what seems to be a very benign ingredient that we should be far more concerned about. In fact, when we finished recording, I went to my bathroom. It was like, “Oh, My God, I have five things I use every day that have water in them,” and I was like, “Oh, water is no big deal. Water is natural.” I would imagine this is how we are absorbing these synthetic hormones.

Trina: Absolutely, yes. So, that is when people ask me, “What is the worst ingredient in skincare and they expect me to say like phthalates or parabens things like that. I come back with the word water, everybody’s jaw drops. It’s in everything. So, we’re so used to seeing it and you’re right. It is a natural ingredient. You don’t even really have to alter it. The problem is they’re not altering it, they’re not purifying it. Most of the time, it’s tap water. So, how you know that is after the word ‘water,’ if it doesn’t say purified, then there’s a really good chance that it’s pure, it’s just tap water, and I call it crap water.

There’s a lot of stuff that can be found in crap water including medications, drugs that are in the water system that aren’t processed– are not processed out there, things that are dumped in the soil that get into the water fill. So, what comes to mind and what is commonly found in a lot of water systems is birth control pills. So, that’s why I mentioned that, but there’s a lot of different anti-depressant things like that that can be found in water as well. Heavy metals are another source that have contaminants in tap water.

Heavy metals, if you’re someone who has a lot of health issues, you can’t find the source, you think you’ve detoxed from everything, your skincare could be providing you have those horrible heavy metals that do get absorbed into your skin if they’re small enough and if the situation is right. So, looking at that, radioactive material, but bacteria, all sorts of other things can be found in tap water. If you look at yours and it says that it’s purified, that’s better. But purified water isn’t even better or isn’t even great for your skin either primarily because your skin doesn’t absorb water. It’s not going to do anything positive for your skin. It’s actually going to do the reverse, even if it is purified water. Water and the amounts that they put in skincare and most skincare, if water is listed first, it’s between 70% and 90% water.

Cynthia: No way.

Trina: About 90%– Yeah, 70% to 90% of your dollar is actually paying for water, tap water.

Cynthia: Tap water.

Trina: Yeah.

Cynthia: Tap water.

Trina: Just tap water.

Cynthia: [laughs]

Trina: [crosstalk] crap water and you’re putting on your skin, and then you’re getting all the other things. I’ll talk about some of the other things. But the problem with water being the first ingredient is that it doesn’t get absorbed into your skin like when you drink it, it’s not going to make you healthier, it’s not going to hydrate you. It actually does the opposite. It evaporates off your skin. As it evaporates off your skin it takes with it some of the moisture inside your skin. Think about when you’re in a bathtub for too long or at a pool for a long time you end up with raisin fingers.

Same type of thing, it starts to pull the moisture out. But even worse, what it does and how it does this so effectively, how it dehydrates you so effectively is that it disrupts your natural sebum, your natural oil, and that is what is meant to protect your skin on the inside. It keeps the good stuff on the inside, it keeps the moisture on the inside, but it also grows the good bacteria that can prevent skin conditions including acne, and rosacea, and things like that. So, watering your skincare for me is the biggest no-no, because it’s really– it’s not doing you any good. Even if it is tap water, it actually can cause premature aging of your skin by the dehydrated effect, and the loss of sebum, the loss of those protective microbiome.

Cynthia: I think, probably, a help for the listeners is to understand a little bit of the anatomy of skin, and certainly, as nurses, we always like to talk about form and function. So, perhaps, explaining like what is the normal, like skin is designed to be a barrier, it’s design has all these functions that actually like getting down to, there’re certain layers in the skin and how that impacts absorbability of some of these products. So, I think people sometimes forget that our skin is our largest organ. I think we just don’t think of it as an organ at all. I think that’s the first like blow your mind kind of concept.

Then, even mentioning that adding water to products, even whether it’s crap water or purified water, the fact that’s not doing a lot beneficially for you and it’s disrupting what is another wise protective mechanism in your skin, that’s surprising, like I would not have even known that. So, let’s talk a little bit about the anatomy and the physiology because I think that’s helpful as we dive into this conceptually.

Trina: You can tell, we’re both nurses-

Cynthia: [laughs]

Trina: -[crosstalk] we want you to understand the why behind it. So, your skin, yes, all the different layers of the skin, the biggest takeaway for your skin is number one, you’re not stuck with the skin that you have today. It does regenerate the cells, regenerate all the layers, to regenerate it takes time and it takes good nutrition. So, if you’re eating good and healthy, you can expect better looking skin in three to six months. If you’re not eating good and healthy, you can either expect worse skin or the skin that you have. Sometimes, the skincare that you put on your face, on your body is actually doing more harm than good because it’s accelerating. Like I said, water is accelerating the damage internally.

The sun itself can accelerate damage internally that you may not see for a couple months or even a couple years as far as the sun goes depending on how deep that goes. So, you’re not stuck with the skin that you have as far as being your largest organ. I love this. I started in the burn center. That’s where I started my nursing career, and I learned so much in the burn center. You either love it or you hate that unit and I absolutely loved it.

Cynthia: It’s a unique smell.

Trina: Oh yeah. Well, yeah.

Cynthia: [laughs]

Trina: No one likes the smell but people are amazing. What I learned about the skin was so valuable. I learned that it can heal, I learned that it’s a protective mechanism. But it doesn’t just protect you from the elements, it actually thermoregulates you, it actually keeps the moisture in, it keeps everything housed. So, like you said, we don’t even think about the skin as an organ. It’s probably one of the most important organs, obviously, besides your heart, your brain. I like to bring it home with the thought that your skin is a reflection, it’s your largest organ, it’s the organ that you can see and take a good look at it because it’s a reflection of how all your internal organs look. So, if it’s dehydrated, if it’s got spots, if it’s prematurely aging, it’s a signal to you of what could be going on internally. So, it’s really important to take a look at your skin. Your skin should bounce, it should feel soft, and smooth, and bounce. If it’s not like that, then it could be dehydrated.

If you’ve got spots, if you’ve got breakouts, there could be some hormonal, there could be some digestive issues, there could be some nutritional deficiencies. So, your skin is really trying to speak to you. But here we are, we go to a cosmetic counter and we go, “I have wrinkles, I need to get rid of these. I have acne, I need to get rid of this.” We’re not going back to the root cause. So, one of the best things about your skin is going back to natural skincare. It’s going to calm everything down and let the beauty of your body speak to you in a way that you can then respond to go, “Oh, I’m breaking out. I wonder what the root cause of that could be? It’s now, I know, it’s not related to my skincare. Is it related to my diet, is it related to my gut?” Of course, those are both related to each other. Is it related to my hormones, all of those types of things?

Here’s the other thing about why your skin is really important. It’s really your second gut. It’s your second digestive system. But the problem is, it doesn’t have the protective mechanism that your internal system does. So, when you eat something that may or may not contain toxins or harmful ingredients in it, your gut sends those things to your liver. Your liver will detoxify it. It converts these things from lipid soluble to water soluble, meaning, you can then get rid of them in your urine. The most chemicals, we call this first pass through the liver, right? Most chemicals are eliminated almost entirely through first pass through the liver and that’s a good benefit for you. That’s a protective mechanism. So that all the food that you consume that has all those nasty ingredients or things in it, your liver will detoxify. So, you want to make sure that your liver is healthy, because if it doesn’t, then it starts to get backed up and clogged up, and then you start to get more and more of the toxins inside your body instead of out of your body.

Here’s the key with your skin. Your skin ingests things just like you do when you eat, but there’s no protective mechanism. Think about it. When something passes through your skin and I wish I had my little skin-

Cynthia: You have the best little props.

Trina: I love my little props. So, when something gets passed through your skin– although, the normal side, not the inflammation side. When something passes through your skin, it passes through all the layers of your skin. It’s small enough, it has to be lipid soluble or attached to something that is going to bring it across. So, there’s a lot of enhancers and regular skincare products because they don’t use much oil. Oil is the only thing that’s really going to pass through your skin. So, they use enhancers to get things through. The problem is, what you’ve got all these beautiful things in your skin that are working to protect you and keep you healthy on the inside, but your blood vessels are right here. Now, it looks like it’s pretty deep, but it’s not really that deep inside you. But your blood vessels are what absorbs those nutrients and carries them throughout your body. So, when toxins enter, they’ll get absorbed into your bloodstream and your blood from your skin doesn’t go directly to your liver, it goes all the way through your body. Very little will go directly to your liver. Most of it will travel throughout your body.

One of the main problems with these chemicals and we can call them almost forever chemicals, they leave an imprint on your body, whether you detox or not– Whether you detox or not, you can get this resonance or imprint that is left in your skin or in your body. But the problem is that, these things love, like I said, they love fat. They have to be fat soluble. But when they’re traveling throughout your body, they can leave your bloodstream and they can settle in your fat tissue. So, a lot of times people that are trying to lose weight when they start a diet, they’ll lose three pounds, five pounds pretty quickly, but they feel horrible. A lot of times I tell them, it’s probably because you’re burning fat that has toxins in it, you’re literally almost giving yourself a toxic load. Drink tons of water, work through it, don’t give up, but you’re getting rid of toxins that are stored in your fat.

The main problem with toxins stored in your fat is they just have to be small enough to cross that one protective barrier, the blood brain barrier. Once they pass, if they’re small enough or if there’s something like fluoride that opens the channel, and the small particles that are too small to pass when the channels are closed or if you have leaky brain syndrome, these things can now get into your brain and your brain is nothing but fat tissue. So, absorbing toxins from your skincare and having them housed in your brain. How do you think Botox works?

Botox has been found in some of the brains of people that have Alzheimer’s primarily, because of the location of most of the injections are very close to your most fatty tissue and organ which is your brain. So, that’s a little bit of a low down on the skin without going into depth on the anatomy and physiology of it, but the main takeaway is that your skin is your second gut and there’s no protection there. The main way to protect yourself is to make sure what you’re putting on your skin is going to actually treat and nourish the skin from the inside, and once it gets into the blood vessels, even further nourish your body and others sorts of ways, because most of the plants that we talk about or that we use are most plants, all plants have nutritional value to some degree.

Cynthia: I think that’s really helpful for people to kind of wrap their heads around if they’re not familiar with the physiology of skin or how it really functions. Now, I know that you’re knowledgeable because we’re middle-aged women and we’re aging in reverse. But what are some of the changes that occur at the skin with regard to the loss of specific hormones as women go through perimenopause and menopause. So, we know that estrogen or estradiol, which is our predominant form of estrogen prior to going through menopause, it has a lot to do with collagen, and elastin, and some of these terms that we hear, and sometimes, the very savvy marketing of some of these said products that you’ve alluded to, there’s a lot of play on, “Well, this will stimulate collagen, this will stimulate elastin, these are things that keep your skin looking youthful.” Is there any truth to that?

I know for people that if they’re on hormonal replacement therapy or bioidenticals that may improve the quality of their skin as they make that transition. For other people, that’s one of the most common concerns that are oftentimes expressed as though I feel like my skin just looks like it’s aging faster than it should. What has been your experience with regard to changes in sex hormones as women make that transition?

Trina: Collagen and elastin start to decrease when you’re in your 20s and mid-20s. We don’t really notice it until we’re in our mid-30s, late 30s, and by the time you’re 40, you’re like, “Whoa, what happened?”

Cynthia: [laughs] Look tired.

Trina: You look in the mirror and you’re like, “What? What happened? I didn’t look like this yesterday,” and you actually did but you didn’t notice it. It’s going on inside your skin. It’s a war no one’s ever going to completely win, but here, I just turned 53 two days ago and I– [crosstalk]

Cynthia: I think, you’re a Leo. I’m a Leo. I just had a birthday yesterday.

Trina: Oh, yours was yesterday? Oh, yeah, I was the 31st.

Cynthia: Yeah. Oh. Look at that birthday buddies.

Trina: Birthday buddies.

Cynthia: [laughs]

Trina: Yeah, happy birthday.

Cynthia: Thank you. Likewise.

Trina: But there’s different ways to stimulate collagen and elastin. Making sure obviously that you’re eating healthy, that your hormones are okay, going through menopause will probably not just change, reduce collagen and elastin even more, but it’s going to change the dryness or oiliness of your skin. Most people end up with drier skin as they get older. So, that cuts down. But keep in mind your skincare products can be contributing, like I talked about, it can be contributing to all of this. As far as skincare products go, I know everybody wants that magic lotion that you rub on your skin-

Cynthia: [laughs]

Trina: -at night and you wake up in the morning and you look like you’re 20 Yeah, I’m here to tell you most skincare products, I can almost say, almost all skincare products are not really going to do anything for collagen and elastin, primarily, because most skincare is made with the ingredients that we were starting to talk about like water, dehydrating your skin. When in the world have you ever felt dehydrated and felt like perky, and felt good, and felt like you were energetic? No. When you’re dehydrated you feel like crap. This is your skin that’s like dehydrated. This is it.

Cynthia: Wow.

Trina: It’s inflamed, it can’t get rid of the inflammation, there’s less blood flow, there’re not cells turning over. Don’t forget, every cell in your body dies. It has a lifespan and it dies. What happens when those cells die? You are expecting your blood to remove, there’s things that will help remove the dead cell that explodes, dies, whatever, so that it can get rid of it. Because it’s pretty much mostly like an acid. Most cells, when they die, they could be acidic, which is what how cancer spreads. Cancer creates its own environment because when the cells die, they explode with acid and they continuously do this to create more acid, more acid, more acid. Cancer cells love acid or acidic environments. That’s how they grow. So, cancer, pretty much creates its own environment.

Your skin, if you’re dehydrated, it’s creating more of an acidic environment to the point where your skin can’t function normally. Collagen and elastin won’t be produced like you could be producing it. It still would be declining as you get older, but you could be producing more if you were taking good care of if your skin looked like this. So, the idea behind skincare products that have water emulsifiers, phthalates, parabens, all of these toxins in them actually making your skin more beautiful is really just like a marketing ploy. Because if you know what your skin really absorbs and needs, those are the things that are actually going to help, keep your collagen production up. In fact, there’s actually two plant-based ingredients that I use. It’s in my carrot seed formula and I’ll have to send it to you, Cynthia if I haven’t sent you my carrot seed, but Marula oil and Bakuchiol oil– Marula oil and Bakuchiol oil are the two plant-based ingredients that actually do something for collagen and elastin. Let’s bounce back for one second. I like how I said bounce when I’m talking about collagen and elastin.

Cynthia: [laughs]

Trina: In case someone’s out there– I just realized, in case someone’s out there and he’s like, “I don’t really know what collagen or elastin does?” So, collagen is what’s going to make your skin feel firm. It’s almost like a lipid type of structure that keeps your skin feeling firm. The more collagen you have, the more you look like you’re 20. When I say, you look like you’re 20, you don’t have wrinkles and bags, and you’re not saggy skin, your skin is not really dehydrated looking. Elastin is the [unintelligible [00:20:32]. It’s actually like an elastic rubber band. It will bounce. So, it springs. When you point your finger, it should bounce back. It shouldn’t dig in and be like, “Wait,” and then you shouldn’t see the impression for a while. So, that’s what collagen and elastin do. Most skincare products will never increase them and actually potentiate your body’s ability to produce less.

While it’s not increasing it and not doing maybe any damage directly, indirectly it’s making your body produce less. Marula oil and Bakuchiol oil are my two favorites. They’re in my carrot seed products. My carrot seed elixir, my carrot seed moisturizer. Bakuchiol oil, I want to make sure I get these correct, but I may mix them up. Marula oil prevents the breakdown of collagen, probably, elastin too, but I know for sure collagen, it prevents the breakdown by inhibiting the enzyme that breaks down collagen. So, here you’re going to get your collagen to last longer with Bakuchiol Oil. Marula oil– this is how I love making my products. When I’m done making them I’m like, “Oh, this was so good.

Cynthia: [laughs]

Trina: Marula oil stimulates collagen production. It actually increases the production of collagen. So, by putting these two together, you’re going to be increasing production while decreasing the enzyme that breaks it down. So, you’re going to end up with more collagen much quicker. There’re a couple other things that you can do for collagen and elastin. Jade rolling is one of the things you know using some beauty tools. Jade rolling– I think I don’t know if I sent you my face wand.

Cynthia: It’s amazing.

Trina: Yes, so this is my sonic. It uses sonic vibration. Face tapping, face yoga, these things work to stimulate collagen and elastin, because as we get older, we become less animated. We don’t use our faces. When you watch kid– next time if you’ve got a kid at home, or if you’re a teacher, or if you in environment with kids anywhere, go sit in a park for five minutes. Don’t be creepy.

[laughter]

Trina: Just watch the kids. When they’re talking, they’re using their face, their expressions. So, they’re constantly using their facial muscles. That is collagen and elastin that’s rebuilding everything using your muscles. But when we get older, in front of a computer, we sit like this all day.

Cynthia: Do you think it’s a byproduct though of Botox, like Botox, Dysport, there are a lot of people who are expressionless by virtue of the fact they use paralyzing agents, right?

Trina: Right. Yeah. Oh, totally. And we can talk about that too if you want.

Cynthia: Sure.

Trina: But collagen and elastin get stimulated internally when you’re stimulating the skin. Stimulating means moving your muscles, moving your face, being expressive, moving your face. So, doing face yoga, that’s why face yoga works, that’s why jade rollers work. My sonic vibration wand, it’s called my facial– Face Sculptor because it re-sculpts your face, it uses this sonic technology vibration to do a couple things. One of the things is it’s going to stimulate your muscles, but it’s also going to stimulate your collagen and elastin. While doing that, it’s stimulating blood flow, so it’s going to help bring nutrients to your skin and help pull all the dead stuff, the toxins, anything that your skin wastes out of your skin. So, you can end up with more beautiful skin. Then your skin can function.

It’s not as hard to reproduce more collagen and elastin when your internal structures are healthy. But when your internal structures are clogged and congested, there’s no way they’re even going to be thinking– They’re thinking about survival. They’re not thinking about, “Oh, let’s look more beautiful today.” So, just making sure that you’re using the right products and then some of the beauty secrets you know, either face tapping, face yoga, a beauty tool like a jade roller or my facial wand works wonders.

Cynthia: A couple of things. So, a lot of what Trina is referring to is, we need this waste and recycling process in our body to work optimally, and this aligns itself with fasting, whether you fast just for digestive rest or you’re fasting– That’s a time when your body goes in and takes up cells that are diseased, disordered. It’s like tires on your car. They wear out you got to put new tires on. So, your body is constantly trying to be efficient with renewing, restoring as much as possible. So, you want to do things proactively to make sure this comes about, what are your thoughts on dermarollers? dermarollers– I see a lot of the skin experts that are out there talking about dermarollers. Do you feel like they’re too invasive, do you feel like there’s benefit to using them?

Trina: Anything like that, that’s like a double-edged sword. They’re great but the problem is, if you’re putting toxic things on after, you are absorbing them much quicker. So, you have to be cognizant. They work great. I love dermaplaning, I love exfoliating, I love the dermarollers. But the problem isn’t necessarily that, it’s what you’re either using when you’re doing it or using right after you’re doing it. So, making sure that you’re using an oil base, I’ve had some of that stuff done and I take my own products. Your aesthetician will use your stuff, you know, if you want to go and have that kind of thing done, it’s your responsibility, because I promise you almost every salon is using not good product. So, getting a procedure or something like that done is great. It actually helps increase absorption, but what are you increasing absorption of, good stuff or bad stuff, right?

Cynthia: Right. And that’s a really good point. It’s interesting. I was at a spa this weekend, my sister-in-law took my mom, and one of my nieces and we all had this spa day, and it was an organic spa, and I was kind of checking out with her, and I looked over at this body scrub, and so, I wanted to look at the ingredient profile. I was like, “Oh, I hope it’s almond oil. No, it was soybean oil.” So, even the organic spas are using junky ingredients. So, let the buyer beware and so along the lines of like soybean oil, what are some of the other ingredients– If we’re looking at our products, what are some of the other ingredients that for you kind of send-off an SOS or we need to rethink the strategy?

Trina: One of the tips I always tell people is the rule of five. The first five ingredients of a product on the back of the label make up probably 90% to 95% of that recipe, that formula. If you don’t recognize if the first one’s water, because a lot of times it is, and then the next four you don’t recognize or if you don’t recognize any of the first four, most likely they’re chemicals. So, they’re probably some parabens, phthalates, things like that. They should really all be plant based. They should all be an oil, essential oil, they should be an extract, something from a plant. So, you should be able to recognize almond oil, you should be able to recognize olive oil, or hibiscus, or all of the plants, because a lot of times they’ll put their name that you’ll recognize in parentheses after it. So, my go to is telling people look at the first five ingredients.

If the first five ingredients, you don’t recognize or only one of them is a plant, beware that what you’re putting on your skin is primarily those first five ingredients. So, that’s really important. But going a little deeper, this is where you become the real snob in the beauty industry. I call all my people like the clean beauty snobs. Because once you know that, the next little tip is are those five oils organic? Because if they’re not organic, they’re grown with herbicides, pesticides, fertilizers that can be genetically modified, glyphosate is probably in there, and here’s where the EWG and all of those different types of bodies that came out that are judging skincare, clean beauty type of stuff. They’re giving you a rating– those rating apps. This is where they fall short.

First of all, they don’t consider water a toxin. So, it’s never going to make their list. Know that right away, if water is in the list, it’s not even going to make a rating. I believe that anything that has water in it most likely should probably be [unintelligible [00:28:37] as it’s loaded with crap. So, they don’t look for– they don’t care about water. The other thing they don’t look at is an ingredient organic or not organic? Is it conventionally grown with herbicides, pesticides, and all the crap? That makes a huge difference when you’re looking at something. Even for the nutritional value, it makes a huge difference. So, just being aware of look, “Oh, yeah, five, but they’re not organic. Oh, I’ll pass I’ll find something else.” That’s a good key.

After the first five, if there’s a couple that are conventional, but they’re down at the end of the list, that’s not so bad, that’s not a big evil, but I would make sure those first five ingredients are completely– My standard for my company is 95% must be organic, and at this point, we are pretty much 100% organic. There’s very few that– there’s some essential oils or oils that you cannot get conventionally or organically grown. So, I tried to do wildcrafted and if not available, and it’s a must then usually, I’ll do a conventional but it’s a very small amount of that ingredient and everything else is organic. So, my standard is 95%, but almost everything is 100% organic that we sell for skin.

Cynthia: It’s really interesting because I don’t think I even consider the oil piece. So, I know, I talk a lot about seed oils and things you want to avoid, I know you don’t have any of those in your products, how did you go about finding oils that were not only you know organic, but that were soothing that were beneficial? Did you have to do a tremendous amount of trial and error? I would imagine as you’re bringing a product into your lines, that’s with a lot of trial and error.

Trina: Sometimes, at the beginning stages it was, but I’ve gotten pretty good at it. When I make a product, I know the formula, oil versus like the beeswax or whatever wax we’re going to use. So, I primarily look for the oils. I do my research and get my wish list. I’m going shopping and this– I don’t spare any expenses. I go for the gusto, give me the good stuff. So, I look for the oils and essential oils. So, for instance, like for my beyond moisturizer or beyond serum. I wanted those to help reduce lines, get you beyond the skin you’re living in is really what it means. For me, at the moment that I was making that I had just healed myself of acne, I was 40 and I still suffered from acne until I changed my skincare, and I wanted to get past all the scars. I was so embarrassed by the scars. I wouldn’t even go outside my house without makeup on to cover them up. They were pretty deep and pretty big. So, I wanted to get beyond the scar. So, that’s why I made beyond, something that’s going to regenerate cells, going to speed healing, reduce redness, reduce inflammation, reduce the scars.

And every product– so, I would search for my oils, what I wanted to use and when that came up as a really good strong point, I’d write it on my wish list. And then at the end of my wish list, I start going through and finding which ones can I find organic and how are they processed? Because that’s really important too. How are they processed? You want to make sure the process correctly? I always look for US based. I think we only get one or two oils from New Zealand or somewhere out because they’re not here. They’re not grown here, but most of my oils are grown here. Mountain rose herb is one of my favorite. We buy from them all the time, places that we get our oils. So, I do my wish list and then I figure out which ones I can use because I can get them. Of course, as being someone that’s not just buying and making for myself, I have to make sure I can get them in large quantities, I have to make sure I can get them all the time. So, I have to make sure that and then I go from there with the list of the ones that I can get and I formulate. I put things in and then we test. Then, I take it home and I get to try it out.

Cynthia: No, I think it’s so fascinating and I think it’s amazing that, you’re a healthcare professional, and you’re able to create this amazing company. So, when people are looking at what are the products that most women or most individuals need? I think about like facewash, and moisturizer, and then I would imagine you need to add in like serums or layer things and depending on, where you are age wise, depending on what your needs are? I know you’ve mentioned that you had adult acne and some scarring. It seems like a lot of middle-aged women are dealing with dryness or the occasional breakout, which is like a total bummer, because who wants to be getting a pimple when you’re in your 40s or your 50s? So, how do we go about putting together a regimen of products? How do we know we need to put together? I guess that’s a big thing, because I think a lot of this has been driven by the cosmetic industry. We’re told, you need this, and you need a toner, and you needed that, and I would imagine not everyone does.

Trina: I’d like to simplify. I don’t want to spend a lot of time in the bathroom.

Cynthia: [laughs]

Trina: I’m one of those girls, simple, make it simple, keep it simple. Honestly, if you’re using the right stuff, you’ll look better and you need less. You honestly need that less. Your skin will do what it needs to do to keep you healthy. It will normalize the sebum. So, you’re not super shiny in the midday, it just keeps your skin feeling good, looking good, and hydrated on the inside and the good bacteria growing. As far as what I tell people, my goal with my skincare, now, I do make some products that are for oily skin, for dry skin, for acne skin. My goal is always to have you on those for three to six months, and then get your skin back to normal. Because your skin wants to be normal, your whole body, every organ has been designed to keep you normal. Whatever is going on inside get you back to normal. Your skin is no different. When there’s something going on, it’s trying to get you back to normal until it can’t any longer because you’ve exhausted either nutrition, or water, or whatever. So, my goal is to get you back to a normal skincare regime and then feed you seasonally. What I developed was a seasonal skincare program, that every season you get shipped the skincare that you need for that season, because every season is different. Every season your skin changes, it doesn’t matter the climate that you live in. We are seasonal.

People, bodies, humans, we live seasonally, we eat seasonally, whether we like it or not because of what’s available. So, your skin should not get the same thing every season. For instance, in the fall and the spring, those are your transition months. So, in the spring, you’re transitioning from the dullness from winter to the summer sun. So, you want to prepare your skin for the sun. The best way to do that is increase certain things in skincare, and red raspberry seed is my favorite seed oil to put in skincare products for summer and spring. Because red raspberry seed oil has a natural SPF of between 30 and 50. So, putting that on in the morning in the spring even when you’re not out in the bright sun is going to allow you to develop your vitamin D, allow you to develop a face tan, so that your skin can actually do what it’s supposed to. It’s not going to really block it, it’s going to let your body develop what it needs to.

But it’s also loaded with antioxidants. So, any free radicals that are being created right there on the surface of your skin can be neutralized before you even have any damage from them before they get in. Because remember, damage from the sun can take years for you to actually see with your own eye. It happens on the inside first. So, it’s just important– My goal is always to get you seasonally feeding your skin. What you need as a basic and honestly– I honestly created my line, so, you could keep it super basic, that you don’t need all those things. When cosmetic companies are making eye serum, they’re making eye serum because they put the toxic stuff on your skin that they don’t want to get in your eyes, right? So, really they take that stuff out and call it an eye serum, but they also sold you two things instead of one because you don’t just need that, you need some for under your eyes and you can’t use them interchangeably.

When you switch to an oil-based skincare product like a moisturizer or serum, similar– like what I make, which is all oil based, you don’t need anything special for under your eyes. It’s the same thing. You just make sure you don’t get it in your eyes so that it doesn’t sting. But even my most potent serum, it’s a face treatment called Fire and Ice. It has cayenne pepper in it. Cayenne pepper, if you get it in your eye, it stings like-

Cynthia: Oh, it hurts. [laughs]

Trina: -crazy. For 20 minutes, you’re just like, “Okay, I can’t do anything. I’m just going to wipe the tears away from my eyes.” It doesn’t hurt your eye, but it– [crosstalk]

Cynthia: It’s irritant.

Trina: Yeah. But they actually make cayenne pepper eyedrops. So, it’s really beneficial for your eye. You just don’t want to get it in your eyes. So, anyway, I always say just avoid the eye area for that one. But anything else that I make, everything else goes directly under your eyes. So, you don’t really need a lot. The basics are your face wash, make sure your face wash isn’t sabotaging the rest of your program. Because seriously, most people don’t think about a face wash. They just like, “Oh, well, just give me the face wash, it’s good. As long as it cleans my skin, I’m good.” Most face washes overclean and they strip your natural oil. If you’re stripping your sebum, you’re opening it up to that dehydration, you’re opening it up to the bacteria that causes acne and all other issues. So, you want to make sure that you’re using a face wash that’s going to leave your natural oil in place.

I develop my face washes using saponified oils. Everyone loves that lather. I do too. So, they do lather but they use saponified oils. So, you’re still going to get that lather feeling clean, but you’re not stripping your natural oils. You’re not going to feel oily, you’re not going to look oily, you’re just going to leave that protection in place, and that’s going to actually keep your moisture inside your skin as well. Then after your face wash, I always recommend a face serum or moisturizer. A toner is great if you want to use it. You don’t have to but I do like to use it. I don’t use it every day, but I love to use it when I do. It’s a spritz or two or some of them as a wipe. Alcohol is defeating the purpose. So, make sure it’s alcohol free. Witch hazel’s great, tea based, mine’s a tea base with a little alcohol and rosewater with not alcohol, but witch hazel in it. Then it’s got some other vitamins in it. So, this is why I say water so bad for your skin.

My proving product is a toner because when you use a toner, most people don’t even know what they’re for or why they use them. But what a toner does is, you put it on and very quickly that’s why they put alcohol in it. It dries on your skin and what it’s doing is drying your skin so quickly that the next thing you put on your skin your skin is like, “Oh I’m thirsty.”

Cynthia: [laughs]

Trina: The next thing you put on your skin it goes [sound] and grabs it, and pulls it in, which is great unless you’re using toxic products. You don’t want alcohol because alcohol is going to strip your natural oil. So, using a toner is really good, but only if you’re following it with the right product like an oil base. So, then the next thing would be an oil or a serum, a serum or a moisturizer all oil based is what I say because if you’re obviously using the wrong product, not going to do what you want it to do, and that’s my go to. Those are the three things super easy. Toner or serum or moisturizer, you don’t need both of them at the same time. I like to alternate morning and night. So, I’ll use a serum in the morning and moisturizer at night or vice versa. Then if you want to play, then, once a week add in. Like you can do the jade roller three days a week, I do my Face Sculptor.

There’re three methods. I do one method a week. Lifting, moisturizing, and cleansing. So, cleansing I do with my cleanser, lifting and moisturizing I do when I put my serum or moisturizer on, and it’s about it, you can do up to six minutes. So, you can do between two and six minutes for a treatment. So, that’s just three times a week. Jade roller, I would use that when I’m doing– after my serum or moisturizer, and I teach people how to use the jade roller and how to use the wand to create a facelift effect. Because if you’re going to do it, why not get some benefit out of it. By doing the facelift effect, you’re actually going to be training your muscles to stimulate them, so that they get a little bit fuller muscles, pull your skin up, and so if you’re doing it correctly, especially around here, around your hairline, you’re going to get a little bit of a lift. It’s not like you’re going to walk away, and people are going to be like, “Oh, My God, you had a facelift.”

Cynthia: [laughs]

Trina: Not one treatment. But over time, people will ask you, “What are you doing? Your skin looks great.” They may never say your skin looks like you had a facelift because it’s really subtle. But it’s going to definitely improve, especially with something like the wand. That’s why I love the wand.

It’s got that sonic vibration. So, when you’re doing it and you’re holding it at your hairline for just a three second hold is what I say, you’ll start at the center, pull it up, hold one, two, three that gives three seconds of charge to that muscle with that muscles turned on and goes, “Wow, this is life, I want more.” Then, you just do that all the way around your face, and then you can do an eyebrow lift, you hold it on your eyebrow, three seconds, and then up, three seconds. So, it’s pretty simple. Those treatments and then masks are great. It depends on the type of mask you’re using. People ask me are clay masks great. I say it depends on what’s in them because clay is great, but some other things are not. So, you just have to know what’s in them. The answer, is it good or not, is never yes or no? Let me ask a couple more questions [crosstalk]

Cynthia: Yeah.

Trina: Packaging, let me look at the ingredients and all that sort of thing.

Cynthia: What are your thoughts on charcoal? So, preemptively when I was asking listeners, meeting with Trina again, what are your questions? I think people are thinking a lot about charcoal. Internally, we can take charcoal for a variety of reasons as a binder, I would imagine you would say, it’s probably dependent on the quality of the charcoal, but are there benefits to using charcoal topically on the skin?

Trina: I love using charcoal. In fact, we’re just revising our– it’s called CharGlo facemask. Charcoal will help detox and pull toxins out of your skin a little bit quicker than clay does. So, I like to use a blend of the two. The problem with charcoal is it’s just so messy. Clay can be too but it’s just so dirty and dark and messy. So, that’s the biggest drawback, but it does have so many good benefits for your skin. So, I definitely– and there’s a lot of full body treatments that you can get that have charcoal in them as well. But a full body detox is awesome with it.

Cynthia: Yeah, no, I love the idea. So, raspberry seed oil, I knew nothing about that. Charcoal, what are some of the other ingredients that you feel like are important for people to understand? Maybe they’re not as well known. To me, I think, most of our listeners are really looking for as clean as possible. I always say clean as possible, because I think, it’s impossible to live in a bubble, but we want to try to be cumulatively making changes that over time are going to have a less net impact negatively on our hormones and our health.

Trina: Yeah, Retin-A comes to mind. A lot of women go to Retin-A because it helps stimulate cell turnover and reduce wrinkles that kind of thing. The problem is it’s very drying to the skin. It’s not the best quality of what’s in most skincare products. If you’re looking for a very natural Retin-A, carrot seed oil is the balm. Carrots are loaded with vitamin A and it’s a natural form. So, you’re not just going to get the form that they’re synthetically creating for Retin-A. You’re actually going to get the other forms of vitamin A that are also very beneficial and do some good things. So, carrot seed oil, my carrot seed– I have carrot seed in the couple of my products for that reason because of the vitamin A. But my carrot seed oil specifically is the one that’s I call the balm. It’s got the Marula and the Bakuchiol oil. So, those three together are a really great product for anyone that’s looking to revitalize very quickly their skin.

The nice thing about carrot seed oil, if someone has oily skin and if you’re like me, I had extremely oily skin, and you’re like, “There is no way that women can talk me into putting oil on my skin. No way.” I only did it because I was pregnant and terrified of the toxins that I discovered in my skincare. I’d suffered a miscarriage and that’s the only reason I did it. I had the oily skin ever, my face was full of acne, and I was like, “There is no way,” but you know what today I’m going to do it and lo and behold, my skin cleared up, my oily skin went away. So, when you reverse engineer why that happens, it happens for the same reason that I was talking about before. Your skin’s trying to go back to normal. It’s angry. It’s so angry at you, because you’re drying it out and drying it out, and I was drying out those pimples, I was putting anything on it including alcohol to try and get those– and my skin was firing back at me. Here’s more oil, here’s more oil, we’ve got to produce more oil because it’s drier and drier and drier. We got to keep her safe.

The minute I started putting oil on my skin, I saw a huge difference and it finally went back to normal. Because my skin was like, “Oh, wait a minute, what’s going on here? Hello. She’s not drying us out anymore. We don’t need to overproduce.” So, oil on your skin is actually probably causing you to have oil– or water in your skincare, drying agents in your skincare products are probably one of the main causes of your oily skin, which is why I say so many people don’t get it. There’s really only one skincare type, normal. The rest we pretty much create. Whether it’s food induced, allergy induced, and sometimes allergies are related to foods, hormones, all sorts of things. Most of the other skincare problems, we pretty much create ourselves. So, stop creating your skincare product or– your skin problems by the skincare you’re using. Sometimes, they’re the culprit.

Cynthia: Although, tangentially, in my nerdy brain, I was thinking about how the standard algorithm and allopathic medicine for dealing with acne involves a whole slew of products and topicals, and then ultimately, the coup de grace is Accutane, and so, I did get questions about people who have struggled with chronic either, like significant acne. I think about I had one friend in nursing school, who was so happy to go on Accutane because it was the only time in her adult life that she didn’t have acne. So, I think– it would be helpful I think for some people because– socially because we have so many questions about how to deal with acne, and you’ve touched on some of this. But let’s talk about some of the conventional options and why they’re not ideal. Doing it in a way that as I know nurses do, we’re really here to like educate. These are the questions you should be discussing with your dermatologist, your primary care provider, etc. If you’re– these types of things are being recommended to you with regard to specific skin acne-related issues.

Trina: And I’ll be honest most doctors and dermatologists aren’t going to even understand what I’m talking, what I’m saying. Most of them are, they’re going to be selling you this stuff that is actually going to make it worse and not because they want to make it worse, they have a good heart, they just don’t know what I’m trying to get across to you. So, really, ultimately, you might be better off, and I don’t want to say this like in a bad way. So, take it with a grain of salt. You may be better off doing your own education and learning your skin from your skin and trying the things that naturally work effectively. There’s no shame. I took Accutane twice. That’s how bad my acne was. I had scars like there’s no shame. I did it all. I did the antibiotics.

Cynthia: Sure.

Trina: [crosstalk] the topicals. So, there’s nothing wrong with having done those, but maybe now that you know that they’re probably not going to get you where you are because they’re not getting to the root cause. They’re not going to actually heal your skin on the inside. I took Accutane twice because it didn’t work the first time and guess what, it didn’t work the second time as [crosstalk] I was 40 years old. So, with all the risks that go into all those other things, to me it’s not worth it. I want to say I gave up and I didn’t give up– I pretty much gave up because I was like, “I’m just going to put the oil on my skin to heck with it. How much worse can it get?” I literally gave up– I gave up.

Cynthia: You surrendered?

Trina: No hope. Yeah, there was no hope. Lo and behold, my skin got better, and I was like, “Wait a minute. Are you kidding me? Olive oil? That’s it? That’s all I need.”

Cynthia: [laughs]

Trina: Because that’s what I put on my skin. Olive oil to get rid of my acne and I spent how much money and how much time in that labs and all this stuff? So, yeah, conventional things, they’re not going to solve the problem, they’re not going to get to the root cause. Maybe the root cause of your acne is food allergies or maybe it’s a digestive issue where you’ve got the wrong bacteria or something going on, leaky gut. Maybe, it’s something like that. But taking something topically to heal your acne, it might for a short term, but if you’re not getting to what’s really bothering your skin or why your skin is so angry, and it’s literally, when your skin is telling you something, it’s because you haven’t necessarily listened. I’m not scolding anybody because I was there. You just haven’t necessarily been listening to the signs or looking at the signs of your body. So, now’s the time to maybe step back and go, “You know what, it’s time to take a shot with it.” My program or my products that I created banished– I had to banish. I’m like, “Banish this.”

Cynthia: [laughs]

Trina: Angry, I was. You can tell, I had acne. I was like, “[crosstalk] So, I’m calling it. We’re going to banish it, we’re going to get rid of it.” So, banished and beyond. I wanted to get rid of it and I wanted to get past what was left. I don’t even want to know that I ever had acne, I don’t want anyone to ever look at me go, “Oh, poor thing. She had some acne when she was younger.” No, I was 40. I wasn’t younger. So, I wanted to get beyond it. So, I literally that’s what I did. I banished and beyond food grade– food ingredients, turmeric, you know, I think clove is another. There’re so many good herb– [crosstalk]

Cynthia: Anti-inflammatory. Yeah.

Trina: Yes, anti-inflammatory, letting your skin get back to an anti-inflammatory state like this. My skin was like this. It was literally, this is acne right here. This is my skin. It was just angry on the inside, and you really got to feed it to get it back to normal. Antibiotics, the topicals, they’re not necessarily going to do anything down here, and this is where you want to make change. So, you may not see changes initially up here. I did very quickly. People usually do pretty quickly, see changes, but you may not because this is really where the change has to happen. So, it might take a little time for this to calm down before you actually start to feel and see things on the outside.

Cynthia: What do you recommend– This is another question that came up. What do you recommend for mask me? So, there are people who have had probably no skin problems forever and then all of a sudden, and with the uptick and its delta variant, we may start seeing more mask wearing requirements. For people that are developing acne or pimples underneath their mask that even if it’s being washed every day and they’re being conscientious, a lot of people are complaining that they’re suddenly developing pimples and acne underneath where the mask is. What do you recommend for them?

Trina: No– Number one, good dental. Good dental, and you can go back to our podcast before I don’t even remember if we talked about mask mouth. But you got to think about your breathing and re-breathing, and what’s inside your mouth doesn’t stay inside your mouth. It goes everywhere. Your nose is connected to your mouth, and your sinuses, and your lungs, and your gut. So, what’s in your mouth, what you’re breathing, whether you’re breathing through your nose, your mouth is a reflection of everything that’s inside your mouth, which is typically the dirtiest place of the three components, your sinuses, and your nose. So, if you’re breathing out bad bacteria, you’re going to only inflame and create madness under the mask even more, because it’s just more acidic, and it’s got some bacteria in it that’s not great for your skin either. So, dental health is extremely important. So, that’s why I always suggest doing a detox of your mouth, using good like my gum serum, I have my dental detox kit. It’s behind me over there.

The dental detox kit will clean up your mouth, keep your mouth healthy. Don’t do gum, don’t do gum. Xylitol is better, but don’t do gum. It’s really going to create more problems than good. Even the breath mints, if it’s got sugar, aspartame, and all that crap is going to make things even worse inside your mouth. You’re better off switching to dental care that’s good and natural, rebuilding your microbiome, you won’t have bad breath. When you start to get a foul mouth, drink some water. That is the best way, rinse, swish with the water, swallow it, spit it out if you need to, if it’s really bad from the first time and then swallow. If you’re starting to get dehydrated, masks dehydrate you. Masks reduce the amount of moisture you’re breathing in. So, you get dehydrated more quickly. So, you need more water. So, drink more water. Those are the types of things that I would say getting rid of mask me is going to be more beneficial.

Then, obviously the skincare is really important. So, making sure that your skincare is clean and makeup is not really irritant. By that I mean, most makeups– maybe it’s time to look at your makeup too. Most makeup, I would say 99% of the makeup out there is toxic. The only reason I say 99% is because I know there’s maybe one or two other companies doing what I do, and I make all my makeup out of mineral free colorants which means, it’s plant based. Mineral makeup is an irritant and it’s a toxin, because the minerals have to be washed in chemicals in order to be put in cosmetics. The chemicals cannot be washed off. So, they’re in your makeup and as you’re breathing in, you’re breathing in your makeup, as your skin is absorbing becoming more oily through the day, the oil blends with your makeup, the minerals release those toxins, some small amount, who knows how much? It gets reabsorbed into your skin or causes irritation to your skin. So, those are just some of the things.

Then, I always say, go mask free as much as you can. I don’t know, if that– where you work, what you do, but if you can sit at your desk and you’re in a cubby, and you can pull it down and wear it under your chin for a little while, as long as you’re safe and feel safe, these are all according to what you feel good and safe doing. Go outside– I don’t care if it’s freezing cold out, go outside for a quick break, take your mask off, breathe some fresh air, go to the bathroom, brush your teeth with something good, not bad, use the gum care that I have my gum serum, even when you can’t get outside, just put it on your gums that’s going to fresh in your mouth, moisten it up, but making sure that you’re getting that mask off, I even say at least every hour. So, whatever that means, wherever you work, really, you should be able to take that mask off for a five-minute break every hour. So, I would try and work that in because here’s a quick little, this is how bad masks can be for you. I didn’t realize this until just recently.

I, as a nurse anesthetist, wore masks all day. In the OR, we have to wear masks. I would take it off between cases, but when you’re in OR, you’re wearing a mask, and I didn’t realize, but I was so sick. I had no immune system, and I had teeth that were getting cavities all the time. My dental health was really bad. I had bad breath. Of course, I kept gum in my pocket. I didn’t realize that that cycle might have been related to the mask, because as soon as I stopped doing that on a daily basis, I didn’t realize till now that all of those problems went away. Of course, I changed my dental care, too. But I didn’t realize how bad the mask really are for you. So, while they’re safe in some respect, they can cause damage, internal damage. They can actually cause more problems when your mouth isn’t healthy, we talked about this, other health issues pop up that maybe never would have surfaced. So, making sure that you’re taking care of your mouth, wearing the mask is probably going to help with your skin as well.

Cynthia: That really makes a lot of sense, and I know in Episode 153, we totally dove into this. If you haven’t listened to that episode, it’s probably one of the most popular ones that I’ve released this year. It’s interesting. For full disclosure, I’ve been using Trina’s tooth products exclusively since February, and I’ve talked all about the benefits. But it never occurred to me like, I used to be a big gum chewer, not that you ever knew I was chewing gum. But as I was rounding in the hospital, and I was rounding in clinic, and I was never a coffee drinker, so, I would drink water, but I always felt like I wanted to have clean breath. Well, I haven’t chewed a piece of gum since March of 2020, and I don’t feel like I ever deal with bad breath.

I think it goes back to your point, the hydration, good quality products, the health of your mouth microbiome, and how critically important that is for health. I think for many of us, irrespective of where you live, if you’re listening to this, and things are changing day-to-day, hour-to-hour, but if you get back in a position and certainly, I have teenagers, and I suspect when they go back to school, they’re going to be fully masked. And my kids’ skin has been perfect. Both of them have been perfect all summer because they haven’t had to wear a mask. If they go back to school, I think the skin problems are going to start back up again.

Now, I want to be super respectful of your time and I could talk to you for hours. So. who knows maybe there’s a third podcast that will be in our future. What are some things you can leave listeners with in terms of looking at their personal care products, their skincare products in particular that would be helpful? I know you’ve talked about things to avoid really thinking, I mean, the water piece alone, I think all of us it’s like a big head scratcher. I think everyone’s going to go look at their products, and they’re going to think about crap water, and they’re going to think about what they’re literally giving their skin and how it’s dehydrating and not hydrating, which blew my mind. But also, as people are– we don’t have to make things complicated, we can keep it simple, we can use plant-based derivatives and products that are hugely beneficial for our skin.

So, walk people through like the methodology of transitioning over from perhaps things that aren’t as clean, like, what would be your first thing to change? If they can’t do everything all at once, what would be like a practical step approach to changing skincare products. If maybe they just bought something from the department store, maybe they’re like, “I can change one thing at a time.”

Trina: Yeah, no, that’s a great question, because I get that all the time. The best thing I can tell you is, you are who you are, and you have what you have, and you don’t need to run and throw everything in the trash, because I said or Cynthia said, “Take your time with it and do your research.” When you run out of something, don’t wait till you run out. Now is the time. So, now what you need to do is go through all of your products. Anything that’s open and sitting in a closet, and probably, sitting in the closet has dust on it, probably just needs to go in the trash. Especially, I’ll talk about plastic versus glass really quickly, because this is a really good point that I don’t want you guys to miss. We as consumers have become a plastic society and guess what? We’re becoming plastic. It’s showing on our faces, it’s showing in our bodies, it’s showing in our organs. We are becoming the containers that we have been putting all of this stuff we eat and put on our bodies.

The best thing you can do for yourself is to ditch the plastic. So, what that looks like is, when you’re looking at a product and deciding whether it’s good for your body, good for your health, and okay for your wallet, the first thing I always tell people is, “Look at that packaging, the house. Is the house, okay? Is it plastic, because if it’s in a plastic house, you don’t want it. That’s going to melt in the sun, literally. Then what’s inside, melted plastic, get it?” Yeah. So, if your sunscreen or your sun protectors are in plastic baking in the sun, you’re pretty much putting plastic on your body. Because anytime there’s a temperature change, that temperature change goes from the time that product was created. Most products are not created here in the US, most products are created overseas. So, they have to be flown here or go by boat. There’s temperature changes every single day, and every single time. Night to day, north to south, something gets here, lands or it’s boated in, and it ends up in Florida, and guess what, you live up in Washington State. Well, now, it’s the middle of winter there. So, now, it’s going to go from sunny Florida to winter, and it’s going to sit in a warehouse there who knows what kind of temperature changes are in there. So, every time something changes, temperatures and plastic, the plastic contracts and expands and leeches some of the toxins into your product. I always say anything that has a liquid, liquid being water, oils or anything like that. Chemicals needs to be housed in something other than plastic. My go to face products, my face products are all housed in glass. They are glass, some things are in tin. I use cardboard, aluminum, those containers, those tin containers. Those are all safe, but glass is the safest for skincare. So, looking at the packaging number one and get rid of the plastic. So, even if you’re going through your cabinet, if it’s old, if it’s been in there for a while, if it’s been open, if it’s got to– pitch it, it’s not worth your time or your health.

Then, once you get down to the nitty-gritty, maybe of what you’re just using right now, when you run out what are you going to run out of first? If it’s your face wash, we’ll start looking for a face wash. Don’t wait as you run out. Now’s the time to start shopping. Look for companies like mine. If you don’t want to shop for me, that’s fine. I’m not offended. Do your homework. Shop for companies that are similar to Primal Life Organics. Know their mission, know their owner, how are they making these products, how are they formulated? Are they putting in glass or plastic or they water? Let’s talk really quick about the confusing words like safer–

Cynthia: Greenwashing.

Trina: Yes, greenwashing. The word safer is a very big term now in the cosmetic industry. Because here’s the key. Your brain knows there’s no such word as safer. There’s no such word. It’s either the gun is loaded with one bullet or six, it doesn’t matter or it’s unloaded. There’s no maybe, it’s loaded, maybe, it’s either loaded or it’s not. That’s how I feel about your skincare. It’s either loaded or it’s not. You’re either playing Russian roulette or you feel good about it. Safer is a word that they use because your brain knows there’s no such word as safer, but there’s a word called safe. I know what safe is. Oh, safe is good, safe is okay. So, then your brain says, “It’s okay.” But safer doesn’t exist. Cleaner doesn’t exist. It’s either clean or it’s dirty. There’s no in between. You either have a disease or you don’t. You either have mud on your face or you don’t. There’s no cleaner. So, cleaner skincare and safer skincare are just another way to trick your brain into believing that it’s safe, but there’s still toxins. It’s ways for them to put them in there like the water, plastic packaging, non-organic oils. It’s a way for them to put them in there and make you feel like you’re doing a good thing without really knowing what’s going on inside that bottle.

Those are some of the key things that I would tell people to start looking for. You want to just make sure that what you’re going to be running out of you have searched for. If you’re really loving anything that we’ve talked about and you do want to try Primal Life, I can tell you that I did put together a package with the Face Sculptor. If you’re one of those people that are like, “I’m in, I want that,” the Face Sculptor, it’s a really good deal, and I’ll give Cynthia, her link– use her link and she’ll get the best deal. But you get the whole facelift kit, and you’ll get the facewash, you’ll get a morning serum, a nighttime serum, and then you’ll also get a face exfoliator which is amazing to exfoliate with, so you get the whole kit.

Cynthia: I love it. Well, Trina, it’s always a pleasure to connect with you. Like I said, we could talk for hours and the listeners really enjoy having other nurses interviewed. I got a lot of comments. People are like, “You need to bring on more nurses.” I was like, “I would love to.” So, if you have a nurse that you want me to interview for the podcast, make sure you let us know. How can we connect with you, what’s the easiest way to do so, you’ve got a great website and you’re very active on social media.

Trina: Primal Life Organics is the company. It’s right behind me if you’re watching the video. primallifeorganics.com. Then on social media, it’s @primallifeorg on Instagram and Primal Life Organics on Facebook. Those are the main two. We are also on Pinterest, and Twitter, and all the platforms that are out there, but those are the most popular that people follow us on.

Cynthia: Awesome. Well, it’s always a pleasure to have you on. Thank you, again, for your time.

Trina: Thanks, Cynthia.

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