Alison and Dr. Deb discuss what really causes aging skin and wrinkles. Do you want to look radiant at any age? There are things you can do both internally and externally to look and feel beautiful at any age.
Do not miss these highlights:
[04:43] What is premature aging
[07:35] Address the root cause to stop the problem from persisting and getting worse
[09:21] Whatever we’re putting in our body, it’s going to end up showing up on our skin
[10:52] The body is so resilient when it gets what it needs
[12:48] Inflammation is the number one cause of premature aging
[14:09] Our skin needs six things each day
[20:35] The three products for the AGE Defense System
[25:29] If the skin responded negatively it does not mean the product is working
[27:05] If skin is red and irritated, it sends off a warning sign to create more inflammation in the skin
[33:11] The fewer ingredients in a product, the better
[37:50] Skin will tell you everything
[40:00] The Holistic Skincare concept
Resources Mentioned
Phoenix Factor – https://debra-s-school-1b7e.thinkific.com/courses/phoenix-factor-protocol
Please use this link for the 15% discount, and enter the code – DRDEB.
About our Guest:
Alison Keith is a holistic skincare expert changing the conversation around premature aging. In 2019 Alison and her husband Steve co-founded Whole Story Skin Care. With family ties in custom skincare formulation, they launched their direct-to-customer brand selling premium quality plant-based products.
Alison saw a gap between the misinformation from beauty industry marketing & advertising vs. what science says about preventing & reversing the signs of aging. It was then she decided to tell the Whole Story. “Our holistic approach shares the same principles as functional medicine, targeting the root cause of aging for long term results.”
Alison is in her 40’s, she has never opted for cosmetic injections, nor is she a self-professed “product junkie.” Alison has learned from cell biologists, chemists, and skincare industry pioneers. Her passion is advocating for a more natural way of aging well without harsh invasive chemical procedures.
You can connect with Alison at:
Transcription for Episode #128:
Debra Muth 0:02
Welcome to Let’s talk wellness. Now I’m your host, Dr. Deb. This is where we talk about everything wellness, and learn to defy aging, and live our lives on our own terms.
Debra Muth 0:16
I have the pleasure of interviewing Alison Keith today, who is a holistic skincare expert, and she loves changing the conversation around premature aging. In 2019, Alison and her husband Steve co founded fullstory skincare. with their family ties they’ve created and launched a direct to consumer brand selling premium quality plant based product. Alison saw a gap between the misinformation from the beauty industry marketing and advertising, to what actually was happening with science, and what they were doing to prevent and reversing the signs of aging. I’m so excited to be talking with Alison today. Because she is in her 40s she’s never opted for cosmetic injections. Nor is she self professed product junkie. And she has learned from cell biologists, chemists and skincare industry pioneers. Her passion is really about advocating for a more natural way of aging, without the harsh intensive chemicals, and procedures. So Alison and I are going to have this conversation today about skin and what’s really happening with the aging process. Hi, everybody, this episode is brought to you by my very own Phoenix factor coaching program. Look, we are all about trying to create that absolute perfect life. Let me show you how to do that for free. In my virtual coaching strategy call. You and I are going to spend 20 minutes chatting about your desires where you want to take your business life, your health, and of course, your sex life. And then I’m going to give you tips and ideas and techniques on how to actually get that going. So you can have that absolutely perfect, amazing life you’re looking for. Now it’s super simple. All you need to do is click on my calendly link here in the podcast notes. And hop on pick your time. And let’s start creating that amazing life that you’re looking for. Welcome back to the show everyone. I’m your host, Dr. Deb with let’s talk wellness now and I have a wonderful guest for you today. Alison Keith and Alison is going to talk to us about skincare and aging could not be a better topic for all of us. Because the reality is we’re all aging, right. And we want our skin to age gracefully. And we want it to look and feel as healthy and good as possible without having to do a lot of crazy things to make us look younger. Right. So Alison, welcome to the show. I’m so happy to have you. Hi, Dr. Deb. Thank you. I’m so glad to be here. So Alison, tell us how you got started in skincare and looking at this from an aging perspective. Yeah, so
Alison Keith 3:15
I consider myself a holistic skincare expert. And but five years ago, I got involved with my husband’s family who has family ties in skincare. And I just started to kind of dive in and learn about it. And what I realized is there is a big gap between a lot of misinformation that’s coming to us from marketing and advertising in the beauty industry. And then what science says about how our skin is aging. And so from that about two years ago, my husband and I started our own brand called the whole story. Because even though I am you know passionate about skincare, my real passion is educating women who are getting misinformation that you know, possibly cosmetic procedures or, you know, really extreme, you know, measures to to prevent the signs of aging. And I think what I’ve learned when looking at the science is that our skin is incredibly resilient. It knows how to reverse the signs of aging when it’s healthy. And so we started the whole story we have about 14 skincare products, we have an essential system and then we have some anti aging systems as well but it’s really formulated for sensitive skin to prevent and reverse premature aging. Now lump that’s when I’m talking about premature aging. I am not talking about our genetics. Now all of us our skin started to age at about age 20. And about every year after that we lose about 1% of collagen and As we age, the natural functions of our skin just start to break down. So we start to make less hyaluronic acid, well, that causes less moisture in our skin, we start to make less acidic water, which causes our skin to become dehydrated. And so all of this is naturally happening. Now, what’s going on in our skin today is that due to the standard American diet due to our lifestyle, and due to environmental toxins, our skin is starting to age prematurely, which means all of these natural functions of our skin are now going to war with things like excessive sun exposure, or environmental toxins or toxic particles in the air. If you live, you know, in a in a large city, that combined with what we’re putting in our bodies, like, you know, gluten and dairy, and alcohol and sugar, all of that is actually causing our skin to possibly look up to 10 years older than our actual age.
Debra Muth 6:07
Wow, that is a huge difference. Because you know, people don’t talk about this kind of thing, we talk a little bit about what we put in our bodies and how it reflects our skin. But you rarely hear people talk about the toxins. And I think that’s important because too, when we look at traditional skincare lines, they’re full of all kinds of toxic chemicals, or chemicals in that nature, if we want to just call it that things we can’t pronounce. And those things can’t possibly be good for our skin can they?
Alison Keith 6:38
No and then also, you know, when you talk to women, you know, 20s 30s 40s, they are being told the message that our culture is getting is to inject your skin, with Botox or with fillers, and to use, you know, really harsh anti aging chemicals to really shock your skin and to stop it from showing signs of aging. And what we know now is that the body doesn’t necessarily respond well, you know, to being shocked. And sometimes I compare the skincare industry to Western medicine, where it’s kind of popular to put a bandaid on the problem, or write a prescription or do something immediately to make the symptoms go away. And that’s not how the body responds, and the skin is no different. So as a company as a brand, I really want to change the conversation around skincare and really align our brand with functional medicine, which goes to the root cause and addressing the root cause to really stop. You know, the problem from persisting and getting worse, I like to kind of explain it, like getting your teeth professionally whitened because they look beautiful, and they look clean and radiant. Well. It’s, it’s a cosmetic procedure, it’s your teeth have been, you know, professionally whitened. But you still need to brush, you still need to floss and you still need to get your your cleaning. And so that’s kind of how we can look at what’s going on in procedures, and then how you can actually reduce and prevent premature aging in your skin on a daily basis.
Debra Muth 8:28
So awesome. You know, and I think one of the things that people don’t realize is, skin is an organ of our body. It’s actually the largest organ of our body. And when we’re talking about skin health, we’re not just talking about our face, although that’s where we predominantly look at things, right? We don’t like those fine lines and wrinkles, but it’s our skin all over our body. So as women age and they start seeing their skin, lose that collagen, and start to be more wrinkly and more creped. Like, they don’t like that on their legs or arms any more than they like wrinkles on their face. And so we definitely have to do things from the inside as well as the outside, correct?
Alison Keith 9:06
Oh, yeah, definitely. What it’s amazing because, you know, you said the skin is the largest living organ in our body. It’s also the first barrier of defense between the environment and you know, what’s going on inside of our body. So, you know, whatever we’re putting in our body and wherever we are, it’s going to end up showing up on our skin, our skin expels up to 75% of the toxins that are in our body. And you can usually tell that kind of the first couple weeks of January. If you’ve gone through Thanksgiving all the way through the holidays and what you’ve consumed during the holidays. It usually ends up showing up on your skin, you know within the new year and that’s kind of a good indicator to tell of what we’re consuming and how it ends up showing up on our skin.
Debra Muth 9:52
How many days does it take for our body to lay down new skin skin cells? I don’t quite remember.
Alison Keith 9:58
too hard skin cells turn over every two to three weeks. And what happens is when our skin is unhealthy It is our skin cells are in an unhealthy environment. Now, most people don’t realize this, our skin cells are alive, and they talk to each other and they send messages. So when your skin cells are unhealthy, they’re going to send a message to the skin cells that are coming up that this is an unhealthy environment, that there is inflammation. And so the new skin cells, the baby ones that are coming up, they’re going to come up unhealthy. And so it’s like this hamster wheel that is continuing to cause your skin to age prematurely. A lot of women wake up at about 40. And they go, Oh my gosh, where did all these wrinkles come from? Why do I look so old. This has been happening for, you know, a decade or so. But the amazing thing is that the body is so resilient when it gets what it needs. And we know this from looking at health and wellness, when you have the right diet, when you have the right combination of exercise, the body can regenerate itself. And we’ve seen this in the lives of people who have committed to a healthier lifestyle, they can look and feel so much younger than they did 10 years ago. And this the skin is no exception. When the skin gets what it needs. When it’s getting supplemented, it could the new skin cells can create a healthier environment that can actually cause the skin to regenerate over time, there’s a compounding effect that takes place. And this isn’t necessarily something that, you know, we hear about a lot in the beauty industry, I think most women would say that what they know about skincare is they need a good cleanser, they probably need some anti aging serum. And they need an SPF. And those three things. They’re not bad, but they’re not going to target the root cause they’re not going to bring down inflammation. And they’re not going to recreate a healthy environment in the skin. which is which is so important.
Debra Muth 12:10
Yeah, absolutely. Now is it just as important to put collagen into the body like a collagen powder, as well as putting collagen on the skin?
Alison Keith 12:20
Yeah, I mean, I take a collagen powder in a protein shake. And you know, I think that that’s also, you know, really healthy too. But what you want to do is you want to stimulate the production of collagen. And so we have, we have a vitamin C cream that’s formulated to actually go in and and that’s its sole job is to just stimulate the production of collagen and really plump the skin back up. But I think what’s also interesting and talking about anti aging products or aged defense products, is that we know that inflammation is so damaging to the body. And inflammation is the number one cause of premature aging, it’s responsible for so much disease in the body, it most I would say about 80% of adults have, you know, inflammation in their skin now that is really, really causing the premature aging. And as long as your skin is really toxic, the anti aging products, or you’re not going to see maximum results.
Debra Muth 13:26
Sure, sure.
Alison Keith 13:28
I like to explain it like going out into the middle of the desert and trying to plant an apple tree. And you know, there’s this dry, cracked Brown, you’re not even gonna get an inch down. And you’re trying to put this apple tree into like, you know, take, you know, take root, it’s just it’s not going to work. And so what we really need is our skin. But each day we need to end it’s about six things. And it’s a combination of six things. And I can’t imagine how women can walk into a store or go on a website and try to piece together a skincare routine. It’s so confusing and overwhelming and it’s hard to know what you need. But our skin if you look at the National Institute of Health and all of the scientific research, our skin needs six things each day and I like to kind of look at it as like a multivitamin. And you know, as we age, we need more vitamins, more minerals to supplement back into our body because we’re not getting it from the diet. And the skincare routine is no different. So what we need is we need exfoliation, hydration, moisture softening, repair and protection. And it’s that combination together, it’s almost works like a team to then target the root cause of premature aging.
Debra Muth 14:48
Does every woman needs something a little different in that line, or when we look at that lineup. That’s pretty much what every woman needs, regardless of their age or where they’re at in life?
Alison Keith 15:01
Yes, I would say every- Yes, every person who has skin needs that combination, give or take, for example, exfoliation. When you’re taking an exfoliation, it can be something as harsh as microdermabrasion, which I don’t necessarily recommend. Or you could have a gentle exfoliant. And like we have an exfoliating morning mask that you can put on and in about 10 minutes, it’s going to help the dead skin cells gently lift off the surface of your face. Now, our dead skin cells are meant to naturally exfoliate, but as we age, they don’t and so they sit on the surface layer of your skin and they like snowflakes. And over time they build up. And then you have this layer of dead skin cells. And it’s the dead skin cells that are responsible for the uneven skin tone, the dull skin tone where you have no brightness or radiance in your skin tone anymore, all of the fine lines. Now all of that is just because you have a buildup of excess skin cells. And it’s so easily preventable. And there’s really no reason to do any harsh at you know, chemical peels, you know, when you can do something just so much easier.
Debra Muth 16:18
That is amazing to think that some of those fine lines are just really build up of dead skin cells. They’re not they don’t go deeper than that.
Alison Keith 16:27
No, I mean, that’s I know. And most women have feel like they have to go and do something really extreme, really harsh, really expensive. And, and that’s kind of what we’re taught in our society is to go do something really dramatic right now. And the same thing is with the deep lines that we see on our face, the deep lines that form our from our skin drying out. And that, again, is so easily preventable. between the layers of our skin, we have these little fiberglass tissues, and they’re holding the layers of our skin together. Now when our skin dries out, as it does, naturally, and then you know through excessive excessive sun exposure, these little fiberglass tissues, they dry out, and then when they get so dry, they snap and break. And then that causes the skin to collapse, which causes the deep lines to form.
Debra Muth 17:20
Kinda like if you were in the desert, and you saw the ground dry up and it cracks, same kind of analogy that happens with our skin.
Alison Keith 17:28
Yes, and what we are being told from our culture is to in order to prevent that, you need to inject your skin and and cause those muscles to flex up through Botox. Now you can do that because once those lines form on your skin, there’s nothing that you can do to you if you have some deep, deep wrinkles. Um, you know, even you know, cosmetic surgery can’t always necessarily fix that. So, you can go and get, you know, fillers and Botox. But you can also prevent it from getting much much worse with adding in a moisturizer and a night cream, and a combination of the oils and the butters that are going to lock moisture in because our skin is constantly losing moisture.
Debra Muth 18:19
Is that the same thing that causes some of those fine lines that we get around our lips, like I look at people and I have a little bit of that too. And I know we always say well, that’s from smoking, or that’s from this. But I know a lot of women who never smoked and they get those fine little lines right around the top of their lip. And, and they just don’t go away no matter what you do with them. Can you repair those lines as well?
Alison Keith 18:42
You can to a certain extent, I mean, that’s with with the deep lines and some of the fine lines, that’s when you want to get into, you know, some more anti aging serums that are going to really go in and stimulate, you know, the skin cells. And so then you can look at doing some sort of a retinol or a natural ingredient would be like a crucial. And then that’s when you can go in and really kind of repair some of those fine lines, but so much of this, even if it is genetic and you’re genetically predisposed to dry skin, you can still really like stop the process wherever you are, whether you’re 30 or whether you’re, you know, in your 60s, when you’re seven days, you can really stop it in a lot of ways. And you can really cause the skin to just become so much healthier, so much more radiant. And you can really, really tell you know, when when you have healthy, plumper skin cells. Yeah.
Debra Muth 19:41
Yeah, it’s so important. You know, so many times we look at that aging process and we just assume that this is what we’re doomed to have, right? We can’t change it. We can’t reverse it unless we do microdermabrasion or Botox or things like that. But there’s natural amino acids that we can inject To the face as well, if we want to go that route, but I love what you’re talking about is let’s prevent us from having to do those expensive things. Because the reality is when you go and you get those things done, they’re going to talk to you about paying for their very expensive skincare line, which is a lot of chemicals, and a lot of things that may or may not work. But if you can do something more naturally and feed the skin what it needs, so you don’t have to get to that place where you’re paying $300-400 for Botox, why wouldn’t we do that? I mean, it’s such a more natural process.
Unknown Speaker 20:35
Yeah, so we have three products aged defense system, and it’s called eliminate, and there’s three products, repair, renew, and restore. And the repair. It’s a mask. It’s an amino acid mask, that is really one of the most unique masks on the product on the market. And you can just put it on at your convenience. And what it does is it actually goes into the layers of your skin. And it cleans out all of the buildup now between the layers of our skin over time, we have that calcium buildup. And to kind of give you an example, it’s kind of like when old rusty pipes get build up in them. And then you have to go in and come out. Well, that’s what’s going on in our skin. So think about how there’s all of this hard calcium buildup in the layers of your skin almost like barnacles on the bottom of a pier or you know, a dock. And without clearing that out. Any anti aging serums are really not going to be able to go in and do the work it needs for repair. So this mask is going to go in is going to almost make a clearing. And that’s what we always need a system because it’s never going to be just one product.
Alison Keith 21:50
And then on top of that, we have the renew vitamin C cream. Now what’s different about our vitamin C cream, most people are going to opt for a vitamin C serum. No, there’s nothing wrong with a vitamin C serum. What happens now serums are popular because they use the most advanced technology. And so we think, oh, advanced technology is better? Well, it isn’t a lot of ways. But it depends on what your goals are. A serum is going to penetrate deep down to the bottom layer of your skin. And that’s fine for certain repair work, what we want is we want this luxurious cream to go in and lace the layers of your skin almost like icing on a cake. And that’s where it’s going to go in and sit there and stimulate the production of collagen. And then on top of that we have this luxurious moisturizer, which is called restore. And it is going to pull moisture from the air deep into the layers of your skin. Now our skin naturally makes hyaluronic acid but as we age, we make less of it. Well, there’s also hyaluronic acid in the air. And so our moisturizer pulls moisture from the air and replenishes it back into our skin, which is then going to hold in that much needed moisture to keep the skin from drying out. So it really is the combination and of layering products. And when you layer products, they actually activate each other. And so we use a lot of botanical plant based products that are going to activate each other meaning that the vitamin C or the aloe or the hyaluronic acid, they’re going to work better together like a team than if you use one just by itself. They’ve also compound which is another amazing thing. You know, just like exercise, just like eating healthy. Are you going to see results overnight? Probably not. see results in a week? Yeah, are you going to see even better results in a month and in three months and in six months. And so that’s kind of what’s going on when you put botanical products, layer them onto the skin. Over time, you’re gonna see those new skin cells start to react and generate and respond to the really amazing ingredients that you’re putting on your skin.
Debra Muth 24:12
Love that. Now when women start a system like yours, can they expect to see some negative effects in the beginning like when they’re cleansing their skin? Can they can they see more dryness or can they see acne? Or can they see things that maybe would make them say oh, this isn’t working I should stop this before it gets better or do they just typically see things improve right out of the gate?
Alison Keith 24:39
They shouldn’t see you know a response if they if you see a response right away it could be some sort of an allergy or your skin responding to any of the natural ingredients if you are, you know allergic to you know certain nuts or seeds or you know citrus then the skin is no different. But you shouldn’t see a really, really harsh response. What happened with a lot of skincare products, especially anti aging, is that they have pandered to the American public that would like to see results overnight. Well, what is results looklike? Well, wehave been taught that results looks like tight, itchy, red, irritated skin, we’ve been taught that that is what your skin should respond to. And that means the products are working, that does not mean the products are working, that means your skin is tight, itchy, red and irritated and has responded negatively because the skin does not like to be shocked. And it doesn’t like to be, you know, pounded into submission. And so the skin wants to, you know, we need to be more healthy or more gentle with the skin. So our products are formulated for sensitive skin, they are high quality. So they are going to be very effective. But it’s going to be a gentle process, because we know that the skin is going to respond over time. Not necessarily the most of the time I hear, you know, women say well, I tried this retinol, or I tried this vitamin C and you know, it really, you know, made my skin kind of red and irritated. And that is just a lot of companies really putting in a lot of harsh products to get your skin to react.
Debra Muth 26:32
Yeah. And I think I’m so glad you brought this up, because so many people think that they have to have a negative outcome to have a positive outcome, you know, like, you’re going to go have microdermabrasion, and we’re going to peel off that layer of your skin and it’s going to be red, it’s going to be sensitive, and it’s gonna be irritated. And that’s normal, it’ll settle down. So we learn to accept those kinds of things as women that if we want to look better, we have to hurt before we can feel better, right? And that’s so not true.
Alison Keith 27:03
And also, what they don’t tell you is that when your skin is red and irritated, it sends off a warning sign to create more inflammation in the skin. So yes, you are going to peel your skin off and underneath, you’re going to have a smoother surface of your skin. But underneath the layer, you have just sent a message to the new skin cells coming up that you have to shock your skin. Now it’s in a state of defense, now you’ve created more inflammation, and the inflammation now is going to trigger a rapid response of more premature aging. And so this is I mean, we’re talking about this is going to happen down the road. But we’re paying for such temporary results without thinking about how do I This isn’t about looking 22 anymore. This is about looking at having beautiful looking skin, where you can put on makeup or not or go makeup free. And and still have, you know, a lovely radiant complexion and age.
Debra Muth 28:08
Yeah. And I think that’s so important because as women, we want to look good. And there are a few of us that want to be you know, 20, when we’re 60, most of us, we’re smarter than that, right? We don’t want to go back to that age, we’ve learned too much. But we do want to look like you said, we want to look radiant, we want to be beautiful, at 40 at 60. At 80. We want to feel good about ourselves, and we don’t want to feel like everything we’re doing is creating something negative for us. But I think like you said, we’ve been taught and we’ve been sold a really big bill of goods that are not right, for many reasons with beauty when it comes to women and how we look and how thin we have to be in all of that there’s been so much mistrust in the community as a result of this. How do women, how do women learn the reality of things instead of learning what the media wants us to think?
Alison Keith 29:05
Yeah, you know, I think it’s about you know, listening to your body and, and, you know, looking at, like, what, what kind of results do do you want? And I think it’s an individual choice, but also kind of looking at, like, you know, the culture around us, like my daughter, she’s turning 10 this summer, and I look at you know, the generation of women coming up behind us, and I think, you know, what kind of messages are we going to be sending to them about, you know, the beauty and what is beautiful, and what does it look like to be proud of aging gracefully? And I think that that’s you know, also something to to look at as well. Yeah.
Debra Muth 29:46
Yeah, I think the media has been so good at finding ways for us to feel bad about ourselves, so that we spend more money with them. Like that’s their job, right? Make us feel bad. So we go out and we spend money on whatever it is, whether it’s Botox or fillers, or liposuction, or diets, whatever, that’s how they get to us. And, and I love what you’re talking about is what is the message that we as as maturing women are going to send to the younger women coming up behind us so that they can be healthy and strong and beautiful and vibrant and feel good about themselves at any age. It’s so important.
Alison Keith 30:24
I also think that there’s a big wave out there big conversation around natural, healthy, organic, you know, and I think that there’s no regulation on what that means there isn’t in the skincare industry, there isn’t necessarily in the supplement industry. And so everyone’s using, you know, plant based or vegan, or, you know, any of that, and nobody really knows kind of what we’re talking about, um, you know, something that can be, you can have one ingredient, for example, that has a less than 1%, of an organic plant organic ingredient. And you can put that in your product. And you are able to say that the product is organic, because you have one ingredient in there that is organic. So technically, you can say, you know, it’s organic, and then you get into clean well what is considered clean, you know, what is considered natural.
Alison Keith 31:25
So I also like to talk about just because it’s technically organic, clean and natural, it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s going to do what you want it to do in terms of the result from the product. And it also doesn’t mean that it is going to go in and effectively prevent your skin from aging prematurely.
Debra Muth 31:49
Yeah, I’m glad you brought that up. Because it’s so true that, you know, this idea of marketing and what we call vegan, clean, organic, natural. They’re all terms that we’re using these days. But the general consumer has no idea exactly what that means. If it says organic, it must be good, right? Right. But the reality is, like you said, it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s truly organic. And there’s no way for consumers to find out those things either, right, it’s to call the company directly, and you talk to the company directly, but then you have to know what you’re asking for. So we assume when someone uses those marketing terms, that it’s healthy, it’s safe, it’s good, compared to some of the other companies that are marketing different things to but everybody’s figuring out the marketing game. So you really have to know your company, and understand what their values are, and understand what their their true desire for putting out their products are for you.
Alison Keith 32:44
Yeah, another thing to look out for is an ingredient list. And it is not required in the United States to print all your ingredients on your label. It’s not also required to actually have it on the website, we do all of our ingredients are listed on our packaging, and on the website. But you all you have to do is put in your key ingredients or active ingredients, what we really believe is the fewer the ingredients, the better. And so we really keep our ingredient list between 10 and 20. And that’s something else to look for. If you’re out shopping. Or if you’re you know, being told that this one product is going to be a catch all miracle, it’s going to do everything and it has 45 different ingredients in it, that should be an indicator to you that if you have that many ingredients in one formula, they’re kind of cancelling each other out and they’re becoming diluted, it’s like you know, too many people in the elevator, we got to get some out of here. And so the fewer the ingredients, the higher the percentage of the active ingredients, which means you’re going to get more potency and you’re going to get much more out of that product. And so we are much bigger believers in layering multiple products that have really key ingredients that are going to do what they say that they’re going to do and they’re going to work together.
Debra Muth 34:07
I love that concept in the skincare line is it much like the food line when you’re looking at an ingredient list like the first ingredient is usually the largest ingredient in that product. Does it go the same way?
Alison Keith 34:18
Yes. So if you’re looking at it, and it’s going to go from like the most active you know, down to, you know, the the least active or you know, some of them that are that are in there just to kind of makeup, the consistency of the product, but for example like we have a product called rosewater gel, which is one of my favorite products it has, it’s all natural, and it’s a beautiful green color. It’s this rich green color. There’s no fragrance in it. There’s no artificial color, but it smells like roses, and it has this luxurious like emerald color and it’s all natural. There’s no additives and another thing a lot of people don’t realize lies that fragrance and artificial color are toxins that can effects you know things as well. But this rosewater gel has 10 ingredients, and it doesn’t have the sodium lauryl sulfate that you put in shampoo. Now that is a chemical that is put in shampoo and soaps to cause it to suds up. Now when we’re washing our hair, or you know, washing our bodies, we think because we’ve been told that the more suds, they don’t, the cleaner it’s getting in actually has nothing to do with the cleansing process. And so a lot of times, you know, you, I’ll be using the rosewater gel to clean my hair, and I don’t have the suds, but even we’ve just all, you know, been trained that that something like that that’s not even good for you is we think that that’s going to be you know, cleaning, you know, our hair or our skin. And so our rosewater gel, we use it as a shampoo, a facial cleanser, a body cleanser, we use it for bubble bath for the kids, but for my favorite my husband shaves with it, and I shave with it as well. So it’s like this really clean Multi Purpose product that has you know, it’s family friendly, and it’s, you know, has a clean list.
Debra Muth 36:18
Well, that’s wonderful. When we use those toxic chemicals like that on our skin. Now, many of them are in skincare lines, and we use them on our skin, what exactly what kind of damage is that doing to us? Besides, it’s supposed to be doing something good, but it can’t be doing something good if it’s toxic for us. Right?
Alison Keith 36:36
Right. And it’s, it’s, you know, it’s using it over time, it’s, you know, you know, just when we put something on our skin, it’s going to, you know, penetrate in and, you know, eventually get into our bloodstream. And so, you know, it is really looking at like, you know, what are we willing to, you know, cut out in terms of, you know, some of the chemicals, and the metals that are going into our body. And it you know, it is over time, it’s it’s not it, it makes it, it makes it harder for the body to function. That’s not necessarily saying that, you know, if you’re going to use makeup, and deodorant, and cleaning products and lotions with chemicals in them, it’s not saying that, you know, this is eventually going to develop into cancer, but it is saying that the body is going to have to work so much harder than it was designed to, to flush out all of these toxins. And you know, it just could mean that over time, we’re going to be more sluggish, or it’s going to come out through our skin. And you know, it’s just kind of like an old car, just you know, it needs a tune up. And it’s just not running the way you know, it should.
Debra Muth 37:45
So one of my favorite things when I was studying in naturopathic school was for them to tell us if you want to know the true health of your client, look at their skin, their skin will tell you everything, the color, the texture, if it’s rough, if it’s smooth, if it’s soft, that will tell you actually what’s happening on the inside of their body. So you’ll know truly how healthy they are by looking at their skin. And so many of us don’t use that as a gauge to say, hey, maybe it’s time I change something that I’m doing. because things are not looking externally for me the way I want them to. But it’s a reflection of what’s actually happening inside our body as well.
Alison Keith 38:22
Yeah, I’m so glad you brought that up. Because again, I feel like we’ve been trained to think about wrinkles, like all you need to do is get rid of wrinkles, or the fine lines, and then your skin will look younger, but don’t feel like we’ve been trained to really look at like, Is there a natural glow to the skin? Does the skin look dull and gray? And um, you know, does it look, when you put on makeup? Does it look like you have this film of cake that’s sitting on top of your skin? You know, it should never look like that? Is there a natural, you know, radiance to your skin. And that is something that can be ageless, that doesn’t necessarily mean that you know, if you’re you know, in your 40s 50s 60s 70s your skin can always have this beautiful, healthy, you know, natural natural glow to it. You know, when your skin’s healthy. We just we don’t really know what that means anymore.
Debra Muth 39:18
No, we really don’t. I think even just when we’re talking about health in general, we’ve made so many accommodations for what’s considered healthy quote unquote, and what’s acceptable to be healthy. We just keep making accommodations because we don’t want to necessarily change what we’re doing. But then we end up in really bad places as we age and for the first time ever, we’re looking at our children dying before the parents simply because how they’re being raised and what they’re being fed and how they’re living is not healthy compared to previous generations. And that’s really a sad thing when we think about that.
Alison Keith 39:59
Yeah. Yeah, no, I mean, my passion is definitely really to take skincare out of, you know, being beauty and and really, let’s just start talking about skincare in terms of, let’s get let’s get healthy. What does that mean? What are you eating? Are you moving your body every day? And you know, what are you doing to, you know, bring joy and fulfillment into your life? And are you know, are you taking care of your skin. And you know, it really is, this is why I call myself a holistic skincare, skincare expert. It holistic means to take a look at the whole, not just one piece, because one piece is really kind of what we’re trying to get away from and health and wellness, like, let’s look at all of it. And let’s address the root cause of of what’s going on here. And how can we how can we really infuse some more longevity into our lives?
Debra Muth 40:56
I love that that’s such a great concept. So Alison, how can people get in touch with you if what they’re hearing from you resonates with them? How do they find out about your skincare line or get in touch with you.
Alison Keith 41:09
So our shop for Whole Story is at shopwholestory.com. And our email is Hello@shopwholestory.com. And then we’re also on Instagram, @wholestoryskin. And I’d like to, you know, give your listeners a gift of a discount code which will be in the show notes. And they can come over and check us out. (Enter promocode DRDEB for a 15% discount.)
Debra Muth 41:36
Yeah, that’s awesome. I love that. I definitely will go over and follow your Instagram page and see what you guys are doing. I’m very intrigued by this and can’t wait to try your products myself. I’m always looking for great products to use and have a few fine lines. I’d like to get rid of myself. Yes, well, thank you. This has been so fun. I love I mean I could talk about this all day.
Debra Muth 42:02
Hey, it has been really great sharing this time with you guys on the let’s talk wellness now podcast. If this episode has helped you or you feel as though this episode would help someone else we’d love for you to leave us a review, share this podcast and if you don’t want to miss the most exciting episodes we have coming. We’d love for you to subscribe to our podcasts on iTunes or Google Play. Until next time, live every day to the fullest