How Sleep Affects Your Skin

Most people are aware of the many benefits of getting a good night's sleep but what most do not realise is just how important sleeping is for keeping our skin in the best possible condition. The saying of not getting enough beauty sleep could not be more appropriate when it comes to skin care.

When we are sleeping, the cells of the body are repaired and this includes skin cells. Various studies have shown that sleep deprivation can lead to reduced levels of growth hormones and it is these growth hormones that are required for the repair process. The less growth hormone that we have, the less opportunity the body has to repair the damage that has occurred to the skin throughout the normal course of the day.

The rate that new skin cells are produced by the body doubles during periods of sleep, so the more shut-eye you get the faster your skin cells will be produced and the younger you are likely to look. Without this cell regeneration or with cell product reduced below certain levels, the skin will tend to become more wrinkled and lose its tone over time.

While all this might lead you to think that you should be spending more hours in bed, you also need to consider the effects on your skin of lying in bed for too long as well. Those effects have to do with the way that you sleep. Most people tend to sleep on their side or face down. In doing so, their face gets crease marks from the extended time that it is pushed against the pillow.

When we are younger this is not a problem, but as we age and there is less elastin in our skin, the crease marks take longer to disappear and if we continue to sleep in the same position every night these marks can become permanent. The alternative is to sleep on your back or to get softer pillows with satin pillow slips to reduce the marks.