Another Decade

Of Avoiding Botox

We are nearing the end of the 2010s (it was easier last decade to roll the decades of the tongue). The fact I know this shows my age. 42!! 43 next year. In the 2020s I will hit 50. Shit! Really? I might go back the way with age. At least 50 still sounds far enough away for me not to think too much about it.

What I do think about most years when I think about my age is one question. When should I get a bit of botox?

I am not saying it is a worry or even a philosophical view on whether people should or shouldn’t get botox. I am just glad that my face has held it together for this long. Especially given the sensitivities of Scottish skin and the numerous bad (but bloody enjoyable) habits.

Botox

Injections for medical things and also for wrinkles. We all know this and all know people who get botox. A good mate of mine recently got his face done. He looks rejuvenated and he feels it too. The funny thing though – the paralysing of his face muscles. We spent a whole evening making him laugh about the fact his laugh only reached his cheeks. I think he went for as much as he could get. He finds it weird that he can’t get across some non-verbal emotions now. We all find it highly amusing whilst we wrinkle up our faces in response.

Faces

I can rarely hide (unless needed) what I am thinking. I succumbed years ago to this and figure why not give immediate feedback on things with your face.

Faces are great. So different, so expressive and so necessary (obviously!). So this is my issue with Botox. I am not at all against it and, like I say, I consider it every year. But what if my face couldn’t say things? Yes I have a mouth…I use it a lot; but facial expressions add a bit extra.

Wrinkles

Is it just me or do wrinkles look better on men than women? Probably just me. Am I starting to find wrinkly men more attractive; that ‘Ive been places’ look. Nope. But I do think they look better on men.

My wrinkles. Hmmmm. I don’t quite yet admit to any. Maybe a few laughter lines and possibly not as fresh looking. That might be down to me having a glass of Malbec on occasion though. I always thought I had a young face. People say this. But when I screwed my face up at work the other day my boss said “don’t do that you look old”. I retorted with “well I would rather have my face than your’s”. There was a continued argument about who’s face was better. At least we act like children even if our faces are past 40.

Ok I am sure I have some wrinkles and this is where the debate, in my head and now out there on this post, starts. When I get up in the morning I sometimes feel like my face hasn’t bounced back. Did it do this when I was 20? I have always had sensitive skin but is it more sensitive now that I am 42? Do I laugh too much? Yes I laugh too much but that might not help avoid any eye wrinkles / laughter lines.

I have a friend who does botox. She is a doctor and runs a successful business with fillers, botox and who knows what. I am always tempted to book in. I just have avoided it so far because I think if I start I might not ever stop.

Its a debate in my head that I don’t know how to answer. My procrastination is probably the only reason why I haven’t done it yet. I don’t know why I am even spending the time debating this. Botox is fine to do. Even young people, that is a whole different debate, do it.

My Face

At any moment my face might fall off and I will need the botox. So today I might just drink coffee and moisturise. I’ll book something next year. If I don’t procrastinate. At least it will be a new decade – new decade new face. Today I should concentrate more on getting up and moisturising, putting on even a tiny bit of makeup and sorting out my bed head, not done anything with it yet, hair.

Header Photo by Jennifer Latuperisa-Andresen on Unsplash

How do people get that loose curl?!

I have this conversation with my hairdresser every time. She can do it. To my head. With a round brush! To be fair she says she can’t do a brush curl to her own. So apologies. This post does not give any answers to the question. It just highlights why I can’t.

Brush

Those bloody round brushes are a recipe for disaster. I have tried and ended up with something like this….

Is it because my hair is pretty thick and if left to it’s own devices it might turn out like this anyway? I straighten it but it is nice to get a little movement. I will never ever be able to get any movement with a round brush. I often wonder why they are still sold and also why there are not more women walking around with round brushes stuck in their hair. Have you ever tried to extract yourself from one?

Rollers

I have heated rollers but, seriously, it takes an age to do it. The expected outcome – well it happens to be brilliant at times. At other times my hair just resembles a poodle.

Photo by Tra Tran on Unsplash

So the problem with rollers is that you commit to an indefinite outcome. Or maybe not. Maybe people can do their hair amazingly every time with a set of rollers. My problem is that I leave my preparation till the last minute. Another recipe for disaster.

Tongs

Curling tongs to be exact. I Feel like they should have been left in the 80s but there are loads of them still on the market. So I have a pair. More like a curling round stick thing. It does work but it just doesn’t last. So my hair ends up a bit limp. Limp hair is never a good look.

The Machine Type Thing

I actually have a thing that sooks your hair in and then spits it out in a curl. It wasn’t cheap and I don’t use it. At all. It sooked my hair in once and mangled it. The only thing it was spitting out was a load of new split ends. I sleep on a silk pillow to avoid split ends so the machine has been relegated to the back of the useless curling implements cupboard.

The Answer

I think it may be a Dyson thing. I know this is optimistic of me, so if anyone has actually used them let me know. They are expensive and most people may be questioning why I would spend that kind of money on something so irrelevant. I think the same about hoovers.

The other answer – have a hairdresser consistently there to curl my hair. It’s probably one of the few professions I haven’t dated. Oh….I did. Once but I was in my late teens so I don’t think that counts. He was a trainee. Very forgetful.

Why am I even writing a blog about this?

I have a lot of nights out and would like my hair to look good. It’s not the only reason though. At the moment I just do the curl / wave thing with my straighteners. It doesn’t feel enough. I would really love to be able to do a loose curl and have effortlessly lovely loose curled hair. All the time please. Any help or live in hairdressers (to do my hair not to date me) welcome!

Header image Photo by Skitterphoto from Pexels

Sleeping In

I think we have all done it. Overslept. Slept in. Any activity that means you have slept longer than you should. That gentle waking up when your eyes are blurry and you take the first movements of the day. The move of your head to look at your watch. Wandering if you still have time to hit the snooze on the alarm clock. The crash of realisation hitting that you have slept in! The immediate question. Is that the right time? The answer – ‘It can’t be…oh hell it is’. Your stomach churns a little (or a lot depending on why you should be up). Immediate thoughts run through your head asking how this could have happened. You don’t have any answers. Especially when you are this tired!

How did this happen?

In my case(s) it happens because I have turned off, in a sleepy happy haze, my alarm. I clearly did that this morning. I have no excuse. Knowing that this is possible in my sleepy state I always set multiple alarms to ensure I get up. My fail safe strategy didn’t work today. Oops.

The time of year and the weather is important in our sleep patterns. A lack of sun, dark nights and dark mornings can make it difficult to get up. Apparently we can sleep an extra couple of hours in Autumn and for some people SAD can kick in during the winter months.

I don’t suffer badly from SAD but there is definitely some effect due to a lack of light. This can affect most of us. I did have a sunrise alarm thing a while back. I can’t remember why I ditched it but it was probably due to my inner rebellious streak of ignoring things when sleeping 💤.

What to do when it happens

It’s easy to say and harder to do but basically once it has happened you can’t do anything about having slept in. So you might as well own the mistake, admit it and take any consequences on the chin.

Today I wasn’t working so it was a yoga class I missed. I woke up at 9.15am and the class started at 9.30am. Not the worst thing in life but I still feel guilty. Email to instructor has been sent fully admitting the fact that I slept in.

Some previous sleeping in episodes have been worse. There was one occasion a few years ago when I agreed to be the only manager on site at my work. The others were at a development day or something. For a 7.30am start I monumentally managed to sleep in till 10am. Much bigger oops. All the potential excuses I could have made ran through my head that day. I told the truth…quickly! It was very embarrassing. It still gets mentioned.

Embarrassing but also funny. People appreciate the truth and you might as well own it and tell the story before others do. Like I said, everyone has slept in at some point.

What not to do when you have slept in

Don’t panic. There is nothing you can do once it’s done. I would say don’t lie but I get that a ‘dentist’ excuse might be a good way to explain things. Don’t take the day off sick. There is nothing worse than extending your feelings of guilt into a whole day.

One last bit of advice. Whatever you do, don’t hit snooze tomorrow!

Photo by Kate Stone Matheson on Unsplash

Split Ends – get a silk pillowcase

Why did I not know this?! How could I have missed the silk pillowcase rule for hair and, apparently, skin care? Well I did miss it but thankfully someone put me right a few weeks ago.

I struggle with split ends. It is due to my hair being quite unruly at times, naturally wavy and thick enough to be embarrassing in the morning (bed head isn’t always a good look). At least it isn’t too thin. So after my recent haircut the split ends are sorted and a, much better informed, friend told me to get a silk pillowcase.

Sleeping on silk

There is no doubt about it that sleeping on silk feels…well it feels lovely. I used to think it was a bit tacky but my view has completely changed. The best thing – the benefits!

Hair

Silk pillowcases can reduce messy and unruly bed head. This also means that it can reduce the chance of split ends. Which is perfect for me as I don’t like getting lots of layers cut into my hair and it’s tough to grow them out when you keep getting split ends between cuts.

My hairdresser always chats to me about this. You can definitely reduce split ends by using serums, being careful with the brushing / combing and not using harsh hair bands. But a silk pillowcase will help too.

After a couple of weeks of sleeping with silk my hair is amazingly manageable in the morning. So if you want to put in a lovely curl and have it last more than the day I would definitely suggest getting a silk pillowcase or two.

Even more benefits of silk

I did a bit of research on this and there are a lot. Silk is naturally hypoallergenic. A tick for good skin! It helps skin retain moisture. Great! It’s not rough on the skin. Brilliant!

If you think about it your face comes into contact with your pillow more than any other thing (well other than your partner if you have one). So with your face rubbing against material when you sleep it can lead to your skin feeling a little dry. If you sleep against silk this doesn’t happen. It also, apparently, means that it reduces the appearance of wrinkles. At my age this might become a good thing; not yet though thank you very much!

My view on silk pillowcases

I won’t go back to cotton. Yes my bedsheets are lovely and I do think you should always sleep on good quality fabric given how much time is spent in bed. But I think I might go with a full on silk bed set for an alternative. Even if I don’t sleep in silk bedsheets every night my pillowcase from now on will always be silk.

Photo by Ömürden Cengiz on Unsplash

The Benefits of a Really Good Thai Massage

I have been doing a lot of yoga for the past year. I thought I was getting more flexible. I have also been working on my posture and alignment. It has improved. So all good…right? Erm…no. My Thai Massage lady would disagree with my conclusions; and after one torturous, but amazingly good, Thai Massage I am inclined to agree with her.

Side note – whilst getting my Thai massage I would agree with anything she says out of sheer fear :-)…in a good way.

What is a Thai Massage

It is a massage that is not for the faint hearted. No gentle rubbing of the shoulders with a Thai Massage. Basically the Thai massage is one where pressure is used alongside yoga like stretches. There is no oil but they will normally use some sort of balm. The pressure comes from the therapists feet, elbows and hands and pressure is applied along the energy lines of the body. It is pretty easy to find a good one if you are in Thailand but in Edinburgh I figured this might be more of a challenge. It wasn’t. There are some good Thai Spa places and whilst the one I went to wasn’t cheap, it is definitely worth it.

Why Choose this Massage?

To be honest I think it is personal preference. I am trying to work on my posture, allignment and flexibility so this was an obvious choice. I also hold tension without even realising it. It might be a job thing but, regardless, the difficulties I have noticed in my body by doing yoga are ones which a Thai massage can even out (aka pummel, crack, stretch out of me).

I have had lots of different types of massage in the past. From the beauty salon type with hot stones and gentle pressure to the Swedish style for specific sports injuries. Because I hold tension, however, I always think I need the masseuse to be pretty firm to work on any knots. In the past I chose men for this reason. Weird assumption to make given my Thai masseuse was about 5ft, tiny (I hardly felt her on my back) and clearly the strongest person in Edinburgh!

With a Thai massage you feel like you have had your moneys worth; especially when you are still feeling a tad tender for a couple of days but amazingly relaxed.

My Massage…The Fear

I was a little nervous last week when I rocked up to a place I had never tried before, to let someone pummel me with their feet, elbows and fists. Actually I was a lot bloody nervous. My therapist packed a real punch.

Anyway – loose clothes on and I lay down on the floor mattress. Lovely surrounds, gentle music and scents of Thailand. But…. I was still nervous; especially when she got on my back and started. Lots of agggghhhhhh’s (silently of course)….with attempts to breathe through it. This didn’t always work and I full on giggled when things were ‘cracked’. She did ask me to say if the pressure was too much or too little (not a bloody chance of the latter) but I told her to just keep it as it was because I knew it was working.

There was knots / tightness literally everywhere. I thought it was my shoulders which were bad but it was also my: back, hamstrings, legs (every bit of them), feet and toes. Lots of things felt ‘owch’ but I could feel things literally melting away as she did her work.

The ending was just as scary as the rest. This was the bit where she got me to sit wide legged whilst she stretched me back and cracked my back, stretched me in the oddest of ways and cracked my neck.

The Outcome: The Return

She said I would be a bit tender for a few days. She was not wrong! The first night I found it hard to sleep on my back. But despite the tenderness my back felt like it had melted away and I was really relaxed. Everything felt more open. My shoulders are starting to relax into a good posture rather than a tight / rounded posture. My hips are feeling great and my legs looser. Everything just feels a bit more even.

I was back yesterday for a follow up. This time we did an oil massage so that she could focus more on massaging out my back and legs. To be honest I expected this to be like a hard Swedish massage but it bordered on Thai without the clothes on and with oil. It was great, still owch, still scary, but the second one has shown me exactly where I am uneven. I know now why my yoga balances are better on one leg than the other and why I just can’t manage some of the binds.

So am I going back? Yep. It is likely to scare me every time but the outcome and the process is worth it. Massage is something that really benefits people who hold tightness. It benefits the body and it has also benefitted my mind. So it is going to be a regular part of my routine. Hopefully it will also benefit my posture and my yoga. Tips for getting through it – don’t be surprised when she gets on your back and try to smile your way through it. You will be smiling about how great you feel after.