Coconut oil trials

Prior to moving to Hong Kong, I was a ‘Mecca junkie’, on beauty loop level 3, reading every email that came out and regularly stopping by the store to get samples of latest products. My favourites being Malin & Goetz, Nude, Nars, By Terry and Stila. This routine worked well for my skin. I had combination/ normal skin with a small amount of pimples or other ‘imperfections’ as deemed by beauty advertisements, and I wore different lipsticks everyday regularly mixing to achieve new colours to match my outfits. Hong Kong threw a spanner in the works. I found my skin was dry and I had more pimples and blackheads around my nose, chin and forehead than ever before. My skin was classified as ‘extremely dry’ by facailists and beauty counter sales staff. 

I was using regular clay masks and drying out powders and liquids to irradiate my imperfections. However my skin remained in the same cycle of dry with imperfections. The products I was using were well above my budget and although felt great on at the time, did little to nothing to return my skin to my former state. I didn’t understand, I was dry out each of the blemishes- how did they keep on forming?

It was about this time that I stumbled on a blog proclaiming coconut oil to be the best thing ever invented. Skeptical about whether this was applicable to my blemished skin I read on. Unfortunately for me at the time, the blog I was reading incorporated the blogger’s vegan eating habitats, meditation rituals and animal cruelty free skincare thoughts so I soon forgot about the blog and clicked back.

It must have been a month later when one of the beauty bloggers I follow on Instagram posted about how she carries coconut oil on the plane and it really helps with the dry skin most people experience with travel. I guess because I had read her previous posts and found her somewhat relatable to my busy, corporate life I decided to buy my first raw, vegan coconut oil from this little beauty store in Hong Kong.

Using it as other blogs suggested, I tried to take off my daily make up with the coconut oil. Failure. Although it appeared to remove the make-up, I was left with an extremely slimy residue of coconut oil which felt like a thick layer on my face blocking my skin from breathing. I reached for my normal chemical containing face cleanser and removed every last trace of coconut oil, stressing about whether this would enhance my already noticeable blemishes. The coconut oil went to the back of my shelf and wasn’t acknowledged for a couple of weeks.

My next attempt was as a hair mask. Again after receiving advice about how to grow my hair longer, I proceeded to heat the coconut oil in a boiling glass of water and apply to wet hair to marinate for 3 hours. After 2 weeks of this time consuming and activity limiting (I wasn’t game to leave the apartment whilst marinating) I found little to no changes in my hair shine, strength, anti-frizzy-ness or otherwise. Again, to the back of the shelf.

I’m happy to say I have now found a use for my coconut oil purchase. Hooray! On particularly dry skin days so yes about 3-4 days a week, I apply coconut oil directly to my face underneath my moisturiser. It works brilliantly and has assisted (note the word ‘assisted’) to reduce my blemishes and dryness. On weekends I sometimes just wear it on its own. The major changes have been to my cheeks which were particularly dry and aggravated. Considering the price and coconut oil and it's availability at supermarkets this will be a product I will be holding onto.