Your Shower Water Is Affecting Your Skin

There is a Clubhouse room promoting cold showers. If you enter that room, which runs seven days a week, there are plenty of people praising the effects of cold showers and the impact that it has had on their skin. There are people who take cold showers all year round. For some, showering in the cold, in the dead of winter is a no go, for others it is a must.

Whatever your forte, what affect does cold water have on your skin though? Is it better than a hot shower? Well, let's see what the science says and after that you decide.

How Cold Water Affects Your Skin:

Coldwater showers can be beneficial to your skin. The cold water tightens your pores, which restricts dirt, oil, and hair from entering. Tightened pores also lock in moisture which gives the skin shine when you leave the shower. Cold water also reduces inflammation of the muscles and the skin, like rashes and cuts.

The cons with taking a cold shower though is that taking a cold or colder shower isn't as effective for deep cleaning the skin with hot water. Cold water won't remove the dirt that has come onto your body, as it restricts dirt, but the point of showering is to eliminate dirt.

How Hot Water Affects Your Skin

Hot showers are the thing for most of us. There is nothing like a hot shower to help wake you up first thing in the morning or help put you to bed after a long day. That hot shower feels so relaxing. Imagine for a minute: Standing in your shower naked with the hot water running down your back and you just take a deep breath and then let it go. That feeling combined with the steam is bar none to anything else. As for what that relaxing and releasing hot shower does to your skin, well that hot water opens up your pores. When your pores are open, it's easier to remove blemish-causing dirt and oil buried deep within.

Just like cold showers, there are draw backs to hot showers. They can be problematic for your skin. When your pores are left open to long --say, for a scalding hot, 20-minute shower, you are more prone to ingrown hairs, dry skin, and more dirt and oil clogging your pores once you're out of the shower. Pores left open to long makes your skin appears dry and ashy when you don't moisturize immediately after your shower. Cutting your shower time down by even five minutes makes such a difference to your skin.

Is One Better Than the Other?

I don't think so. I think they both have their benefits. I think that you should do both when you are showering. To ensure your body is actually clean, wash in hot water and then rinse in cold water. Hot as hot as you can bare it and cold as cold as you can bare it. Using both allows your pores to open up enough to get the dirt off and oil out and rinsing in cold water helps to tighten and moisturize your skin once all the dirt and grime is off. One is not better than the other, both are great.

Do what pleases you just as long as you're washing. Don't be like the celebrities who barely wash themselves or their children. Be clean. Clean is cool. Clean is sexy. Clean is fun. Clean is good for your skin.