14 DAY TRIAL // You are what you eat, they say. According to the results of a new poll on over 8,000 women, you also look how you live your life, with an unhealthy lifestyle adding an average of 4 years to women’s actual age.
Smoking, drinking, fake tanning and not using protection in the sun are among the four most damaging things that add years to the face, it has emerged with this survey, as the Daily Mail reports.
Junk food is also very bad – and not just for the waistline. It all sums up to the modern lifestyle, the Mail says, which is making the average woman look about 4.25 years older than she actually is.
This goes hand in hand with an increasing obsession in looks: as if looking older than her years wasn’t enough, the modern woman also wastes over 2 days each year of her life worrying about how she’s ageing and studying her face in the mirror, the same survey has revealed.
As noted above, the survey was conducted on 8,000 women and the results were as follows: one in five don’t use moisturizer on a daily basis, 25 percent eat junk food at least twice a week and 40 percent don’t use sunscreen.
The average amount of alcohol and cigarettes consumed is respectively of 448 units and 894 cigarettes a year, the survey has also revealed.
In order to prevent premature ageing, Dr. Ravi Jain of the Riverbanks Clinic recommends not smoking and using sunscreen, but also drinking plenty of water and eating berries.
“Collagen production in our skin naturally slows as we age, with a loss of about a third of collagen normal by the age of 45 causing a reduction of facial volume and the appearance of wrinkles and folds,” Dr. Jain says for the Mail.
“However smoking, alcohol consumption, sun damage, poor diet and even a lack of exercise can accelerate collagen breakdown and cause us to age prematurely,” the specialist adds.